‘. . . you just needed a change,’ Maureen says.

Chloe stops and looks up at her. A connection made across the table.

‘Yes,’ Chloe says, the heat of the lie still lingering inside her throat. Unsure whether it was really necessary to bury Nan to live with the Kyles. Perhaps it was just easier.

‘Yeah, well, we know what that’s like, don’t we, Pat?’

He grunts a little, moving the racing pages of his newspaper an inch or so.

‘Oh?’ Chloe asks, but Maureen doesn’t elaborate.

‘It’s isolated out here,’ Patrick says without looking up. ‘For a young girl on her own, like. You sure you wouldn’t rather be in the city, somewhere that’s got a bit more going for it?’

Is he trying to be helpful or put her off? She looks at Maureen.

‘Oh Pat, I’m sure that Chloe is old enough to know what she—’

‘Yeah, well, I’m just sayin—’

Maureen reaches out and puts her hand on the back of his. He stops talking.

‘How old are you, Chloe?’

‘Twenty-nine,’ she replies.

Maureen swallows her tea, not blinking. She seems unsure how to answer Chloe. Instead, she gets up from the table.

‘Well, I’d best be showing you the room then.’

Patrick doesn’t follow them upstairs but Chloe feels him watch them leave the kitchen. Maureen leads her through to a hallway with parquet flooring. She glances into two rooms. The back room seems to be the main living room, and the door to the front room is pulled to, open enough only for her to spy peeling wallpaper and dusty floorboards, boxes stacked inside. When she turns back, Maureen has stopped on the first step of the stairs.

‘Like I said, we haven’t been here long so we’re still getting the place together.’

‘Yes, of course,’ Chloe replies.

Chloe follows her up a grubby runner and, at the top, on the left, there’s a window, the sill covered with dead flies. Why haven’t they cleaned them up? It seems an easy thing to do.

‘Will be nice when you get it how you want it,’ she says, filling the silence, anything to make this situation feel natural. Still pinching herself inwardly that she is here, walking up and down the insides of the Kyles’ own home.

‘Yes, it’s got a lot of potential,’ Maureen says.

There are five rooms leading off the landing, each with closed doors. Maureen points to them in turn.

‘This is the bathroom.’ She opens the door and Chloe dutifully pokes her head inside. There’s a modern suite, navy and white tiles on the wall. She nods.

‘It’s got a good shower,’ Maureen says, as if to persuade her. ‘That’s our room there at the front, next to us is a box room. That’s the spare room, and this here is the room we’re renting out.’