“The MacRae sisters tell me you were the first one to spot the creature?” He sounded like he’d jumped straight out of the BBC Radio the boys had sent their father from Edinburgh.

People think OCD is hand washing and checking, counting and rubbing. That it’s all about cute quirks and endearing eccentricities. The compulsions. What bothered Helen most were the images.

The baby glared, the two half-moons of his mouth puckered indignantly. The midwife inhaled and forced herself to count. Five... four... Babies were adorable, she reminded herself. Three... Two... a deep breath.

Such messes my spouse left behind. Our finances in tricky tangles. Closets, drawers, cupboards sloppily stripped. All the good LPs: gone.

In Rena’s garden, beside the leaning fence, grew a tree as tall as the house was long. With silvery bark and pale, thin leaves, it sheltered summer flowers and watched them sleep through winter.