Ben still hadn’t answered any of my calls and I was at a loss to know what to do. When I hadn’t heard anything from him on the day of Eve’s funeral, well, I was trying not to think too hard about the words I wanted to use. I had already insulted him enough. Annie was right. I didn’t know him. A few months isn’t long enough to know someone you decide to spend the rest of your life with. I had been stupid and impulsive. But that didn’t take away the ache that I felt, I missed him so much it hurt in my gut. It seemed no painkiller or pill could stop that.

I was still so unused to the whining and the creaking of the old house that I was really feeling the impact of the noise, far more than perhaps I would have done had I been living in the comfort of my own flat. I tried to focus on the other sounds the house offered but my mind always seemed to be drawn back to the high clanking sound. It was almost melodic, like a beat and, as a dancer, I automatically heard music wherever I went. Certain sounds like the creaking of a drawer opening, or the beeping sound of the telephone as it went back into the holster, always sounded like the beginning notes of a familiar song. It amused me and I would have the beginning of a song in my head for ages after hanging up after a call or shutting my old oak drawers. The thought of my drawers burnt to a cinder distressed me. Then I thought of Eve and hated myself for caring for an inanimate object.

Annie had fussed around me when I returned from Patrick’s. She didn’t ask any specific questions about how the day had gone, but I was grateful she was there. But I soon tired of her fluttering about me and I went upstairs to be alone.

I went to the plug socket in the corner of the room and took out of my handbag the small digital radio Patrick had kindly lent me. I tuned it into a local radio station and heard the beginning of a favourite R&B track. I nudged up the volume and began swaying gently to the music, allowing my hips to familiarise themselves with the beats I had so often become immersed in on a dance floor or during an aerobics class. I was instantly thrown back to my uni days with Eve and I closed my eyes as I remembered our many nights out drinking until dawn and stumbling home with the DJ’s classic tunes still ringing in our ears. It had only been a few weeks, a matter of days really, since Eve was snatched away but right then, with the heavy insistent beat folding itself around me and bringing with it the euphoria I always felt when dancing, she could have been with me in the room. I even allowed a smile to creep across my lips as I felt a few firm kicks from the baby as it showed its appreciation of the bass line.