The spare key had lived in the biscuit tin for so long that it had become less a key than a memory with a metal edge.

The spare key had lived in the biscuit tin for so long that it had become less a key than a memory with a metal edge. We had kept it there for years, along with the folded receipts and the old button that belonged to a coat now gone, and I had long since stopped expecting it to be useful. It was one of those household objects that seems to exist mainly to remind you of the life that came before the current one, and I had almost begun to feel that it belonged to the house rather than to us.

Then the lock on the back door began to stick. It made a flat, stubborn sound when I turned the knob, and at first I thought it was simply another small irritation in a long chain of them. But the next time I tried, it would not release at all. I found the tin in the cupboard and took out the key, and the metal was cold and slightly rough from years stored in the dark. It turned with a quiet, satisfying certainty, and the door opened as if it had been waiting for some form of recognition.

It was not a grand victory. There was no applause, no sudden change in fortune, and no one but me to celebrate it. Still, when I stood in the doorway with the late light on the tiles and the kettle already beginning to sing, I felt the odd, steady pleasure of something small and practical having gone right.