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I’m sitting in my office shed looking through the open door into the garden. It’s warm and sunny – the first spring-like day of spring.

Across the lawn I see my wife open the kitchen door and place the tortoise on the back step. Later it will be cold and he will have to come in, and I will not be able to find him. I make a mental note to start the search before dark. On my way to the kitchen an hour later, I notice he’s already disappeared.

That evening I’m celebrating the end of a long week by sitting on the sofa, a beer in my hand, dead tired.

My wife is watching the show that’s always on before the news, in which a middle-aged British couple, after viewing several modestly priced flats in a Mediterranean resort town, decide they don’t like any of them. Or, alternatively, they put in a derisory offer on one, which is instantly accepted, before a voiceover informs viewers that in the end they decided not to buy after all. I have watched the second half of many episodes of this programme, and those are the only two outcomes.

“Lovely balcony,” I say.

“You don’t have to be here,” my wife says, because she believes I disapprove of this show, because that is what I want her to believe.

“I know, but I can’t move,” I say.

The programme has reached its climax – the middle-aged British couple are sitting at a table with a local estate agent; each has a glass of orange juice in front of them. For reasons that I believe may have something to do with continuity, they never touch the orange juice.

“Stop going on about the orange juice,” my wife says.

“Maybe it’s not even juice,” I say. “Maybe, for the sake of consistency, they use antifreeze.”

The dog comes into the room with a ball in its mouth. After taking a turn around the table, it sits in front of me, looking up expectantly.

“I don’t want your ball,” I say, “and you can’t make me want it.”

The dog places the ball gingerly on the sofa next to me, and then rests a heavy paw on my knee.

“Fine,” I say, picking up the ball and flinging it away. The dog nearly does a back flip trying to follow the ball’s arc in the air, before chasing it under a chair on the opposite side of the room.

“Don’t encourage her,” my wife says.The middle-aged couple have decided to make an offer for property number two – the one near the town centre. The estate agent rings the seller’s estate agent, and then they all sit smiling for a few seconds, trying not to look at their still full glasses.

“What’s for supper?” my wife says.

“I don’t know,” I say. “I’ll think about it in a minute.”

The couple’s offer is accepted. They raise their antifreeze in a toast to success. The dog returns, climbing up on the sofa and sitting very close to me, ball in mouth, nose nearly touching my ear.

“Leave me alone,” I say. “I’m gripped by this.”

“I told you,” my wife says.

The dog leans forward gently and drops the ball into my beer.

“What? No!” I say.

“Ha!” my wife says.

“Ugh!” I say.

“Sorry,” my wife says. “I can see that’s not funny from your viewpoint.”

I try to remove the ball, but it’s wedged a third of the way down the glass and hard to grab hold of. Finally I manage to pull it free. I hold the ball up for the dog.

“There you are,” I say. “Mission accomplished.” The dog sniffs the beer-soaked ball, and turns its head away.

“Oh, you’re disgusted, are you?” I say.

“After some reflection, Hope and Andrew decided not to pursue the property,” says the television, “but they’re continuing their search and we wish them the very best.”

“Something off-putting about a tennis ball that’s been in my beer?” I say. “Well, guess what?”

The dog leaves the area. The news begins – it’s not good. I sit, still holding my ball-tainted beer, thinking that it might as well be antifreeze. After a few minutes my wife leans towards me.

“I’m hungry,” she says.

“OK,” I say. I go into the kitchen with a view to figuring out what to make from what we have, but in the end I pour myself a new beer in a new glass and sit with it. Oh well, I think – another week over. Then I look out the window into the darkening garden and think: the tortoise.