The Report Was Brilliant. It Was Also Two Days Late.

Dan was at the office at ten past six in the morning, which told Priya everything before he spoke.

The heating in the church hall the charity rents in Easton doesn’t come on until seven.

He had his coat on, three mugs beside him, and 4,000 words of the funder’s impact report on the screen – words that had not existed at 9pm the night before.

They were good words. They were better than Priya could have written. That was, in a way, the problem.

The report had been due on the Friday. It was now Tuesday. The National Lottery Community Fund had been emailed an apology on Priya’s letterhead, because she is the director and the apologies are hers.

Dan has ADHD, diagnosed at thirty-one, medicated since April, and an adjustments plan that Priya wrote herself with more care than she has ever given her own contract.

Flexible start times. Deadlines agreed rather than imposed. Big tasks broken into chunks with check-ins. No chasing him in front of other people. She believes in every line of it.

She also believes that the four-person team has raised £340,000 this year and that £62,000 of it depends on reports arriving when the funder says, not when the work is ready.

She said it carefully. She’d rehearsed it in the car.

“You keep telling me it isn’t about effort. And then you build every single thing around who can be on time.”