“It’s all right for you; you’re not meeting a brother you didn’t know you had. And I’ll tell you this - I’ve got a bad feeling about him already.

Corporal Earnest Goodheart is crouched in a ditch on the edge of an orchard between Dunkirk and De Panne. It’s 28th May 1940, just a day into the evacuations.

“I got a call this morning. My dad…” And Martin had explained the situation, as best he could. He wanted to see his father one last time. He wanted Joel to see his grandfather.

‘Sofia, let me in, I didn’t mean nothing,’ shouted Charlie as he banged his fists on the door. ’It won’t happen again, I promise. You can come out now, darling.’

Looking round he saw an old woman dragging a bucket across the floor and holding a mop. When she realised that his eyes were upon her, she said in a throaty voice, ‘Oh, don’t mind me, dear. You carry on.’

Most of our problems involve Grandma Grace, or rather her ashes. “It’s a public health violation,” Mom loves to snap at Dad. “We can’t have your dead mother on a shelf next to the food.

Ambling along the paths of his childhood apartment complex, Will told me stories from before we met.

A dark figure was struggling with the gate latch. It turned and, a moment before their eyes met, Rory recognised his father.

A final chink of light disappears behind me. The five steps up a narrow staircase lead me to a tiny, sacred space where showbiz magic is made.

While I was indulging in the ritual hand blowing that characterised my Christmas travels around the graveyard, I noticed a man who was by a grave which was two rows forward and three plots along from where I was.

By the time I was old enough to watch my first Michael Myers movie, Halloween III, I already knew firsthand that infamous Haddonfield, Illinois, was not the only place where nightmares come true for ordinary kids!

If I can just keep walking, I can burn off some of this nervous energy. I need to walk until I’m exhausted, until I can convince myself that this rapid, stuttering heartbeat of mine is the result of exercise.

Red’s Place was the starting point for what would arguably become the most (in)famous story in the history of Semmes County.

Critical. Critical. Critical. She was shrieking the word. And his name.

Sandra performed her little charade in front of the mirror and morphed into the Gisela character on a whim. She had a small tickle of flirtatious laughter down pat.