Maybe one day I’ll write about Thomas too. But not now. Because even seeing his face staring back at me from my phone makes my hands shake.

I sit back, listen to nothing but the hum of conversation around me and look at my reflection in the windows as I wait for the darkness of the Chunnel to end.

Chapitre Quarante-trois

Chapitre quarante-trois

The next year passes in a blur: soon after my name finds its way into the press, the media figure out which is my Instagram account and so I delete it and every other social media platform too. I follow the story in the papers, and every time I learn a new detail I catalogue it with a forensic detachment that makes no sense to me. Like: Thomas worked in the same large, mirrored building as Matilde Beaumont. The papers speculate that’s where he first saw her. He stalked her. He approached her. He spent that evening on the bridge with her. And then, one night, he grabbed her and killed her. Just like I hypothesised. The papers speculate about lots of things, really. But I’m the only person aside from Thomas who’ll ever see that photograph of her on the bed in that dark room. Crying. And it haunts me.