I felt a surge of frustration—at Lina, at Georgia, at everyone; wondered why everybody kept expecting me to figure it all out, why nobody would just tell me what to think or how to feel or what to do. Why I had to do it by myself, when they knew the answers. Suddenly it felt incredibly unfair.

I pulled my tobacco out of my bag, finding a filter and touching it to my lip. I wasn’t allowed to smoke in Lina’s car, but she let me roll cigarettes, just for something to do.

I touched again, put the filter back in the packet, not in the mood.

‘Cait …’ Lina sighed. She turned the steering wheel, taking us around a bend. ‘You’re going to be okay,’ she said, still looking at the road. ‘I know it.’

She was smiling, and I didn’t know why but there was something about her expression that broke the tension, and I smiled too. She turned the music up, and my shoulders softened as I sank into the seat, clutching the blue elephant and staring out the window. In that moment, I believed her.

Lina and Matt stayed up watching television but I went to bed early, exhausted—by Georgia, by the drive, by my own thoughts, which seemed louder than they had been in a while. Different thoughts; not about death, but about everything else. Trying to solve riddles I didn’t understand. Answer questions I’d been ignoring for years … for my whole life.

What did I want?

Hey. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry for everything. I’m trying to fix the ending. I hope one day I can. Caitlin

It took a long time to tap out, longer to send. And after I did I stared at my phone for a long time, wondering if he’d get it, if he’d respond, if it even mattered. Then I turned the phone off and put it down, tried to sleep.

It didn’t feel like progress, but maybe it was.

I walked more and more during the day, my body feeling more and more solid. I read books and flicked through the newspapers Matt brought home.

Mum came round and took me out for lunch on her days off. I’d never been much for housework but I found myself tidying up, just for something to do, folding laundry and cleaning the bathroom and vacuuming the carpets. Lina said I didn’t have to; she thought I was doing it out of guilt, obligation, but I wasn’t. It was just something to do with my hands, with my body.

I was halfway through rearranging her butler’s pantry when I realised I was bored. There was a little over a month until the wedding, and suddenly that seemed like an impossibly long time to spend cleaning Lina’s already much-too-clean house, as nice and safe as it was. I needed something else.