Beth can’t bring herself to say she’s in a shelter. ‘With a friend.’

‘You don’t have any friends in Brighton.’ Greg sounds like a man who hasn’t slept, hasn’t lived, since the night she bundled Lenny into his coat and fled.

‘It’s complicated.’

‘No, it isn’t, Beth. It really isn’t. You took my son away from me.’

‘He’s my son too.’ Her voice is cracked and thin, a car skating on black ice.

‘You don’t deserve him.’

‘I know.’ Tears run freely down her face. They burn like acid, hurt more than a kettle or a cigarette ever could. Tess is in the doorway and she’s seeing everything come undone. That burns too.

She grabs the phone from Beth and barks the shelter’s postcode into it. Then she hangs up and turns to Beth, who has crumpled to the floor.

‘Get up.’

‘I can’t.’

‘You can, Beth, and you will. Women who have actually been battered get themselves up, so you can too. Your husband got up, didn’t he?’ The words land on Beth, like a slap, and she forces herself to her feet.

‘You’ll stay here until he arrives. I want to make sure you don’t run off again. I’ll get Lenny from school if need be.’

Beth just nods. The reins have been taken from her and it’s almost a relief. Now she’ll be told what to do and where to go. Now she won’t be left alone with herself. She wants to cling to Tess’s skirt and thank her. She’s grateful, at last.

George

(Small china dog)

GEORGE FINDS THE LETTER when he gets home from the allotment. It’s tied to a small china dog. The writing isn’t Ellen’s. George is so disappointed he has to sit down.

This handwriting is scratchy. It looks like a pigeon walked over the paper with a gammy leg. He can make out his name and then inside, after a bit of study with the magnifying-glass, the words appear.