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cleaning the windows again with handfuls of brown paper. To let the light in, she always said. To let it fall.
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Annik pushed the glass away and yawned, tilting her head back from the candle.
    â€˜Aren’t you going to open it?’
    She stared at the parcel.
    â€˜It’s for me?’
    â€˜Of course.’
    Her delighted smile clouded suddenly with doubt.
    â€˜For me, for me, for me, for me!’
    She sang the words like rhyming couplets. Like a spell to ward off something. Which he knew it was. Serge went to the sink and ran the tap until the water was cold. He held a glass underneath then held the glass to his mouth and drank. He needed a proper drink.
    â€˜I’m going to the cellar.’
    Silence. The gleam of her pale skin, her face downcast. Serge went out of the kitchen and unlatched the cellar door. The cold air soothed his face at once. He switched on the light and went down the steps. He took a bottle of red wine from the rack and ran his finger over the label. Médoc. A decent wine he’d got from Fabier’s shop in the marketplace.
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Back in the kitchen, the oven hummed. Annik had still not opened the parcel. Nor had she prepared any food. Some days she did; others she simply forgot. You could never tell. Serge broke a piece from a baguette and cut a wedge of cheese. He poured black olives into a bowl and sliced some tomatoes which he sprinkled with fresh basil and olive oil. He pulled the cork from the bottle and placed it on the table next to Annik’s glass. He imagined racks full of bottles of red carnations, their petals pressed against dusty glass.
    â€˜Hungry?’
    Annik shook her head and then her lower lip trembled.
    â€˜Oh I haven’t...’
    She trailed off and Serge was behind her touching her neck with his fingers.
    â€˜It’s alright, I’m not hungry tonight. Anyway, you’ve made a cake. Remember?’
    He poured some wine for himself and sat down at the table opposite his wife. The bread tasted dry and bland. When he was a child they’d still used the communal oven in the village every year on Bastille Day and the rye loaves had tasted of wood smoke. His mother used to bring them home in a long basket and he and his sisters had been allowed to break off bits of the hot crust. Delicious. Serge took an olive and bit into the flesh, leaving the stone carefully on the side of his plate. Annik was watching him with her head tilted to one side. She began to sob, her tears glinting in the candlelight.
    Serge took a hasty gulp of the wine. He leant across the table and gathered Annik’s hand.
    â€˜Don’t cry, darling.’
    â€˜I can’t help it, Serge, I can’t.’
    â€˜I know, but they’ll love it.’
    â€˜Love it?’
    â€˜The cake.’
    She looked at him blankly, the tears suddenly stayed.
    â€˜The children, I mean.’
    Annik’s face cleared, she leaned back in the chair and sighed.
    â€˜They shan’t have it if they’ve been naughty!’
    â€˜Have they been naughty?’
    That old game again. Annik didn’t answer. She giggled then frowned, then leaned forwards with her elbows on the table.
    â€˜Sometimes they are; they’re so naughty!’
    Serge drank, watching the wine cover Annik’s face as it tilted in the glass. It burned in his belly, reminding him he was hungry. He took a slice of Cantal and balanced it on the bread. Cheese cost a fortune here, not like in the Auvergne. Things were still reasonable, there. That was city life for you.
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He remembered his father shaking his head when the letter came saying that he, Serge Durand, had been accepted into the Civil Service. He’d blown a sigh through the gap in his front teeth, propping his hayfork against the barn.
    â€˜City life, boy! That’s shit!’
    That’s all he’d said before spitting on the barn door and going in for his breakfast with the farm dog slinking