Has my tech guy moved to Africa to escape from me?

‘I can’t put it off any longer. She’s dying and I don’t think I can ignore the inevitable. We’ve got to let her go. I’m scared. Will you come? Please? I really need you.’ I sent the text and waited.

After a few minutes, the man I depend on more than any other texted back. Usually he drops everything and comes. This time, his reply would shatter my world.

We had been planning to go together to Currys, my tech guy and I, when the old Acer finally gave up the ghost.

But I had been dreading it so much I had nursed her along even when the keys started malfunctioning. Being a writer with a laptop with a T that doesn’t work is a challenge.

But I managed for a long time by banging the dodgy key repeatedly until a T popped out and when it finally refused to spit a T, even as I pounded it with extreme violence, I plugged an old-style chunky computer keyboard I dug out of the loft into the side of the laptop and sat at my desk with the two machines piled up in front of me, reaching over the big keyboard to press the mousepad on the laptop.

I continued in this vein, scared witless of impending change, until the overloaded memory seized and a good few minutes passed between pressing a key and getting a response.

Clearly, it was time. So I texted my tech guy, only to receive this heart-stopping response: ‘I’m moving to Africa.’

Oh dear lord, what have I done? The guilt swam over me. He had taken so much over the years. Many times it had occurred to me that it was surely too much for any man, no matter how clever.