‘I have a whole load of stuff out there, Liberty. Some real heirlooms. I’m a bit of a collector. I buy so many instruments. Last month, I bought Gene Simmons’s Axe Punisher bass guitar.’

My eyes widen. ‘From Kiss?’

‘Yep.’

‘Wow.’

‘When you and your band record your single out there, you can play whatever instruments you want. Can I still say single? Or is it track now? Singles are from the good old days of record players.’

‘I have a record player,’ I say.

‘No.’ Michael leans back, eyes widening. ‘Really?’

‘And a cassette player. I’m interested in all sorts of sounds. Every medium has a different feel to it.’

‘Just you wait until you see my stuff,’ says Michael. ‘It’ll be like all your Christmases coming at once.’

‘Do you have a drum machine?’

‘Come now, young Liberty. Of course I have a drum machine. I have five different drum machines – one of which is a cool little number from the Eighties that Scruff took on tour with him.’

‘That’s … wow. Wow.’

‘What’s mine is yours,’ says Michael. ‘I mean that. You can use the studio whenever you like. When I was your age, the band and I put our pennies together to buy an hour in a crappy room with egg boxes and tin foil on the walls. A lot of arguments, trying to get the material right in the time. But it was the first step, you know? Getting the sound down. After that, we conquered the world.’ Michael’s eyes go all teary. ‘Like father, like daughter. Right? Have you ever been in a music studio before?’

‘Never,’ I say. ‘Mum would never let me. It’s like … my dream.’

‘Well, that’s me,’ says Michael. ‘The man who makes dreams come true.’

Once upon a time …

My pale, unhappy face bounced up and down in the gym mirror, cheeks hollow, lips blue-white.

Stay slim. Stay in shape. Stay young and beautiful if you want to be loved.

It was a regular habit now, running on a machine in Michael’s gym room, exercising amid boxes of tiles and stacked-up plasterboard. My skinny arms and legs flailed around. I was not, and never had been, a natural runner. I hated the running machine and I hated exercising inside like a lab rat, but I was determined to keep my figure for my man.

I used to be a feminist. What happened?

Suddenly, my legs flew out from under me and I caught myself on the digital running display, hitting the emergency stop. This was happening more and more lately – head rush and near fainting during exercise.