So I said yes, and when I asked Joyce and Roy the next day they were delighted to help. They came over the following evening – a Friday – with a tube of Smarties for you, and I said you could stay up a little later to be with them. But my heart still felt heavy as I waved goodbye on the doorstep, you standing between them, Roy in his brown big-buttoned cardigan and Joyce in her floral dress, the light from the hallway spilling out onto the driveway. And then, when Joyce closed the front door, we were plunged into darkness. The air was so cold our breath fogged in front of us and frost sparkled on the ground. We clutched on to each other as we negotiated the hill into the village without slipping. Daphne was wearing her velvet patch coat, a black polo neck and flared burgundy cords, a long scarf wrapped around her neck, and I had changed into a long flowered dress and boots under the thick sheepskin coat I’d bought in a charity shop five years ago. I tried not to feel jittery, just the two of us in the dark, tried not to think about being watched from the hedgerows, telling myself nobody would think to look for me in Beggars Nook. I tried instead to concentrate on Daphne, my lodger, the person who – despite all the promises I’d made to myself after Kay – was becoming a friend.

‘Are you sure you want to go to the Stag and Pheasant when you work there?’ I said.

She shrugged. ‘I don’t mind. It’s warm. It has alcohol. And it saves us having to drive anywhere.’

I hated driving, although I did it occasionally, when needed. But just knowing my mum’s Morris Marina was parked outside the cottage gave me extra security: I could escape quickly with you if we ever had to.