In the entire nine-floor tenement, there is only one human heartbeat.

She puts the kettle on.

Walks through her hallway.

Painted ancient symbols adorn the floor and walls.

A black moon with a cross below it.

There are three protection sigils by the front door in red, blue and gold.

Aramaic incantations inscribed around the hallway – trail towards the bedroom.

Babylonian spells stand like sentries on either side of the bathroom door.

Hebrew talismans guard the Hoover cupboard.

There is a painting of Lilith in the hallway.

Dot looks at her every time she goes by.

Lilith was Adam’s first wife. She left him in the Garden of Eden to have an affair with the archangel Samael. Her husband followed her. He told her that if she did not come back to Eden, he would curse her for all of history, he would kill 400 babies in her name each day, and he would have her vilified in all religious texts and then written out of history entirely. She was unfazed. She did not go back. Lilith was rumoured to have a tribe of lilitu – female demons – and it was said that she could seduce any man or cause his death with mere thoughts. In Dot’s drawings of her, Lilith’s thighs are wide and strong. Legs taper down toward three-pronged talons, long and yellow. No shoes required or available for such a design. Her ears are lightly feathered and peaked. She has thick dark eyebrows. Two three-foot-tall owls (companions to travel every realm) stand on either side, blinking long and slow. If Lilith was sat at a bar, they’d rotate their heads all the way around – ensuring all but the truest of heart stay the fuck away.

An icon to aspire to.