And I do appreciate it, I’m not lying. I still remember the fear that gripped me every time the buzzer rang, or the neighbours banged on the wall, when I first arrived – how the blood would speed around my veins, making my breath come short in my throat, believing that Harry had found me. And I remember the way Mags didn’t mind me leaving the chain on twenty-four/seven, even when it meant that she missed her dealer dropping off her gear one Saturday evening. The way Mags would sit with me for hours, watching old movies with one arm looped over my shoulders, so I didn’t have to be alone, even though she probably had a thousand and one better things to be doing. But I don’t want to live like this anymore. I’m ready to get back to the old Emily.

‘Did I get any messages?’ I ask. I handed my CV to a recruitment company in Swindon town centre last week, and they’d said they’d call but they haven’t.

‘Nope.’

‘I might call them. I just think it’s time I got back out there, you know. Properly out there, working, not just taking Tiny out for a walk twice a day. I can’t hibernate in here forever.’ I move towards the clothes airer in the corner of the kitchen, even though there is barely any laundry on it and start to fold the few things that hang there.

‘You don’t have to, Em, you know that.’ Mags follows me, standing close behind me as I fold and smooth the fabric. I can feel her breath on the back of my neck, a grass-scented huff raising the wispy hairs that don’t reach my ponytail. ‘I like you being here, and it honestly doesn’t matter about the rent; you know my dad pays it anyway.’

I realized this not long after I moved into the flat. I had answered Mags’s Gumtree advert, taking the flat without even looking at it in my desperation to get away from Harry before he carried through the threats he hurled at me daily, and when after the third month of living there I had run out of money and couldn’t pay the rent, Mags had waved me away and said not to worry.