It‘s a spring morning, and I’m getting dressed. I always keep the bedroom curtains closed, and today there’s a beam of sunlight coming through the gap. I pull a scarf from the drawer, and dust particles fly up, illuminated in the radiance. They swirl: red, green, and white; a miniature cosmos. It’s entrancing. I give the silk another shake, and more of the tiny fibres rise, hang, and slowly drift in the still air.

I am taken aback when the calm pattern changes, as if stirred up by invisible fingers.

I didn’t do this. It’s not natural. My heart beats faster, adrenaline pumps. Then it happens again; and again. It’s surely not possible. Children’s fingers playfully circling, making impish eddies, sweeping. Could it be?

Yes – at last my lost ones have found me. I picture their laughter: gappy smiles, bright innocent eyes. Playing along with them, I touch nothing tangible, there is no sound. We chase each other’s traces in the sunlit motes. Then, all too soon, a cloud passes outside and they are gone.

Come back. Please, I implore. Am I forgiven? I didn’t know the secret police would take you too. In limbo, I wait for the sun.