In November 2020, when Manni Coe received an unsettling text from his brother, Reuben, containing just five words: “brother. do. you. love. me.” he knew exactly what it meant.
Manni was at home in Andalusia where he runs an independent travel company, and Reuben, 39, who has Down’s syndrome, was living in a care home in Dorset, depressed and isolated in lockdown.
“He knows I love him so when I got the message, I knew it wasn’t a question,” Manni explains. “There wasn’t a question mark — Reuben doesn’t really use punctuation. It was coded and I interpreted it as, ‘If you love me, then show me the colour of your love.’
