I crossed the road. On the right, I could see the entrance to a small slip road that took a sharp dive down to some kind of depot at the back of the railway station. There were iron gates stopping vehicle access but on the path that ran alongside, there was no gate. It was dark down there and I would be out of sight. I hesitated at the top of the slip road, looking back. Why are you doing this to me, Lisa? I felt it then, the grasp he would use – but more than that, I felt the power of his hatred and scorn, the low disdain in his voice, the sheer force of his disgust. Matthew had never hit me, perhaps he never would, but the situation between us was only going to deteriorate. What was I waiting for, for some unequivocal sign? A man like Matthew would never cross the line, I saw that now, he would just make me feel worse and worse until I didn’t trust a single thought I had any more. If you want to boil a frog, put it in cold water and turn the heat up gradually. It won’t even move. It will just die.

I wanted my parents. I wanted to go home. I wanted to be sitting in a bar with a bottle of prosecco with Rosie, saying, it’s so hard to tell when you’re in it, you just don’t have any sense of perspective, that’s why it took me so long to work it out … Rosaria lived too far away for me to reach on foot. I had to get to Dogsthorpe.