‘Hi,’ I say, as best I can, without moving my lips.

Elaine gets a surprise. She was obviously talking to herself.

‘How are you feeling?’ she asks, sitting up, or making a movement something like that.

‘Crabpp.’ My lips are like blubber. ‘Did I try to kill myself?’ I am not embarrassed about this likelihood. Unlike suicide failures I’ve read about, I don’t seem to be disappointed that I am alive. Despite the pain and the general blur, I am glad to still exist. Who knew?

‘No. Someone hit you over the head. I found you. Ian and Mandy helped me.’

Maybe I remember that — being hit — but maybe not. I look around the room. There are other beds and other people. We have a curtain that is pulled part of the way around us. There is a small table sort of thing next to me, and not much else. Hospital. Then I think about the ash and the hiding tree. I remember having returned from the hiding tree, so my attacker probably didn’t find the boxes. I fall back asleep.

When I wake again, Elaine is still there, head bowed, her phone taking her attention.

‘Hi,’ I say again, and she looks up and smiles.

Elaine is examining me closely, so I must look pretty odd. Nothing new there. I feel a bit like I did when we were kissing: out of body. The pain brings me back. I could throw up, but I don’t. At least the blurriness is lifting. I can see Elaine’s beautiful face lined by concern. Hopefully, the concern is for me. A random question presents itself, and, as is my current habit, I ask it.

‘You said Tito had a contract. What was the contract?’ This obviously comes out jumbled, because Elaine just says, ‘Ah, sorry?’

I say it again, and this time it is her turn to get it on the second round. ‘My husband was being blackmailed.’

‘I know. You said that.’

‘He had a gambling problem. It got out of hand. I paid his debt with my own money, and we moved. I thought we had beaten it, and I think for a while we had. Then I found out Tito had been punting on the side and he’d racked up a debt with the same criminals. They said he could pay it off by making pottery for them.’

My head is suddenly fuzzy again. Underworld crime bosses demanding clay coil pots? I guess she sees my confusion, because she shrugs and says, ‘He was just really good at what he did.’