Standing stone

The stone had stood in the corner of the high field forever. There was an English Heritage fact sheet about it and a steady trickle of visitors turned up at the farm looking for directions.

There was a family tradition of drinking toasts around the stone to mark important events - getting engaged to Jen, the birth of the twins, his father's funeral. The stone would be splashed with a little champagne and he would picture his grandfather or his grandsons standing at the same spot, celebrating the same sort of things.

And, now that the boys were both in London and Jen was, to all intents and purposes, gone, he would sometimes take a glass of cider at the stone. Just so as not to drink alone.