‘No. No. Well, I don’t know,’ Clodagh says, cutting through my thoughts, and the urgency in her voice seems to increase. ‘So you haven’t seen her today?’

‘No,’ I reply. ‘I’ve not seen her since, maybe, this day last week? She called in to pick something up from her room. Shoes or something.’

It comes to me. It was those awful clumpy platform boots. She’ll break her ankle in those one of these days. I’m sure of it.

‘But have you spoken to her? Or heard from her even? A text or a WhatsApp?’

I shake my head as if she can see me. ‘No. Not in a few days. Why?’

‘How many days is a few days?’ Clodagh asks and I start to realise something is clearly wrong.

‘I don’t know. I can’t think. I don’t think I’ve spoken to her since she visited. What’s going on, Clodagh?’ I ask and I notice a sharpness in my voice. It’s enough to make Harry Styles arch his back and glare at me in disgust.

‘So you’ve not seen her since Thursday? Shit!’

‘Clodagh,’ I say as if I were trying to get through to a preschool child. ‘Tell me what’s going on.’

I can feel the hairs on the back of my neck rise up, a cold shiver creeping from the base of my spine up towards my neck.

‘She, well, she didn’t come home from work on Thursday. And I thought, well, maybe she was still with Rob.’

‘Who’s Rob?’ I ask, immediately feeling like the worst mother in the world for not knowing who this person in my daughter’s life is.

‘Rob. She met him a few weeks ago. On Tinder. It’s been going well between them. So I thought maybe she was just, you know, with him. You know what it’s like when you start seeing someone.’

It has been a long, long time since I’d started seeing someone but I know enough to know what she means. I don’t particularly enjoy thinking of my daughter in that situation. Consumed by lust. I shake the thought from my head, and shiver. I should put the heating on. The temperature is dropping quickly. It will be another frost-filled night.

Is my daughter out there in the cold somewhere?

‘So, she isn’t with this Rob?’ I say, which is a stupid question. Clodagh would hardly call me if she was.

‘No, or I assume not because Jenny in work had a date with him on Saturday night and he stayed over at hers,’ Clodagh says, and I wonder do I hear a trace of a sob in her voice. ‘I’ve called everyone I can think of and no one has seen her or heard from her. And she didn’t go to work today – or call in sick …’

My head starts to swim. I grasp the edge of the worktop to get a hold of something real. Tangible. I hope my hand will float right through it. That this is all part of a dream.