He was getting a little cross. Like a child, not being allowed out to play. They had a disagreement, he kept it polite, he promised, vowed that he would be fine. It would take him two hours and he would be back, she had his number, he had his phone, they were connected. He was, inside himself, so grateful and full of a soft emotion, that she cared.

She cared more than he did, he was just compulsed, on a railway line, stuck with a magnetic force that wouldn’t let him off, but that was starting to eat him from the inside. It didn’t like him being stuck, his psyche, it was giving him things that were breaking down his confidence, his control over his obsessive compulsion. He was being devoured. That way, maybe he could, without knowing it himself, be released. He was being split from the inside. And it was beginning to hurt.

He left anyway, with Lomita pleading the opposite, though with no bad feeling. He started the engine on his Discovery and couldn’t let go of the key. Three times he went through the process of turning it on and off, until it felt right.

Inside.

What was Mr Wong going to think?

The car was deposited at the rental company with the minimum of fuss, which involved a routine check for damage. He never understood this process, as he was fully insured. The check revealed nothing that he could be accused of, be hauled before the rental company and put on trial for unintentional, or was it wilful damage, to the vehicle. But the smell of vomit, lingering, caused a glance, disturbed, from the inspecting man.

What can you say about vomit?

‘A friend’s dog,’

Mumbled Ever, following the inspecting man round the car.

Had that helped?

It’s not damage – fact – an act of life, a natural event. An act of God. He always felt he was in the wrong.

Wherever.

Whatever.

He was on his cell, ordering a cab from the Beverly Hills Cab Company to take him to Chinatown; on completion of the call Clarissa’s name was illuminating the screen. The ringing barely had a chance to tone itself before he had pressed the button to accept, resisting, with an agony, the urge to cancel the call.

Had his dealing with the remote last night caused a problem? To Jacob?

He spurted.

‘Everything is all right isn’t it?’

It came out with such an urgency that it surprised Clarissa.

‘And with you?’

‘Yes fine.’

Was his reply. Not definitive.

‘Why are you still there? What are you doing?’

‘I’ll be back soon.’

He lied.

‘I want you to come back, it’s all shit. I’m an idiot, I’m sorry Ever. I don’t know what I want. Sorry, I’ve had a few drinks. Jacob’s good. He’s asleep.’

‘Does he ask after me?’

Weedy thought, Ever.