‘Actually, he is and I want to speak to him now, or else I’ll wait and have it out with him in Flannelly’s bar later where we both know everything that’s said will be round the village jungle drums in no time.’

‘I don’t see why I’d have anything to worry about… It’s not as if my Eddie has ever done anything to have people talking about us,’ Barbara said, but all the same, she peered around the doorframe, up and down the street to make sure that none of the neighbours were catching this exchange.

‘No. Are you quite sure about that…?’

‘Oh, you might as well come in and don’t be making such a huge drama on the doorstep.’

‘He’s in his room?’ But Liv was only confirming it as she took the narrow stairs two steps at a time. For the first time, she noticed just how shabby everything was here. There was an air of neglect about the flaking paint, the thin carpet and the faded drapes all overseen by a picture of the Sacred Heart, whose red-light bulb had long gone out. She pushed open the door to Eddie’s room. She’d only been in here a handful of times, never for anything more than collecting or dropping off his belongings, and now it seemed that her final drop-off would be the man himself.

As she looked about Eddie’s room there was that same sense that time had stopped here – she guessed around the time his father died.

‘What the… Liv, what are you doing here at this hour of the day?’ Eddie scrambled up in the bed. At least he was alone. Liv actually felt a small wave of relief pass over her at this thought – God, how pathetic was she? She wrinkled her nose. The smell in the room was sickly and depressingly familiar. She knew it too well: a combination of stale drink, fags and body odour and, today, she could admit to herself just how much it disgusted her. It took a genuine effort not to walk to the window and throw it wide open. ‘I meant to ring you. Sorry, it was late when I got back. Is something wrong?’ He was pulling the quilt up around him, as if protecting himself from what was to come.

‘You tell me what might be wrong, Eddie.’ She walked about the room, not that there was much space. The floor was strewn with discarded clothes and bags and it was difficult to tell what was for laundry and what she would, so recently, have automatically begun to hang up in his wardrobe. God, she’d been such a sap.

‘Wrong? I don’t know that anything is wrong; it’s just you, you look…’ He stopped, clearly not yet being wakened enough to put the right word on how Liv looked. He settled on: ‘Different.’