Lauren puts her hand in the dress pocket and runs a finger across the ridged antler, then along the metal strip that is the edge of the blade. She has been doing this recently. Soon they break out of the forest altogether and speed down the hill to Clavanmore: four houses dotted along the road; a constellation of lights among the dark fields. Niall parks near her friend Billy Matheson’s house, at the disused phone box. Its bare bulb is still working, illuminating one corner of the pavement. Weeds are growing through the cracked tarmac and up under the glass.

Lauren watches the wing mirror for several minutes, until she sees the small figure of Billy and his frost-coloured shorts. His mother Kirsty and little brother Lewis follow behind, walking downhill from their home along the narrow edge of the road.

Billy has fake blood smeared over his face and down the front of his long-sleeved goalie’s jersey, under his coat. His hair stands up in gory spikes. ‘What’ve you been doing to that football strip?’ Lauren’s father says flatly, slamming the pickup door.

‘He’s a zombie.’ Kirsty’s voice catches in the iced air. She is wearing a yellow and navy Puffa jacket that reminds Lauren of a bumblebee. Her cornflake-blonde hair is mostly tucked under a bobble hat. It looks cosy. ‘Red food colouring,’ Kirsty says, smiling at Lauren, her eyes small and bright. ‘Lewis here is a little monster, aren’t you?’ The toddler is wearing a dinosaur onesie over some bulky underclothes, his chubby cheeks flushed.

‘You can say that again,’ says Niall, with a sting of humour in his near-expressionless face.

Lewis looks up at him and says something urgently that they can’t understand.

‘He’s excited,’ says Kirsty. The wind howls in the distant trees.

‘What are you?’ Billy asks Lauren, as if it isn’t obvious. He’s growing taller than her.

‘Vampire,’ says Lauren. She tries not to sound too excited about it. The supermarket had sold out of glow-in-the-dark fangs, so she had to make do with the lipstick-blood.

They leave Niall in the pickup, the muffle of Moray Firth Radio fading as Lauren and Billy make their way further down the sloping road, Kirsty and Lewis ambling behind. The dark is broken by the light of windows shining through the cotton backing of curtains, and two streetlights, like orange boiled sweets. They walk towards the homes of people they have known their whole lives.