The world, with all its sights, sounds and people, was getting further and further away. And what scared her the most about it – this process of becoming invisible – was how strangely comfortable it felt; how familiar and unthreatening.

Kate

Kate Miller felt, every day, like she was fading out and away. Echoing around, getting fainter and fainter. The world, with all its sights, sounds and people, was getting further and further away. And what scared her the most about it – this process of becoming invisible – was how strangely comfortable it felt; how familiar and unthreatening. It was like life was being lived on the surface of a pond, and she was sinking towards the dark, silty bottom. People said, didn’t they, that drowning was soothing, almost peaceful: how ridiculous that was, when surely you should be fighting for breath, terrified, panicking. Apparently not – you read about some sort of surrender, some sense of peace, and almost hallucinatory happiness. And this was the same. Kate knew she should fight this feeling, this sapping apathy. But something about it, she realized sadly, suited her

There were days when she didn’t leave the house. Her home, this place – it was safe and it didn’t challenge her. She knew every inch – everything in it. She slept poorly at night, but often drifted off as dawn broke and slept until ten. Waking so late, it felt as though the day had started without her and the energy to catch up sometimes – often – deserted her. She’d lost weight, though she had been slim enough before. The loss didn’t suit her, but cooking for one held no appeal, whatever Delia Smith might have to say on the subject, and anyway, she didn’t look at her shape much – she dressed without mirrors, and without variety. Most days the phone didn’t ring, and she didn’t dial.

It seemed to Kate, when she thought about it, and she thought about almost nothing else these days, that in her sixty-plus years of life, she’d been two distinct and very different people. There was the woman she had been, had allowed herself to be, for most of her adult life, and that woman lived her life in quiet black and white; and there was woman she had been for the last ten or fifteen years, before she lost him, who had basked in glorious Technicolor for all of that time. How quickly she had gone back to black and white. How weak she must be. And how she hated herself for it.