She woke up at eight thirty to sunlight.

Proper sunlight — not the grey early light of yesterday morning but actual autumn sun coming through the gap in the curtains and landing across the bed in a warm stripe. She lay in it for a moment and felt it on her face and felt the specific quality of a morning after a wedding which was different from a morning after anything else — something completed, something resolved, the air lighter.

His arm was around her.

She lay still and listened to him breathe and thought about the day ahead. Checkout at eleven. The drive back to London. Her flat, her...