He had expected to feel nostalgia as he drew closer to the old holiday park, but he didn’t expect the grief, crushing and physical, that assaulted his body, slowing his footsteps, filling him with the kind of horror he’d heard described by the families of murder victims, but never experienced directly himself. The missing of Alice, his sadness, was a burden heavier than anything Will had carried before. What a terrible waste of a life!

Over the years, Will had had counselling, hypnotherapy, even psychotherapy to try to get Alice out of his head and heart. He knew his obsession with the young woman he’d loved for three weeks during his nineteenth summer was the darkness at the root of his tendency to drink too much, to work too hard, to be unfaithful, to stay up too late, to say things that shouldn’t be said, to go too far because he never knew when to stop. The therapists had tried to needle Alice out of Will’s psyche. They’d poked at her like a cockle in its shell, but they couldn’t move her. She was so deeply rooted that she was part of Will, integral to him. In any case, he didn’t want to be rid of her. He was like an addict. He knew his passion for Alice wasn’t healthy, but the thought of it being taken from him was unthinkable. He honestly didn’t think he could exist without it.

Will walked until the concave wall protecting the town from the sea gave way to the small cliffs where Marnie used to hunt for fossils and where she had her secret cave. This was a lonely and strange place. If it wasn’t for the distant traffic on the bridge, Will could have been alone in the world.