I was still drunk as I rode the bus to work. Broken, numb. The vodka’s odorous molecules bounced back into my face when I breathed against the window.

I’d woken early, the sky barely lit, to the smell of TCP and the sound of snoring.

After sliding my arm around your waist, I’d opened my blurry eyes and watched your hair flutter as you exhaled. But it wasn’t you. It was Dale. And I had no idea why.

Crispy velour itched my neck as I shifted down the bus seat to snag some physical comfort, instantly ruined by a school lad bouncing into the space next to me, knocking my bandaged hand.

Feeling queasy, I closed my eyes and attempted to block out both the annoying rustling of the boy’s anorak and the loud banter with his mate behind. Their voices triggered fragments of the night before. The Castle. Drinkers. Raucous, laughing. Amy Winehouse, ‘Back to Black’. Searching for you. The barman’s startled eyes when he clocked me. Scanning myself in the lager pump’s reflection. Black mascara-stained sockets. Blood from my hand now smeared across my cheeks from wiping away tears. Your absence. I’ll wait a bit longer. Getting drunk. Not drunk, smashed. The desperate middle-aged perv in an Eighties leather jacket. ‘Why don’t I take you home?’

‘Why don’t you fuck off?’

You never showed. And considerably less intoxicated, remembering, I was nothing but thankful that you hadn’t.

But the point is, you lied, Samuel. You lied.

Aside from Harris, the light shining beneath his door, I was the first to arrive.

I headed straight to the toilet, splashed my face and used loo roll to remove the smeared remnants of funeral make-up from under my eyes. Combing my hair with my fingers, I vowed that from then on, I’d always carry a brush like a proper person.

I hung on to the sink through a moment of swimming nausea. This induced another memory fragment. Throwing up. On Dale. His horrified expression as the acidic potion splashed his jeans and new Converse. Being ordered to sit on the bed like a naughty girl. Hot black coffee. Him removing my shoes.

‘Now get undressed.’

His presence as I did. Tucking me in. Bathing my hand with TCP. It stung. He bandaged it. Slowly, carefully. Crying.

‘What’s wrong, Constance?’

My lies.

‘It was the funeral. It brought it all back.’

‘You’ve got me . . . You’ll always have me.’

Linda, disgruntled I’d beaten her into work, waxed lyrical about the ‘lovely send-off’. How the hotel was ‘grand without being ostentatious’. I nodded. Made the correct noises. But the whole time I was focusing over her shoulder, waiting for you.

‘It was only for us close friends and family anyway, really . . . so probably best you didn’t come . . . What’s wrong with your hand?’