Thanks, everyone. Lovely comments...you restore my faith in humanity
A special shout out for
@adamfarr - that was my favourite line too...thanks!
And to
@Skub...that’s the loveliest thing I could hope to have read...thank you!
Social services have declared them to be “at risk” because of their advancing years, and so want to know how they would cope “say something happened” - which is a delightfully English way of saying “when one of you dies”
The thought had, of course, previously occurred to them...and they are ready for it, as best you can ever be. They have a daughter who rarely visits them and also a son (whom they declined to mention and never discuss) who “wasn’t right” and lives in a home. They visit him when they can. “He knows us...he’d miss us if we didn’t go”
They concern themselves with trivia “more leaves coming down” and try not to reflect too much on the way so many things in life just didn’t quite work out for them...
It’s a lovely story. I find this kind of thing really sad but quite uplifting...if anything will save us as a species...it’s empathy.