The music faded and the gramophone’s needle scratched the inner vinyl waiting patiently to be lifted and placed in its cradle, its scratching annoyed the woman who sighed over by the French windows.

She leaned on her walker and stared out beyond the lawns at the dappled shade beneath the beech tree; the wind sighed with her and sent a flutter through the crispy autumn leaves.

A light breeze edged in past the sliding doors and tickled her calves, her nylon dress stretched over her hunched back exposing pale knees and wrinkled stockings as she moved to another place.

In her mind she leaned back, coquettishly, against another tree, a similar tree, and a man, clean-shaven and earnest, whispered in her ear his words wandering, even now, through her body and she exhaled noisily, her chest creaking and wheezy.

Her body, long past its best, gripped the plastic handles of her walking frame and her cardigan hung as loose as her sagging skin, but her mind, as bright as the proverbial button, lost itself amid an onslaught of memories…