The office was small and warm. Technically I wasn’t allowed in here, but I’d spent hours sitting with Nic while he cashed up, watched him count coins, flick them off the table into his palm while muttering numbers under his breath. Sometimes I even helped him, though I wasn’t supposed to.

I trust you, he’d said once, and I’d liked it more than I wanted to admit. Too much.

‘What happened, Cait?’

I hesitated, not sure where he wanted me to start.

‘Not today, not last night—I know all that.’ He lit his cigarette, took a drag. ‘I don’t understand why exactly, but I know what happened.’

I unclenched my fingers, reached for another cigarette but didn’t light it, just brought it back into my lap, looked at it. Perfectly cylindrical, as it should be.

‘What’s going on, Caitie?’

I bit my lip, shrugged. I didn’t know what to say.

I put the cigarette in my mouth, lit it. Took a drag, exhaled.

‘I broke up with him.’

He sighed, disappointed.

‘It was my decision, so you don’t need to feel sorry for me. You don’t need to worry about me. I’m fine.’ I inhaled again, felt a rush of nausea. ‘It was the right thing to do. I’m sorry you’ve lost a customer but I’ll be fine.’

‘This isn’t about Tom, Caitie.’

The sound of his name pierced something in me, sharp, awful.

I shook my head. ‘Yes it is.’

He looked at me.

‘It is,’ I said. ‘You’re just mad because he won’t be coming in anymore.’

‘I’m not mad, Caitlin.’ His voice was flat. Calm. Steady.

I took a drag, didn’t answer.

‘This isn’t about Tom,’ he said again.

I wanted him to stop saying his name. Every time he said it I wanted to scream.

‘This has been going on for much longer than Tom. And it’s not about Dex either, as much as I enjoyed hearing you yell at him. This is something else.’

I tried to ignore him, block him out.

‘You need help, honey.’

I took a drag. ‘No,’ I said, exhaling. ‘I just need …’

To be careful. More careful. I would be okay so long as I was careful. I took another drag, let my head spin, looked up past Nic’s head at a stack of boxes in the corner. Precarious, ready to topple.

‘You do.’ His head turned, eyes looked past me. ‘It’s not about Tom.’

I looked at his hands in his lap, thumb tapping on his thigh, perfectly in time. Tap tap tap. Tap tap tap.

‘I don’t know what it is. I have an idea. But I don’t know what specifically. Just that you weren’t much better than this when you started. You just held it together better then.’