Xanthe turned and hugged her from behind, long brown arms looped over the chair and round her shoulders. This was a lot of physical contact for Sam, but she relaxed into it. Her friend smelled of sun cream and oil.

‘You just need to let her back in, I reckon. Does she know? About all the … stuff?’

‘She knows I was involved in a court case. That’s all.’

‘How old is she now? Sixteen?’

‘Fifteen. Near enough sixteen.’

‘They know more than you give them credit for at that age. Do you reckon she could take it?’

‘I reckon she probably could.’

‘That’s what you have to do, then.’

In the years that followed, it would be gently suggested to Samantha Burke and Samantha Smith, by psychologists, during marriage counselling sessions, and at various survivors’ groups, that she was too focused on Clio Campbell, that she was perhaps using her anger at Clio as a distraction from probing the real issues and how they had affected her.

‘You’re distancing yourself,’ said one of them, one of their voices, and Sam had wanted to say, actually, no, you’re wrong. This is when I’m closest to myself. But she nodded and swallowed it and tried to show them progress and healing.

It was easy to avoid her, avoid hearing of her. The anonymity Clio herself had ensured was built into Sam’s interactions with the journalists and lawyers made it easy for her to drop back out of sight. Clio, she understood from occasional swipes up onto her Facebook page, at night, when the feelings were strongest, had moved home to Scotland, was involved in some other political campaign up there, posted links to articles with increasingly hysterical capital letters.

Dale woke up one night, glanced over at the glowing screen and sighed.

‘Babe. Again? This woman again. You need to stop it. Everyone’s said.’

It was one of the last nights they’d spend together, the relationship already broken beyond fixing. Dale said no, and he kept on saying no – for better or worse, he said, crying, holding onto her hand – but Sam couldn’t stand the nights spent red-eyed and scanning his face, the secret compulsion to check his phone all the time, the very double fact of him in her – that she knew with her conscious brain he was as loyal and honest a man as you could find, but there would always be a second voice whispering secrets and doubts whenever he was in her line of vision.