‘I’m not asking for pity. I’m trying to tell you why I was scared. Scared of being physically hurt, yes – of dying, like her. But mostly I was scared that if something did happen to me, you’d look at the child, the baby you’d wanted so badly, with the same eyes my father used on me.’

‘I wanted a family so badly—’

‘Oh, Ernie. I know.’

‘—maybe I forgot I already had one.’ I sighed. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘I’m apologising to you, you prick.’ She gave a choked laugh. ‘I’m sorry I lied to you. I didn’t want to be the one who couldn’t give you what you wanted.’

‘I would have loved you just the same.’ I still did, but I didn’t say that. It was too painful, even with the oxycodone, to confess. Maybe I should have said something. Maybe that’s part of the reason I’m writing this all down. A book is a physical object, remember. It is written to be read.

After a pause, her voice floated down again. ‘Do you want to come up the ladder?’

I knew she was only hunting intimacy as a reaction to Michael’s death. I knew it would be false and hollow, and would only make everything hurt afresh tomorrow. I knew all of this, but still I lay there, unsure how to answer her.

‘More than anything,’ I said at last. ‘But I don’t think I will.’

CHAPTER 32

I dreamt of my wedding day, though it was more of a memory than a dream. Michael was leaning on the lectern like it was the only thing keeping him upright, slurring his words as he tried to get his third rule of best man speeches out, the guests laughing along with his struggles. Even Audrey was smiling. He took a swig of his beer and held a finger up – wait a sec, I’ve got this – hiccupped, wiped his mouth with his sleeve, and tried once again to get his tongue to form the words ‘happy wife, happy life’. The room roared with laughter, and he grinned, believing he was earning those laughs through talent and not buffoonery. He hiccupped again. But this one sounded different, a little more like a . . . Another hiccup, but this was definitely more of a gag, and then he was clutching at his throat, eyes bulging, as his hiccups turned into a full-blown choking. And the room kept on laughing, riotous, as black, bubbling tar seeped from his lips.

The morning was grey-skied, dim, the storm back with renewed fury. The snow had dumped so heavily that the door needed a shoulder charge to carve an opening. Outside, we were wet-shinned and shivering within thirty seconds. Flakes of swirling ice bit my skin like sand-flies. The cars remaining wore white toupees, and drifts sloped against the walls of the guesthouse like suspended waves.