‘What’s going on? What are the boxes for . . .? Are you really going?’

He took my cold, greasy hand in his. I wanted to cry. It was the kindest he’d been to me for some time.

‘Constance . . . are . . . are you a member of Fight Club?’

I pulled away from him.

‘Sorry . . . I know . . . I know . . . The first rule is you can’t talk about it, but—’

‘Are you really moving out?’

He looked down and rubbed his nose with his finger, spoke to the floor. ‘I . . . It’s for the best.’

‘It’s not. It’s not for the best . . . I don’t want you to.’ I couldn’t look at him.

‘Jesus, Constance . . . you’ve left me no choice.’

My eyes fixed on the hinge of the door, but I could see he’d stopped leaning. He was drifting backwards into the room. My words barely formed a whisper. ‘Please, Dale. Don’t leave.’

The interlocking metal of the hinge twisted as the door shut.

I removed her dress. Put it with the red one in the dirty linen basket. Naked, I was at least free of the physical connections to the evening.

In the shower, I stood under the scalding water, watching the grey liquid fall at my feet. Scrubbed shampoo so hard into my scalp that red appeared under my nails. Knowing I’d never be clean enough.

Back in my room, I dried myself off apart from my hair and threw myself into bed. Pulled the duvet over my head, burying myself in a safer world. Terrified at the possibility of police visiting soon. Squeezing Blusha and kissing the hole where her eye had once been. Until, thankfully, my brain cut off and I fell asleep.

The scream of metal on metal like a rusty machine grinding to a halt.

It was outside our house on the estate. They were all out. Those people who’d avoided me. Cath and Ian next door, George from number six, the Patels.

She was wearing the black dress. Her arms slung around a lanky, moustachioed man, whispering hollow honey into her ear. They gathered and watched. I used the small knife. Scratched and scratched and scratched the white car. She giggled as the man’s hand disappeared under her dress. I stepped back to view what I’d done. They all applauded me. Until the claps slowed to silence as red paint dripped from the marks.

I woke, breathless. My room pitch-black. Hair still wet from perspiration as well as the shower. I wiped my hands across my belly to remove some of the sweat, then switched on the lamp, which I didn’t think I’d turned off. The bulb had blown.

The erasure I’d tried to achieve with sleep hadn’t worked. It was all still there. Pounding my mind. What I’d done. What you’d done. What Dale was about to do.