By the time I was dressed it was still only 7.20, too early for what I had planned, so I sat on the bed and scrolled through my Facebook feed on the mobile. Four new notifications. A colleague’s birthday, and a belated comment in response to the picture of William I had posted last Friday. At least someone hadn’t noticed I was now a pariah. The third notification was to let me know another of Ben’s friends was now my friend, on Facebook at least: Hardeep Sangha accepted your friend request.

I’d sent the request earlier in the week, along with a dozen or so others. Hardeep seemed to be a friend of Ben’s from Manchester, and I scrolled quickly through his posts from the last week to see if they’d had any interaction.

My last notification was the most interesting.

It was a response on Messenger from Mark Ruddington, one of Mel’s friends on Facebook who’d accepted my friend request a couple of days ago. I had asked him to get in touch with me after seeing the post about their schooldays together. And now he had.

Hey there Joe, nice to *meet* you. Yes can give you a call – what do you want to talk about?

I typed another message:

We’re having a party for our 10th wedding anniversary and I’m gathering stories from her schooldays. I didn’t know her back then so thought you might be able to fill me in.

He replied almost straight away.

No probs. School run now but can call you a bit later this morning?

An hour later I sat silently in the back of a taxi, watching street after street of terraced houses slide by, working-class neighbourhoods clustered near to the docks. The air was cold under a sharp blue sky, people walking to work, standing at bus stops smoking or staring at their phones, teenagers slouching to school. Lines of cars bunching up in the morning rush hour.

My mobile rang in my hand, Mel mob on the display.

‘Joe, are you OK? Where are you?’

It occurred to me that these two questions always went hand in hand when she tried to reach me.

‘I’m all right,’ I said quietly. ‘How are you and Wills doing?’

‘We’re worried about you. Both of us. William keeps asking what’s happening, and why you weren’t here this morning to take him to school.’

‘What did you say to him?’

‘That you were visiting a friend.’

It wasn’t even a lie. Despite everything, I almost laughed.

‘Yeah. A friend.’

‘What did he say?’

‘Who?’

‘Ben. Did he say where he’s been the last few days?’

‘I didn’t quite get the chance to talk to him.’

‘Oh,’ she said, trying hard to keep the disappointment out of her voice. ‘That’s a shame. But you saw him?’