‘I wish it was me who died!’ I cried. ‘You were the useful one, the clever one. You were the one who had something to give to the world. What do I do?’ I scoffed at the uselessness of my career. ‘It should have been me who died.’

Thunder cracked overhead, an explosion that reverberated, and then there was creaking like a hundred wooden doors, slow at first, but gathering in speed and intensity until it was all I could hear, the entire house filled with the deafening roar of tearing and splintering. I flung my arms over my head and ran into the hall, as if getting away from the window might save me as the oak finally crashed down. Seconds later, as stillness prevailed once more, I looked around: the house was still standing. I was alive. I ran to the window of the girl’s room and saw the garden entirely full of tree, the smashed remains of the Wendy House at the bottom of the garden barely visible beneath it.

‘Cheers to that,’ I said and raised the vodka bottle to the garden. I sloshed some into my mouth and felt its fire burn inside me. For a moment the wind dropped and the silence echoed. Then, overhead, there was a sound. Something in the attic. A footstep above. I shivered. Meena was right: it was deathly cold.

I stumbled a little as I made my way clumsily across the landing and clawed at the little door that hid the attic staircase until I prized it open. I bumped against the walls, ricocheting from left to right as I climbed up the narrow stairs, aware all the time that maybe I should be advancing more slowly but, with over half the bottle of vodka inside me, slow and delicate were a stretch too far.

I reached the top step, crashed through the attic door and there she was: Grace.

Fifty-Nine

Tall, beautiful Grace was standing with one hand clasped to her chest among the paintings I’d done of her – among the gruesome portraits that ripped her apart, melted her, drowned her, smothered her and wiped her out. I closed my eyes and the room swayed. Nausea rolled in my gut; the vodka too harsh on my empty stomach.

‘Why did you do this to me?’ Grace said sadly. ‘It’s as if you hate me. What did I do to make you hate me?’ Her jaw clenched. ‘I thought we were friends. Together forever. Hey, Abs? Isn’t that what we used to say?’ She gave a hollow laugh and went over to the picture of her face smashed and distorted, the rustiness of the blood I’d used rich on the canvas. Her hand moved up to her mouth, as if she were physically holding in vomit.

‘I think you should leave,’ I said.

She spun around. ‘Leave?’