She goes back inside and plods upstairs with a pile of Chloe’s ironed clothes. In the child-size wardrobe she hangs Chloe’s favourite party dress and in the bottom drawer she tucks the paint-splattered jeans she wore to help Max paint her room. There’s the T-shirt she wouldn’t give away, even though it was too small and the jumper Maddy knitted for her. She’ll take them out and wash them all again next week.

Sitting on the bed, she folds back the pillow and smooths over the unicorn print pyjamas. She pictures Chloe bouncing into the room, arms open, launching herself at Maddy for a hug.

At the window, her hand brushes away the invisible layer of dust. It leaves a grey shadow on her skin. She opens the window and wipes the specks into the passing air.

As she leaves, a drawing of them on the wall above the bed comes unstuck. Daddy, Mummy, Emily and Me. When she presses the corner back, it immediately pops out again. She can hear Chloe’s giggle.

Downstairs, she puts a saucepan of hot water on the hob and wanders into the living room. The sleepless nights are catching up with her. Lying on the sofa, she switches on the television, but soon drifts into sleep. She dreams about chasing Max, trying to make him come home. Everywhere she goes a line of blood trails behind her from an umbilical cord. When she catches up with him his face has changed, it isn’t Max at all.

An hour later, she wakes to a faint nutty smell of burning. She staggers into the kitchen. The sleepy dogs plod after her. The empty pan hisses on the red cooker plate. The water has evaporated, and the bottom of the pan has burned. She can’t remember what she was heating water for. She switches the cooker off and drizzles cold water into the pan; it sizzles and turns cloudy. Max has told her so many times not to leave the kitchen while she’s cooking. Once, she gave everyone food poisoning from not cooking frozen chicken pies for long enough. Max was angry that he was too ill to go to work for the rest of the week. She’d joked that it was the longest time he’d spent at home in ages.