The dishwasher gave a little growl and a grunt, and then beeped three times.

She’d had to run it again. Last time the dishes had come out all dirty.

“Oh no, they’re all dirty!” she’d said. And then she’d started to turn her head to see his response but had stopped herself as she’d remembered that she was alone. It would have come across as a sort of a strange twitch had anyone been there to look. And she’d sighed and slowly pulled out a plate and had angled it about in the light to see the extent of the muck, and then had pulled out a bowl that had turned itself the right way up and had filled with sad grey water, which she had poured slowly into the sink saying, “Oh…” with a wrinkled nose. And she had rifled through the cutlery as if looking for some mischevious spirit to blame. But there had been none, so she’d reached past the knives and forks and spoons and removed the filter and bashed it on the side of the bin and filled up the salt and set it running again.

And now it was 11:39pm and the dishwasher had gone vrrrrrpkhhhts and then beeped three times. And she couldn’t face getting up to check if the dirt was gone.