What had she been thinking? Chloe knows she has to get out of the bedroom quickly. She shuffles back the way she came, only as she does, she sees what she disturbed when she launched herself underneath here. She can’t tell how many there are, but there are dozens of them, more books than she’s seen anywhere else in the house. But why would they keep them here under the bed?

She rolls out, dragging one with her. She rearranges the towel around herself and turns over the book so the cover is facing up. There’s a black and white picture of some police tape on the front. It’s a true crime book. Chloe picks up another, another, they’re all the same: true crime, forensics, all real-life crime scene investigations – just like the programmes Patrick watches so obsessively.

Chloe stands up. She needs to get out of this room. She throws the two books in her hand back under the bed. The duvet cover is slightly askew where she has leant on the bed to get up and she quickly – frantically – tries to smooth it out, but she sees that her hands are shaking. She needs to get out of this room.

She opens the door to the landing. All is quiet. She takes three short steps and she’s in the bathroom, she’s closing the door, she’s turning the shower on and she’s leaning against the cubicle. Chloe steps under the water and its only then that her breathing returns to normal. She turns the dial hotter until her feet are pink and the air is thick with steam. She breathes deeply until she feels her pulse start to steady. She imagines the steam sterilising her from the inside, right down to the very core. She stands under the shower until the hot steam permeates her lungs, until she feels new again. She steps out and opens the window, and her day hurries away into the night.