For M
She is the mother of my husband’s late wife. They have remained close and she is a type of mother-in-law. She loves him and she likes me. She often talks about her brilliant, deceased, eldest daughter.
It is a muggy afternoon in Golder’s Green when I come to show her photos of the wedding. She is holding one of me, alone: bride, dress, flowers, shoes. She inspects the photograph, then me. Up at me, down at the photo, up, down again, back to me.
She sighs.
“It is so interesting, how some people just look so much better in photographs.”
!!!!