“Hello Darkness, my old friend,” I said as Sy took a chair opposite me, at the small café, beneath the warm Mediterranean sun.

“Hello Brightness,” she replied, smiling, as she sat down.

It was an old joke between us. We had first met during the French Revolution, in a crowd waiting to witness that day’s batch of guillotine beheadings. Gruesome, I know, but back then there was no Netflix.

Seeing me amongst the throng of spectators, she knew imme...