Day 20

Tonight I gave the girls a bath and put them in fresh pjs, and read to them out of Jip and Janneke. Halfway through the last one, my father came upstairs to say goodnight and, as usual, they managed to wrangle another bedtime story out of him, this time a fairy tale from one of Anna's birthday books. I said goodnight and blew kisses and went across the hall to my own bedroom, and collapsed on the bed. It's been a tiring couple of days and I'm fighting a nasty flu/cold/not sure what it is. But it's winning.

I could hear my father in the girls' room reading, still using funny voices for all the different characters, just like he would for me and my brothers, all those years ago. Mirthe and Anna were quiet and, I imagined, hanging on every word, just like we used to do.

I curled up on my bed and listened to the fairy tale unfold, and for a while it was so wonderful to be 5 years old again. To have my dad there with us, to hear that story at the end of a long long day. We're all going to miss them so!