She doesn’t reply but instead lies back in the warmth of the sun that stretches across her pillow. She likes waking up in Low Drove, she loves to lie back in bed and hear the noises from downstairs drift up to her room: the clattering of crockery, the scraping of a chair leg. There’s a safety in domestic sounds like these. The humdrum that other people take for granted.

She listens out for Patrick’s voice, but instead it’s the low buzz of the sewing machine that seeps up through the floorboards. She gets up, putting on the dressing gown and slippers she bought especially for Elm House.

Downstairs, Maureen is sitting at the kitchen table humming and sewing. She breaks her stitching to say good morning.

‘Would you like me to get you some breakfast, love?’ she asks, abandoning the floral material bunched in her hands.

‘No, no, it’s fine, thanks,’ Chloe says. ‘I’ll get it.’

Though she likes Maureen to ask.

The gentle whizz tap tap of the machine resumes as she shakes cereal into her bowl. In the sink are two mugs and two plates still covered in toast crumbs. Next to them is an eggcup with Angela written on it, and a picture of a fairy. Chloe has never seen it before.

‘Is Patrick working today?’

‘Yes,’ Maureen says, her eyes trained on the stitches. ‘On the early shift this morning.’

Chloe nods as she pours milk on her cereal and sits down on a chair opposite Maureen, her eyes still trained on the egg-cup.

‘I thought you might fancy eggs for a change?’ Maureen says.

Had she noticed Chloe staring at it? She quickly looks down at her cereal.

Life had got back to normal in the last couple of days. Whatever Maureen and Patrick had rowed about had soon blown over and Patrick had never said anything about finding her in the front room, though the door had remained shut ever since.

Maureen looks up to see Chloe clutching her bowl to her chest. ‘Set your bowl down, I can finish this after you’ve had your breakfast,’ she says.

‘It’s no problem,’ Chloe says. ‘What are you making? It’s nice material.’

Maureen smiles, pulling it out from the machine and biting off a loose thread. She flaps the fabric, the same orange pattern she’s been working with on and off for the last week or so. She smooths out the cotton and Chloe can see that it’s actually covered in mustard-yellow sunflowers.

‘I’m glad you like it,’ Maureen says, ‘because it’s for you.’

‘For me?’ Chloe drops her spoon into the bowl and puts it down on the table.