‘Pull yourself together now,’ she said in a sharply insistent voice that she barely recognized as her own. That was no good; she didn’t want to be bossed about by a no-nonsense girl guide. ‘It’s all right,’ she said more kindly. ‘This will pass. This will pass, Irene. This will pass.’ Her voice sank to a croon. She wrapped her arms around her itchy, sweaty, bony body and rocked herself slightly on the seat. ‘This will pass. I know I know I know.’

She waited, wrapped in her own arms. She stared into the night and watched the moon slide out from under a small cloud. Then she levered up the driver’s seat and, leaning forward, opened the door. The ground was soft and mossy under her bare feet. Below her, the river gurgled. Around her the trees bent their dark branches. Somewhere in the invisible distance a car drove past. She wouldn’t go back to sleep now.

Irene sat down sideways on the front seat, feet still outside the car, and picked up the unopened bottle of red wine. She turned on the overhead light, fished the car keys out from the glove compartment and jabbed at the cork, until it started to crumble inwards.

‘Corked,’ she said, trying to sound jaunty. ‘Karen would send it back. Never mind. Here’s to you, Irene.’

She tipped the bottle to drink, but the cork was blocking its neck and only when it was held strictly upside down above her open mouth did the cork shoot upwards and the wine gush out. It splashed over her cheeks, ran into her hair and ears. She spluttered and gulped the liquid; set the bottle upright outside the car. Then she took off her shirt and rubbed her face and hair with it.

‘I’m all over the place,’ she said out loud. Her voice had a crack in it, so she tried again, louder: ‘I’m all over the place. And now,’ she said, ‘now I’m talking to myself as well.’ She held her hands up experimentally and saw they were shaking; she clenched them into fists.