Chloe obeys her command to join her downstairs, then on the sofa, side by side, she and Maureen sit down and look again through the same dusty photo albums she’d got out that very first night. This time, though, Maureen pauses over each photograph, searching Chloe’s face for recognition, pointing out everyone, giving her every name. She seems disappointed when Chloe fails to feel what she does.

‘It’s all . . . it’s all such a blur,’ Chloe says finally, knowing Maureen just wants to hear something.

‘Don’t worry,’ Maureen says, tapping her arm, ‘it’ll come back eventually. We can try again tomorrow.’

Across the room, Patrick watches the news on mute, ready to join in with their conversation whenever Maureen attempts to include him. She’s talking to him when Chloe turns the last page and finds the photograph she was thinking of earlier. A day on the beach at Hunstanton. She opens the cellophane protector, and loosens it from its sticky page. It has been years, but eventually the photograph yields and it’s there in her hands. There is something about this photograph that feels familiar. Maureen turns to see her holding it. She points to the place where they’re sitting.

‘Do you remember the steps down to that part of the beach, and the green that ran all the way up to it? Do you remember the carousel? The painted horses? Oh, you loved them. And we’d sit and eat fish and chips on that green, do you remember?’

Chloe nods, just a little, and as she does she’s aware of Maureen turning round to Patrick and saying, ‘Look, Pat, it is coming back to her, I knew it.’

But Chloe is distracted by Patrick’s face in the picture, a different man to the one who sits with them now. She thinks of what he said earlier, about the secrets you keep in a marriage. She pictures again the gun on the back seat of the car, the newspaper article about his arrest. She brings the photograph towards her face. What else has he been hiding all these years?

‘Can I keep this one?’ Chloe says. ‘Just up in my room.’

‘Of course, love. It might even help.’ Maureen gets up. ‘I’m just going to get a tea. Would you like one?’

Chloe shakes her head, yawning. ‘I think I’ll just head to bed, busy day tomorrow,’ she says, and pictures the same insurance building, as if that were really where she worked. It’s amazing how quickly things can feel real.

‘Poor love, it’s getting that bus that does it to you. Pat, are you on a late tomorrow?’

‘Yes,’ he says. ‘Late tomorrow and Wednesday, then nothing till next Monday.’

‘Oh good. Well, you’ll run Chloe into work, won’t you?’