‘Have you eaten?’ he asked. ‘I bet you haven’t. Let me put some pasta on for you, it’ll only take ten minutes.’

She agreed, because she was hungry and because Toby’s kitchen was warm and bright, and the shadows at the edges were not darkness but contrast, and because she thought that perhaps he understood what it was to carry something with you, always, always.

Twenty-Four

One night at Edie’s became two, and then three. They didn’t talk about it. It was simply that every evening, once their printmaking lesson was over, Edie put down a plate of food in front of her and then Gilly just… didn’t leave. It made her nervous, and taking charity was always a bad idea, but she couldn’t pretend that it wasn’t good to sleep in a proper bed, in a proper house, with someone from whom she felt no threat. And it wasn’t as if Gilly had anywhere else to go, especially not if she wanted to carry on working at the bookshop, which she did. She figured that sooner or later Edie would kick her out. In the meantime, Gilly made herself quieter than a mouse and every bit as scarce. She didn’t touch anything she didn’t have to. She didn’t take food from Edie’s kitchen unless she was given it. She left everything the way she found it. The most she helped herself to was water from the tap.

Be invisible and maybe the world will leave you alone.

On the morning of the fourth day, Gilly got up and crept downstairs, aiming for the front door, when the artist yelled at her from the kitchen.

‘Gilly! Come here a minute, would you?’

Gilly hesitated with her fingers on the latch. ‘I’ve got to get to the bookshop.’

Edie appeared in the doorway. ‘It’s not even 8 a.m. It takes five minutes to walk up the hill, not an hour and a half.’

‘What’s it to you?’ Gilly asked.

‘Nothing at all,’ Edie said, ‘which is the whole point. You wake up, you go out, you spend your time in between the bookshop and our lessons God knows where, whatever the weather, because…?’

Gilly still had her hand on the latch. She shrugged. Edie was quiet for a minute, watching her, and Gilly didn’t like it. She didn’t need anyone’s pity, and she hated the way people giving you stuff meant they thought you owed it to them to answer their questions.

‘You don’t need to do that, is all I’m saying,’ Edie told her. ‘You’ve been no bother, and Rachel needs you. It makes sense for you to live here, so why don’t we agree here and now that you’re going to do that?’

‘Live here?’

‘Yes. I mean, you are anyway, aren’t you, really? Let’s make it formal. And then maybe you’ll stop behaving like a ghost.’

Gilly blinked. ‘How much?’

‘How much what?’

‘Rent,’ Gilly said. ‘If I’m going to live here, I need to pay.’

Edie crossed her arms. ‘You don’t. I don’t need it. I’d rather you save.’