Just after they got married, they moved to a wee village on the coast, into a little cottage which, as estate agents say, “needs a bit of work”. My friend spent a great deal of time (not to mention money) carrying out said work, and now he’s built a cosy little nest for himself and his brand-new family. I live quite far away, so I haven’t visited them as much as I’d like – but still, his house now bursts with colour and expectation. And the smell of fresh paint.

But his house is the second last on the block. Not five feet from his front door is another wee cottage which has its front door padlocked and a permament “For Sale” sign outside that seems to be there just to gather cobwebs rather than interest. The previous occupant – who was a bit of a loner, as the village stories go – died suddenly, without any next of kin to pass his meagre possessions on to. Apparently, in those stifled, stultified rooms, nothing has been touched – his old gramophone still sits in the corner, and the records he once listened to just lie there where he left them, gathering dust; discarded husks of lost attention.

What I’d like to see (and I know this is well-nigh impossible) is for someone to pump jelly (jello, if you’re American) through the letterbox. Lots of it. Enough to fill the entire house. But it would be neither raspberry nor strawberry flavour – instead, it would be impregnated with photographic developing fluid. Not much; just enough so that, over a period of years, the otherwise clear jelly would take on the colour of the light that reaches it. Because the house would be utterly dead if not for the daily changing slant of the light that floods into it. Areas of the house would be burned burning white as the sun shines in day in day out – other corners would be lent a red, bleary-eyed tinge as the fading twilight touches them for only a few minutes a day at particular times of year. Some shadowy corners might even turn black over time. Preserved in such aspic, even the smallest of ornaments (robbed of their sentimental value by the passing of their owner) would still cast tangible (and perhaps even edible) shadows behind them. The colour and shape of those shadows might give back to these otherwise insignificant objects something of the significance they once had for their original owner.

How you would view this, I don’t know. Peering in through the windows I don’t think you’d see the whole thing, but then again, in an almost imperceptible way you’d be adding your shadow to the work in progress. Might be quite fitting if it couldn’t be seen in its entirety. Or something.