A blanket of heat stifled the air. All the windows were open but no relief. Soon the storm must break The fridge was working overtime. I took the brie out of the fridge ready to spread on crispbreads for my lunch.

The Brie cheese was the beginning, at least for me though for others it may have been different.

My stomach tightens as the smell of chalk and polish hits me. Why am I here? I should at home walking Kate, watching her chase the water fowl her pom-pom blowing in the wind.

Vicky Melvin had just finished her homework when the door bell rang. "It will be Yasmin for me," she shouted. her blue eyes peered anxiously round the living door. Sometimes she was needed to run errands or to look after young Becky, her baby sister.

The sky muffles the land like an army blanket. Stars and moon are hidden it will be a long night. The man's heels click on the cobbles as he gropes his way down the hill. He flicks on his torch. The faint slit of light picks out the white painted curb edge guiding him. It will suffice until he needs to cross over. Concentrating on the pavement his head makes impact with a street lamp and he falls unconscious.

"I take it you were expecting me."

Doctor Peter Triar felt as if he had been cast overboard without a life belt. Had he expected to be faced with the indomitable woman before him it was doubtful whether he would have entered the surgery that day.

Janet took deep breaths to try to settle the fluttering in her chest. It didn’t work and her stomach churned as she walked down the long corridor with its smell of dust, disinfectant and polish. The first day of a new term and a class she only knew by reputation.

I realised that as I studied the birth certificates. It was fate, inexorable, unchangeable. But for Father I might have had only occasional lapses, followed the pattern of the maternal line.

Mother was the seventh child of a long line of seventh children. That in itself was ominous enough but worse was to come.

The women sat knitting or mending stockings with fine hooks. Jeanette left the other children to watch fascinated

Mrs. Tribble stood pensively for a moment before the gas stove, then turned to the living room to add matches to the shopping list that sat on the sideboard under the one eared china dog, she put on her striped woolly hat and threadbare coat, took the key from the hook on the wall and left the house.

"It’s a lovely day," John my ever patient husband said peering round the dining room door. "Couldn't you leave it and come to the park with us?"

"The only way to get rid of temptation is to yield to it." Oscar Wilde said. I am sure he was right. Take Dave and me. I fancied him from the word go. He was 6'2, blonde with a crew 4 hair cut, a perfect foil for my 5'4 and long dark hair. He was all man, firm pecs a tight bottom and footballer's knees. The latter because he played every weekend for his home team which didn't give me much of a look in - until last weekend.

"Is any thing wrong?" Dora Marchant asked her friend who had sat through the Community Meeting with a glazed look in her eyes and a worried frown on her forehead.

"Morning", Caroline cheerfully greeted her colleague as she entered the office of Frith & Jones.

"I suppose", Katrin answered without raising her eyes from her P.C. "At least it has stopped raining." The heavy downpours of the holiday weekend had soured her outlook.

The rhythmic thumping has always been there - familiar and strangely comforting. My space is diminishing. I stretch out and touch the walls. How long have I been here?

'I don't want to meet him.'

Laugh, I could have died when I overheard this woman on the bus. She said some woman had rung her husband only it was his elder brother she wanted.

"Granddad?"

The old man stirred in his armchair. He had been almost asleep. He opened his rheumy eyes to focus on the tot at his feet. The child had his head bent over a picture book

"Yes Sonny?"

The boy was named John after his father. To avoid confusion he was called Sonny.

"Have you ever seen an Angel?"

I could see something was troubling Sandy, my daughter, when she paid an unexpected visit on her day off from work. She would be going on holiday in a few days time and I felt sure she should be sorting her clothes for packing, cancelling milk, papers etcetera.