She marched out of the room into the bedroom. Jamie followed her, feeling as if all the blood had drained out of him. I’m bloodless, he thought. A husk. Kirsty stood on a chair and took the suitcase down from the top of the wardrobe. She threw it on the bed and unzipped it.

‘What are you doing?’

‘I’m going, Jamie.’ She opened the top drawer of her chest of drawers and pulled out a handful of knickers and socks, tights and lacy things that she rarely wore. Jamie stood helplessly by the bed, watching her.

She turned to him. ‘I can’t live here anymore, Jamie. I know you think it’s giving in. I’m not stupid. I know you haven’t put the flat up for sale because you see it as quitting. And – I don’t know – maybe it is. Maybe I’m a coward. But you have to understand, if I stay here one more day I’m going to go mad. I keep bursting into tears at work – and not just because of the baby. I dread coming home. I actually feel afraid to come into my own flat – and shouldn’t your home be your sanctuary? We’ve lost that.’

She opened the wardrobe and removed shirts and dresses, putting some back but placing the others in the suitcase, very calm and methodical. Jamie sat on the bed beside the suitcase. A husk.

‘It makes me feel so sad doing this,’ she said, speaking evenly but wiping away a tear that had fallen onto her cheek. ‘We were going to be so happy here, weren’t we? It was our little paradise. We were going to be a family here.’ She smiled. ‘Whatever’s happened since, we’ll always have those early weeks. It was really good then.’

‘Don’t go,’ Jamie croaked. ‘It can be good again.’

She lay her palm against his cheek. Her hand was warm. She looked down at him and her face was so full of sadness he wanted to die.

‘It can’t,’ she whispered. ‘Not here.’ She held her hand against his cheek for a few more moments, then resumed her packing.

‘Are you going to come with me?’

He didn’t answer.

‘I’m going to go to my parents’. I’ve already ordered a taxi to take me to the station. I want you to come too.’