They ask, ‘Was he okay?’

You say, ‘What do you mean by that?’

‘Well, you often find with these creative types that they need to go to some very dark places. You know, for inspiration? It can often mean they don’t feel great about themselves.’

You wonder why your husband has suddenly decided to join the conversation.

‘He loved all of that dark and broody stuff. Thought it was all part of the process. Made him feel like a writer, but it wasn’t real.’

You tell yourself that he’s trying to protect his son but also getting in his daily dig.

‘I apologise for being blunt but your son took his own life very recently, so I’m not sure how much of that writerly angst was posing for pictures that weren’t being taken. We’re trying to get to the bottom of that.’ Then it comes. ‘He never spoke to a professional about how he felt?’

This is the part where you tell the police yes. You let them know that you found a group of therapists and one of them offered counselling sessions on a means-tested basis. That he would work outside his regular paid office hours to do pro-bono sessions if needed. Maybe it was his way of giving something back. Dr Eriksson was a good man, who offered to listen to the Poet whine about his art and his father once a week for a fraction of his usual price.

But you don’t want that stigma, do you? That you couldn’t parent well enough and your son was in therapy.

So you let your husband chirp up again.

‘Headshrinkers are for rich people with more money than sense. He never needed that. And if he did, we couldn’t afford it. All he needed was for someone to like his poems.’

This cuts you. Because you can’t understand why he behaved that way to his own son when he clearly understood what the boy needed. And you blame him a little more, which eases your own guilt. It’s not all your fault.

But it is your fault that you held information back from the police. And it is your fault that you didn’t push back at your husband’s lie.

It’s your fault that the police are nowhere.

And it’s your goddamned fault that twenty people will receive a letter telling them that they’re fucked.

94

On the sofa, she hands him a shoebox filled with tin, hand-painted jockeys riding their horses, individually wrapped in kitchen roll.

‘Nan, what’s this?’

‘Nice, ain’t they? Reckon they could be worth something.’ She says this somehow as a question and a confirmation.

‘I don’t know. I mean, they look old. So, maybe…’

Her flat was filled with trinkets she’d picked up on her travels or from the market. She loved the market. She’d once shown him a bag of CDs and proudly pronounced, ‘50p each.’ Then nudged her grandson with her arthritic elbow.

‘Nan, you don’t even have a CD player.’