It starts as a simultaneous pressing in and a swelling up from somewhere deep inside. My heart’s racing, I’m freezing hot, I feel sick as the raging black wolf erupts inside me. The jitteriness goes into overdrive. My vision clouds as I blaze to black …

I’m trembling, sitting on the kerb. I can hear barking. My heart ramps up again, before I realize it has passed. The barking is Kush in the car.

‘Jesus,’ Vermeer says.

She’s sitting beside me, and she removes her arm, which I now sense was over my shoulders. ‘You okay?’

There’s a weird taste in my mouth, sour and metallic.

‘Yeah … I’m all right.’

She looks at me. There’s concern there. Doubt too. She hands me my phone, the corner dented, the screen snaked with jagged cracks.

‘You threw it at the ground,’ she says in explanation. I press the home button and the screen still lights up, the messages still just visible.

‘Guess that Oscar isn’t in the running after all,’ Vermeer says, having looked at them.

I take a big, long breath in. I put my head back and stare at the sky.

Police Brutality

I’m sat on a bench up by the Lekkeresluis waiting for Sabine to turn up. For some reason I keep thinking that Tanya will appear and see me with Sabine. I try to shake that thought off, but before I can I hear Nellie’s voice in my head telling me to contact her before it’s too late.

Earlier Vermeer dropped me off at the houseboat and the first thing I did was to go on the roof and roll a joint. Being unable to medicate during the day meant I’d succumbed easily to the rage, the black wolf, the thing that isn’t me but seems to be trapped inside. The darkness within. If I’d been able to keep my cannabinoid levels up during the day it wouldn’t have happened with such severity, and the come-up would have been long enough for me to have done something about it. But I’d been caught up in it all, the investigation taking over my mind, and I’d welcomed it, felt good about doing the work again. Part of me thought that I was strong enough now, that I could do this on my own. Seems that part of me was wrong.

Up and down the canal, elm trees are scattering leaves, their delicate forms picked up by the street lights, and Kush has been amusing himself by staring at the waterbirds that float past every so often, their jerky head movements contrasting with their stately glide. He freezes when he spots one and I notice his legs tremble a bit, as if he’s holding himself back from jumping down the metre or so into the water, swimming over and tearing them to shreds.

‘Hey … Jaap?’