I remember how I did nothing, just stood by, watching, when she died. Even if they believe me, I’m guilty of that. They won’t take any account of the fact that I was afraid of what I could have done to him, if I had let go of myself. Whatever condition she might now be in from the delay – from the hours wastefully passing, while I was running – that was me. I caused it.

Another bang of metal brings me back to myself. The door swings open to present what must be the duty solicitor. She is slight, with dark auburn hair tied back in a high ponytail. She mutters something about an interview and although I haven’t fully absorbed what she is saying, I nod. She has bitten nails. Something about them, those nails, bleeds away any confidence I might have had in her. That and the faded suit.

‘I don’t want you!’ I say at her.

‘Sorry?’ she says. The northern vowels make her sound slow and even as I am thinking that, I know that it’s unfair. She looks at me again, confused.

‘I don’t want you,’ I repeat.

‘Sorry? What?’

‘I don’t want you. I don’t want you. I. DON’T. WANT. YOU!’

She stands back, a little shocked.

‘Fine,’ she says and bangs on the door until it is opened. ‘Good luck then,’ she says to me, not unkindly. Then as she is let out, she says to the officer, ‘He’s on his own.’

I stare at the door that has just closed. A scratched PIG on the blue paint makes me suddenly laugh.

Moments later, an officer opens the door and nods at me.

‘Interview,’ he says.

My heart starts beating again. I haven’t been able to distil the events into any order. What am I supposed to tell them, that I lay cringing in a corner? If I come clean about being there, what does that say about me? That I am a man who is not above breaking in and being somewhere uninvited? That I violated someone’s home and lurked in its dark corners? What kind of man will I become by admitting that?

What kind of man am I if I don’t admit that?

9

Wednesday