I see my mother considering her options. She seems confused and trying to work out how to play this. She has aged so much in the last sixteen years, a shadow of her former self. I see the exact moment she decides to give me more information as it crosses her face, as if there is still some way out of this for her that might win me back.

‘I made a deal with Tim. He told me his suspicions about your father, showed me the photographs. I told him if he came to the woods with me and dug a grave, I would kill your father and Tim would have his revenge. I told him that you had confided in me. I told him I was scared of what Frank was going to do. I wasn’t wrong to be scared. You have no idea what your father was capable of.’

‘But Tim ended up in a grave not far from Hannah Torrence. There is only one person who could have put him there.’

My words throw her a little; she isn’t understanding my logic. I realise in that moment that she thought maybe I hadn’t run away alone on that day, that maybe my father had taken me and we had gone together, leaving her alone in this house.

‘Jasmine, what did you do? What happened to your father?’ she says, her hand moving to her mouth as she catches her breath. Was this ever about seeing me again, or was it about seeing him?

‘I had no choice. He killed my friend.’

‘He told me to deal with Tim and then he would come and get me when you had calmed down, that he needed to make sure you weren’t going to do anything stupid. You would go away for a couple of weeks until you had come to terms with everything. I thought you were both coming back for me, but you didn’t. He never came back for me,’ she said, sinking to the ground, sobbing.

‘If Hannah Torrence was there, that means you killed her, too.’

‘I don’t expect you to understand. Your father had certain … needs. It was my duty as his wife to make sure they were fulfilled. I was driving back from my book group and I saw Hannah walking up the road. I could see she was around your age and so I pulled over and asked her if she wanted a lift. Told her I was your mum.’

‘Christ, you used my name?’ I say, wondering how I never noticed what kind of people they were. Wondering if that kind of behaviour was hereditary.