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She stood there with her hands shoved in her pockets, resisting the urge to kick Rob’s doorstep.

She wasn’t entirely sure what she was doing there.

Chipping pockmarks in Simon’s wall hadn’t helped.

On the one hand, it was ridiculous and somehow she’d have to fix it, and on the other, the fact that Emmeline might have done it the other day made her feel somehow violated.

Either way, it meant that not only was she a miserable person and a second-rate musician who had no soul to connect with, but she couldn’t even keep weirdos out of her own house or re-decorate with any kind of skill.

She kicked the step and turned to go just as Rob opened the door.

‘Sorry, I was in the studio and didn’t hear you. Come on in. Thought you might bring the cello.’

Rose shrugged. ‘I’ll bring it to the rehearsal tomorrow. Not in the mood now.’

Rob led her through to the kitchen and made her some coffee. ‘Want to talk?’

‘I don’t know. Did you say you had something to show me?’

‘Yes.’ Rob opened his laptop. ‘Took me a while to find it, but here’s a photograph of something I found in the sitting room just after Saoirse died. I’ll show you where, come and have a look.’

In the sitting room, just by the door was a small lumpy piece of wall where it looks as if someone had used a chisel and then filled badly.

It hadn’t been repainted and was a small patch of grey in the vibrant blue.

The symbols in the photograph looked so similar to the ones on Simon’s wall that Rose shivered.

They had been written in teal coloured ink and were barely visible.

‘If just one thing made sense…’ she said.

‘I don’t know what they are either,’ said Rob. ‘I thought it was a curse. But I don’t understand why anyone would want to curse Saoirse. Can you think of a reason they’d want to curse Simon? ’

‘I can think of several, but then I’m his sister,’ said Rose, staring intently at the two sets of images.

‘Seriously.’

Rose took a breath, then noticed something and pointed. ‘That there,’ she said. ‘I think it’s an eye. What do you think? Perhaps it’s not a curse but a spying symbol. A bit like a hidden camera.’

‘That’s ridiculous.’

‘More ridiculous than a curse?’

‘Why would they spy on Saoirse? Or Simon?’

Rose sat back and fiddled with her coffee. ‘Was there anything, er, different, special about Saoirse?’

Rob opened his mouth and shut it again. ‘She was Irish. I mean, she was an outsider.’

‘I mean, anything unusual, apart from being an incomer?’

Rob looked round at the blue walls, then said, ‘She liked swimming in the loch, in the sea, even in winter. It was a family thing. I used to worry about the baby, but she said her mother and her grandmother had done the same and they’d be fine.’

He went silent. Rose hated swimming in anything cooler than a bath.

‘Makes me think of selkies,’ she said aloud.

‘What?’

‘Sorry, it was something Simon and I were arguing about before he went back to the city.’

‘Did he tell you we met in town and had a drink on Thursday?’

‘Well, I gathered you’d brought him home because he was off early walking into town for the car. Was he OK? There was something up, but he wouldn’t tell me what. I can sort of guess, but I didn’t ask. Not that men talk about that sort of thing I suppose.’

‘Do women always talk about their feelings?’

Rose conceded, ‘It depends on the woman and who she’s talking to.’

‘Well, anyway, he seemed a bit wound up. Wasn’t very clear but he did ask about Saoirse, how I coped.’

‘Really? Simon? I hope he was tactful.’

Rob laughed. ‘He was direct. He said “I gather you lost your wife. How do you cope?”’

Rose pulled a face. ‘Oh I’m so sorry. He won’t have meant to be thoughtless.’

Rob smiled. ‘Don’t worry, direct can be good.

Depends on the person as you say. He wasn’t being nosey, it was a genuine question.

I got the impression he’d left a girlfriend in Denmark and was missing her.

And that he was hoping to see her again, but something had gone wrong: she’d told him she wasn’t coming after all or something. It was a bit vague.’

He tensed. ‘Can I ask something personal?’

‘Why not?’

‘Why do you and Simon…’

‘Still live in the same house?’

‘Not that it’s any of my business.’

‘I thought you might have heard on the grapevine,’ said Rose.

‘I bet you could find out if you asked. Our parents died when we were students. We didn’t have anyone else and we just reverted to moving back to the family home and living there.

It’s not as bad as it sounds, it was a big house.

’ Rose thought back to the airy rooms and space.

‘We took a floor each. To start with neither of us were home a lot. He was off with his wildlife and I was off with orchestras. Then he introduced me to David and my work dried up a bit. When we got married, David moved in with me and it just made sense to stay put, house prices being what they were. David and Simon were mostly off on their filming and … Anyway, I ended up being Simon’s PA when the last one resigned.

I was only one who could put up with him.

We were… that is David and I were thinking of moving out and starting…

but then David died and Simon got ill. I’m still all he’s got.

If I don’t care for him, he won’t care for himself. Someone has to. Turns out it’s me.’

‘And you’re furious.’

Rose snorted. ‘Well, you try it. No really, Simon lives in this world where everything will magically turn out all right, even when there is no evidence. He’s a talented scientist when it comes to wildlife, but not when it’s human life, his own life.

The evidence is missing but he’s still making the conclusion. ’

‘That’s not what’s biting you now, is it? So, if you can’t express how you feel in words, why not play some music?’

‘Because I’m not really that good. Maybe I was never that good. Maybe it’s because I’m too…’

‘Hurt?’

‘I was going to say “cold”.’

‘Did Simon tell you that? Isn’t that the sort of nasty snidey thing that siblings say? Why do you let it get to you?’

‘Because it’s true.’

‘Rose, I don’t know you at all, but cold is really not the vibe you give off.

Quite the reverse. I’m wondering where you’re hiding the blue touch paper in fact.

You said you’re the only one who’s around to care for Simon, but who’s caring for you?

Use your music. Play it. Play it in spite of everything, because of everything.

Don’t stop. You don’t need permission. It doesn’t need to be good all the time.

It’s like exercise, you have to stretch the muscles sometimes, get back into shape. ’

Rose grunted.

‘OK, tell you what, let me give you a drum lesson.’

‘You’re not a drummer, you’re a guitarist. Patrick’s the drummer.’

‘I am a man of many talents. Come on, put the coffee down and let me show you something new. Get some of that mood channelled somewhere else.’

In the evening, Rose closed the curtains and settled down.

She wandered back into Simon’s room and peered round.

The filler had nearly dried and she could sand it in a few hours.

Tomorrow, she’d put some undercoat on the walls and put everything back where it belonged.

She wondered if Simon would even notice the change.

Her earlier restlessness and anger had gone.

Even the sadness which always followed was different.

She visualised herself hammering on the drums and laughed.

She’d forgotten all the terminology already but the rhythm remained in her hands and she tapped it out on bookcases and doors as she passed through the house.

She peeked into the spare room with its clutter and quickly scanned the walls again.

There was nothing there, and the neglected boxes whimpered to be sorted, so she shut the door again.

Once the ceilidh was out of the way, she’d do her own room. The morning sun came in through the window and maybe a soft yellow or apricot would be good, but then those colours seemed unfeminine.

She thought of Saoirse’s sitting room with its blues and greens, cold colours people would say, but somehow it was warm, cosy, like a nest of grass or a pool of warm sea water.

She wouldn’t copy Saoirse. She liked reds really, but it might be a bit much in a bedroom.

Rose didn’t actually want it to look like a bordello, even if no one was ever in there but her.

Decorating really wasn’t her thing. Now the sitting room, that was simple. Neutral all the way .

Rose walked over to the mantlepiece and picked up the wedding photograph, stroking David’s face and blowing him a kiss.

‘I miss you,’ she said. ‘I wish you weren’t dead.’

She ran over her conversation with Simon. He had said, ‘I was going to get her back somehow and then persuade her to shift permanently, then I don’t know, marry her I guess and settle down… Look at all those legends; those selkie women who became women and married men.’

Poor Simon. A part-time wolf with half a hope for a part-time woman.

And clearly, it hadn’t gone well the other day when he went to the forest. Or at least, something had gone wrong.

She had just been too irritated to ask. She cast her mind back to the selkie legends.

What did they say? How did those seal women find a life weighted down by gravity on land, their two legs stomping along under their clothes, burdened by children and duties, instead of free in the ocean?

‘Maybe I’ve got the better deal,’ she said to David, putting the picture back on the mantlepiece but still tracing the frame with her finger. ‘How would you feel if…’

She petered off. How would I feel if… she thought, if after I was dead, someone else seemed attractive to you?

There’s no room in my heart for anyone but you, but all the same, I miss knowing someone is there for me, miss the little touches, the quick kisses.

. I miss that more than sex. I miss the intimacy.

If I were dead, would I want you to find someone else…

Even in her mind, she could not think of falling in love.

Her mind slid away from the thought of David in someone else’s arms, holding someone else’s hand.

And yet, Rob’s green eyes, that slow smile under the red-blond beard, the scent of him as he directed her hands over the drums. She smiled. It was impossible not to.