‘Oh darling.’

‘But then the girl … Martha … she was Martha.’ His voice catches. ‘She … died of a heroin overdose.’

‘Oh God.’

‘It was so … ugh, you have no idea seeing someone hooked on that shit. When we met, I said I’d help her stop and she really tried.’ Maddy can tell he’s in real pain. ‘She must have done some in the night when I was asleep. She was in the next sleeping bag next to me. When I woke up she was blue.’

‘Oh my God. What did you do?’

‘Scully, who was in charge of the squat, refused to call the police or the ambulance. We put her body in the little park by the church where we knew the community officers would find her. I felt wretched. I should have gone to the police, but I was so ill and I wasn’t thinking straight and Scully threatened me.’

‘Oh, darling.’

‘I couldn’t sleep for a week. I needed for her not to have died in vain, you know? I knew the only thing I could do about it was to stop using drugs altogether. To turn things around. I decided then and there to stop everything, but it was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. It made me so sick. I didn’t go outside for weeks. Months maybe.’

No wonder she couldn’t find him, Maddy thinks. She sees the despair in his face and she longs to hold him.

‘It just got worse and worse. I’d been clean, you see. Off the hard stuff. Then …’ He squeezes his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. ‘Then, well, some bad shit went down.’

‘What kind of bad shit?’

He shakes his head. He’s not ready to tell her. She can see that, but his eyes are full of fear and shame and they meet hers. ‘I got hold of some vodka and prescription pills and I was so cross with myself for cracking and so scared.’

Maddy feels a tear falling down her face. Her gorgeous boy. In despair. It breaks her heart.

‘I don’t even think I consciously planned to go to the pier. But I was there, with Martha’s phone.’

‘Thank God you called the Samaritans,’ she says.

‘It happened to be the last number on her phone. The last number she’d rung.’

‘And you got Dominica,’ she manages. ‘That feels like fate. It really does.’

‘She was nice. Calm, you know. I don’t really know what I was doing up there, or what I intended. There was no plan, but if I’m honest, I …’ He pauses and Maddy waits. ‘I just couldn’t see a way out.’

‘Oh, darling. I’m so sorry you got to that point.’

‘I’m the sorry one. I’ve let you down. I know that.’

‘You haven’t let me down. Christ! I’m the one who should be apologising. I’ve pushed you all your life. I’ve piled on the pressure for you to be a perfect son, so that I could boast to my friends about it. I see that now. And if I could go back, I would. I’d do it all differently, Jamie. I would, I really would. I’d be a better mum, a better wife, a better person. I’d stop being such a … well, such a stupid, vain idiot wanting everyone’s approval at the expense of everything else.’