He sinks back down and falls into a light, uncomfortable sleep, his brain like padded, lumpy bedding. He is in the work shed and there is a hand on his shoulder. He hears a creaking and the sound of a gun being cocked. He wakes again and realizes he is hungry and shivering. Some of the sick feeling rolls back and he lies still for a while, cold air on his face from a gap in the window. He wants to get up and eat but his body is a grey sack of coal. He can hear Lauren still bumping around downstairs, then walking up and closing her bedroom door.

‘Lauren?’ There is no answer, just a crash.

He puts on his dressing gown but as he stands, the room spins, and he heads to the bathroom, touching the walls for balance. He kneels on the damp blue carpet. Nothing comes. It doesn’t any more. He rests his head against the edge of the bath for a while. ‘Lauren?’ He listens carefully and hears another bump. He picks himself up slowly and slumps under the shower.

He calls Lauren again, but the house stays silent. He knocks on her door and, when there is no response, goes in. A heady smell hits him like flowers and bad chicken. Water has spread across the ceiling. Shadows play in her empty room from the swinging dreamcatchers. It is tidier than usual: her duvet, patterned with sea creatures, has been tucked straight and her books have been stacked neatly on her bedside table. Webster, her fluffy toy duck, sits on her pillow. There are no clothes on the floor or any of the little horses she likes to play with. He sees the little wooden animals he carves for her in a straight line along her windowsill: a shoal of fish, a family of cats and a parliament of owls. Her wardrobe is fuller and tidier than it has been all year. He looks out of her window and into the empty garden. He calls her name again. Occasionally the house creaks when he is the only person home, he knows that. A drop of water trickles down the wall. His foot stubs against something hard and he looks down at a trail of rocks, curving around the bed in an oval. They look strange on the blue carpet, the only untidy thing in the room.