There she is, lethal and irresistible, my high-kicking side-kick, and there goes that minx of a song, ‘Impossibly Beautiful’, and there is the sky so high and the light so bright and the sand warm velvet beneath the soles of my bare feet, and here comes the rush, an intense feeling of connection with all that is right and good in this world: my son’s sticky hand in mine as he stares at the sky, my dog trotting alongside, his black coat glinting in the sunlight.

‘Don’t look directly at the sun, sweetheart, it burns your eyes.’

‘But Yaya, you do it too.’

I bend to kiss him on the forehead, over and over as he laughs and pretend-wrestles me away. We look like everyone else as we skip down Sandymount Strand, dogs and kids, a mark of normality. No man, but then that’s not unusual these days. Tommy breaks free and he careens like a drunk – no, that won’t do, push that one away – runs unsteadily towards the surf, the frothy tongues of water that lick the sand. ‘Go, Herbie, go – mind Tommy!’ The dog bounds after him and the two of them frolic at the water’s edge and I feel wave after wave of delicious things, my body vibrating with them, fingertips electric, heat pulsing its way through me.