She leans against the bus window, tired in every bit of her body. The world is fast darkening as dusk becomes night, and the rain is still falling.
Peter and Edmund will be home from school tomorrow, and she runs through the checklist in her mind: make the beds, Hoover the rooms, and make sure Lucy really did get that spiderweb in the corner.
She knows the bus route as well as she knows her own face, and she looks up as it lurches to the third stop on her way home.
The church windows are shining, and, for a second, Susan considers getting off and stepping in to pray for a minute or two. But she is very tired, and there is so very much to do, and she is still on the bus when it pulls away from the stop.
The church lights are still shining behind her. She will come, but not yet. Not just yet.
