I flick between the photos and Facebook. I’m getting no work done and I’m dying to check Monica’s messages, so I call it a day and set off home. At the tram stop I wonder if the police will be waiting for me at home. If that guy had reported his credit card missing and now someone knew I had been at the hotel with him. Had proof. If I’d left something in the hotel. A hair. Likely. DNA. Almost certainly. But surely that would take a while to determine? I damn myself for being so fucking stupid and breathe deeply as the familiar feeling of inevitability sinks in.

Obviously this is your doing. An eye for an eye. Is this the way you want to play it, then? You know I have the journal so you’re threatening me with my pissed-up performances. It doesn’t explain the photos from my previous excursions. Have you been watching me for a while? Building evidence against me? The thought shocks me. All the more reason to prove you were lying. And quickly. It’s all happening for a reason, this, and it’s to make me hurry up and prove my innocence.

I hop onto the tram and take the single seat near the door. I can’t open made-up Monica’s laptop quickly enough and log on. When I do I’m delighted to find an inbox full of messages from school friends, all claiming to remember her. Asking if she was on the school trip to France, if she was on the hockey team? Some couldn’t quite place her. I marvel at the power of the human brain to fill in the gaps. Schema theory. It works both for me and against me.

In this case, for me. Give them five facts and they’ll find a sixth degree of separation. But it’ll probably work against me when the police go sneaking around the Premier Inn.

I open Monica’s timeline and Christine’s got involved. She’s made a comment under the photograph.

‘I just want to make it perfectly clear that this photograph is completely innocent. I met Jack at work and we were about to go out for a meal. I’m sure “Monica” will confirm this, as she was there to take the photograph.’

She’s trying to protect herself. Naturally. I wouldn’t expect anything less of the scheming, cheating bitch. She’s forced my hand, really. I was going to leave it at that, but it’s like a game of chess. Some people might actually think that the situation was innocent. And I don’t want that at all. I want them all to know that you fucked her.