“Why wait that long? My mother married on her eighteenth birthday.” And wouldn’t Annie look beautiful in a white dress, her face glowing with love just like this. His voice drops conspiratorially. “I was born six months later.” Less romantic was the fact that his father had been in his forties and had fourteen children already, but those facts could be overlooked.

His sweet Annie, he could hold her forever. He runs his hands over her lovely back, pliant where he’s only bony, then pauses, frowning.

“You’re cold.” Quickly he lets go of her to swirl his long coat off his own body and around her shoulders in one graceful swoop. On him the garment comes down to his ankles - on her it’s piddling onto the floor, but he doesn’t even wince at the muck, not when he can keep her warm.