Louis found his father propped up in his chair in the day room where they hung the children’s paintings of farms and grandparents and siblings and cows and sheep and football pitches and choo-choo trains. Board games were stacked up on a table in the far corner, beside Get Well Soon and Thinking of You cards. A spray of illuvial bands draped lazily from a hook a little to the right of the TV, on a bracket high up on the wall. This story is included in the collection Second Chance & Other Stories, published October 2022. Read it below or listen here: