I shouldn’t have done what I did next. It was yet another really stupid thing, to pile on top of the last few months of very stupid things. I seized my phone and called up the secret email account, dashed off a message to him.

You never mentioned you gave the police my name! FFS Damian. I never even thought about you after I left work. I was glad to get away from you, alright? I want nothing more to do with you. So if you tell them anything more about me, they’ll find out a few things about you too.

I had pressed send before I had time to realise quite how stupid it was. I was threatening him – but with what? An accusation that what happened in the alley was not consensual? I regretted that night, of course, and I would not have done it sober, but was that really what I meant? I thought of having to go to court if it all came out. Nick’s face. The shame of it, claiming I was a victim, when I’d gone there willingly with Damian, kissed him greedily, flirted with him for months. Even if I hadn’t wanted it to go further, who would have any sympathy for me?

A cold terror slushed through me, and I jumped to my feet, almost crying with frustration. What was I going to do? There was no one who could help me. Nora was your wife – she must hate me, even if she hadn’t told Nick the truth yet. Something terrible had happened in her past, I was sure, and she was taking medication for severe mental illness. I had to get away from her, but where could I turn? Nick at least suspected I had done something with Damian. Someone, maybe Nora, was watching me, perhaps had stolen my dog. I wasn’t safe, and I was pregnant, and I was fairly sure I’d made several large mistakes in my interview with the police, tripped myself up on my own lies. What if they came back?

I was trembling, standing in the middle of my expensive kitchen, listening to the house click and whir about me. Machines to set the temperature, and play music, and make the blinds go up and down, and switch the lights on. To lock the door and keep me in here for ever. I was like a bird in a cage, with a cat sitting just outside my door, watching my every move.

Eleanor

Eleanor