I left in the middle of the night, even though my train wasn’t due until seven a.m. I was frightened that when it came to morning and I tried to walk out of the door and into my future, I would be stopped. Carl might be an addict, but he was strong, and he would use that strength against me.

At one a.m., I held my little case close to me and slid out of the door. Pulling it gently closed behind me, I looked up at the house I’d lived in all my life.

Would this be the last time I was here?

I thought back to the little girl I once was, the girl who’d worked out at a young age that cutting herself was a sure-fire path to love and cuddles. That same girl who slept under a pink flowery duvet, oblivious to the man who pulled up her nightgown and photographed her body while she slept. I thought of the mother of that girl, who had never protected her from things she had seen too young, too early.

In the pitch-black of night-time, I promised myself that I would never return here.

At the station, I sat in the waiting room, surprised at the number of passengers who came and went in the middle of the night.

I didn’t know much, I realised there in that cold, dank room. I knew very little of the world. The things I knew were unacceptable: the dosage of heroin and how pure it needed to be; the filler ingredients to look out for that would likely kill you. How to get blood and shit and vomit out of a carpet; how to dodge a man who seemed docile but could easily be violent and savage and sexually predatory.

My eyes were dry, but I was sad.

I picked myself up, like I always had. I didn’t know nothing. I knew enough to get me into one of the top universities in the United Kingdom; I knew how to work my backside off while keeping a household running and a mother alive.

The 7:04 to Edinburgh rolled into the station. I raised my chin and tried to smile as I stepped onto the train that would take me to a new life.

I had a room in halls, sharing with two other girls. I forced myself to smile as they came in together, arms entwined, and threw me a friendly greeting.

My jaw hurt from the unnatural action. My muscles were rigid with tension, waiting for the attack. But none came; this wasn’t school. These girls were older, kinder, here to get trashed for the next few years and have as much fun as they could.