She goes to change. He stops her, tells her to change where she is. She pulls the dress over her head. She stands in her underwear, ribs moving uneasily with her breath, before trying to pull another on. The makeup artist chides her, holds the collar of the dress clear of her face. Rose stands, stretched high in heels, arms above her head, dress over her face. Then it falls over her. The makeup artist moves in to double check her work. Adjust some hair. She dabs a touch of foundation over the scar at Rose’s temple.

Rose goes back to her mark.

‘OK. Stand straight on, legs slightly apart. Straight on, like that. Symmetrical. Look at the camera.’

She does.

After the shoot, she walks down the street to the Tube station. She knows the Tube better now. She walks, holding her gaze ahead. Every time she meets someone’s eye it feels like they were staring and she’s caught them out. The studio makeup is gone, but the makeup artist put some more on, a light touch. She can feel it on her face. She can feel how it makes her look.

She wants this.

Sometimes she has to say it to herself. It’s true. She wants this. She’s better now than she was. She knows this gives her power.

They call her ‘stunning’. She likes that. It sounds like she can freeze men. Lock them. Hold them. And she sees it happening. She sees it in their eyes. It makes her feel strong and weak at the same time.

The street is lined with tall trees, broad and curling towards brown. Men pass her. She can see her knees, and below them her feet. She knows her cheeks are red, and she knows they can’t see that. She looks up and sees a leaf falling. Two.

In the woods with Aaron. In the leaves. He liked to play at being in a nest. Anything was turned into a nest. In their house, before they left, they slept in sleeping bags. She curled them round in rings, and then she lay in the middle, with Aaron.

‘Watch out!’

She pulls up sharply. The road roars with traffic. A hand is on her arm.

She smiles. He looks at her. She can see how he looks at her.

There are rules to this new life. Rose is gradually working them out. She’s stunning, but she has to follow the rules. Rules about makeup and rules about heels. Rules about following the rules.

This is hard, because no one quite says what the rules are.

They talk so differently here. Not the accent, which is like being on the TV, but the way they talk. They say ‘of course’ a lot. There are a lot of things that everyone except her knows. They know about people, names, places. They know about house prices.