And ringing and ringing and ringing. The sun streamed through my window, so bright that for a moment I couldn’t see anything at all. I rolled away from the noise and the light and a scattering of postcards fell to the floor.

The ringing stopped, and it took me a minute to remember what had happened.

I remembered tequila. The casino.

Before that, Holly.

Holly’s arm on mine. Holly walking me out of Sawyer’s. And then the casino and tequila, so shiny and so bright and so loud. So loud I couldn’t hear my own voice. And the bathrooms. Shiny. Such shiny bathrooms, full of glitter, and so loud, so hot.

Acid, burning at my throat. Vomit. Hot and sour. Holly’s hand on my back. Holly’s voice, telling me I would be okay. Lying.

I remembered walking. Tripping. Walking. Someone asking where I was going and me laughing. Tinny. Empty, my throat torn open, raw. Tasting blood.

Nowhere.

Walking.

I had to send Lina a postcard. I’d been meaning to send her a postcard. For months.

We’ll still do the postcards, won’t we?

I just didn’t know what to say.

Not going anywhere. Never going anywhere.

I remembered the postcards. At some point I’d made it home and there had been so many postcards. Reading all of them, all those fantasies, those lies. All those facts and none of them the important ones, the ones that mattered. Did she know twelve people died every year visiting the Grand Canyon? That eighteen people a year drowned in the canals in Amsterdam? Did she know at least twenty people died building the Brooklyn Bridge? That two hundred and twenty-eight thousand people died in the Boxing Day tsunami? And four hundred thousand died building the Great Wall of China? Their bones were buried in the wall itself and I wondered if Lina knew about them, because I did and I couldn’t stop thinking about them, couldn’t stop thinking about dying, all the ways I could die, the ways I would die. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t move. There were so many ways to die. No way to avoid it. None at all.

The ringing stopped, then started again. I picked it up.

‘Caitlin. Thank fuck.’

It was Nic. He sounded weird. ‘Hey.’ My voice broke. My throat felt like I’d swallowed a hundred acid-coated razor blades.

‘Where are you?’

I blinked. It was so bright. My hands were shaking.

‘I’m sleeping.’ I rolled onto my back. My whole body hurt. ‘What time is it?’

‘Twelve thirty.’ He exhaled. ‘You were supposed to be here an hour ago.’

When I sat up, my head spun. I fought the urge to vomit. ‘Shit.’

‘It’s fine.’ There was something in his voice. Something awful. ‘Just get here as soon as you can. We’re fully booked.’

‘Okay.’

‘Okay.’ He sighed. Awful. ‘See you soon, Caitie.’