Tuesday, 7:40

The radio on Nadia's kitchen windowsill is older than her daughter. The dial is cracked, the aerial is held on with tape, and it only picks up one station, which comes in clearly about half the time. Everyone who visits offers to replace it. She always says no.

It is because of a Tuesday. 7:40 in the morning, nothing special. The toast had burned again and the window was open to let the smoke out. Her daughter, who was six, sat on the counter in one sock and asked whether the moon could see them in the daytime. And the radio, which usually played traffic reports and adverts for mattresses, played a song Nadia loved.

Up, not down

Most mornings she would have turned it down. There was a lunchbox to pack and a missing shoe to find. That morning she turned it up instead. Her daughter laughed and started dancing on the counter, badly, still in one sock, and Nadia let the toast burn a little more.

That morning she turned it up instead.

It lasted maybe three minutes. She does not remember what she answered about the moon. She remembers the song, the sock, the smoke drifting out the window, and thinking very clearly: this is a good one, keep this.

Why it stays

The radio is not really a radio anymore. It is the closest thing she has to a recording of that morning. When the station comes in and she hears the first few notes of anything, the kitchen goes back to being that kitchen for a second.

Her daughter is eleven now and thinks the radio is embarrassing. But last week, when that song came on in the car, she reached over and turned it up without saying a word. Nadia did not say anything either. She just let it play.