He’d seen her and himself in the van, struck, rolling over.

He was snapped out of his thoughts by his phone ringing. It was Emily.

‘What’s happening?’ she asked, anxiously. ‘The police have sealed off the road and won’t let me through. I’ve got all the prawns and I need to get them into the house and put them out to defrost, urgently.’

‘Thank God you’re OK, you’re safe.’

‘I’m safe, yes, are you OK?’

‘I’ll come and find you.’

75

Thursday 27 December

Jason hurried away, walking quickly past the carnage of the purple car, avoiding looking in. His view was blocked, in any case, by police and fire and rescue officers. He picked his way through all the emergency vehicles, had a quick word with the police officer on guard at the cordon of blue and white tape, then ran up to Emily’s van, which was parked outside the shell of a partly built house. She was standing beside the vehicle, looking ashen.

‘What’s happened?’ she asked. ‘Are you OK?’

‘I’m fine.’

‘The police wouldn’t say anything. They just told me there’d been an incident. I was so worried something had happened to you.’

‘Our neighbours,’ he said, shakily. ‘Claudette and Maurice. Horrible. Their car malfunctioned – something went horribly wrong. They’re both dead.’

‘What?’

‘They’re dead.’

‘No.’

Another wailing siren was approaching.

He held her in his arms. She felt limp, like a rag doll. ‘It was horrible.’

‘Tell me it’s not true. Tell me you are joking?’

‘I saw it, from my studio window.’

‘What did you see?’

‘Let’s get your prawns. They said they’d allow us through. Just don’t look at the car when we walk past it.’

‘Why not?’

‘Honestly Em, don’t.’

Five minutes later they lugged the plastic bags filled with prawns into their house, and Jason slammed shut the front door, against the horror and the horn that was still blaring. Inside there was a stink of chemicals from the fumigation. To his surprise, the Go Pest man had gone, but had left instructions.

‘I looked,’ Emily said. ‘I couldn’t help it.’ She fell, sobbing, against him. ‘Dead? They can’t be dead.’

‘I’m afraid so. He was OK, not a bad old stick. I can’t believe we were having drinks with them only yesterday.’

‘I can’t believe it either,’ she said. ‘Tell me it’s not true.’

‘It is true. But it’s OK.’

‘No, it is not OK. Nothing is OK. We are living in a fucking nightmare.’

The horn suddenly stopped.

‘Just tell me we are imagining all of this, Jason. Tell me it’s not happening.’

For some moments he had no answer. He didn’t know any more what was real and what wasn’t. ‘It’s just a terrible accident. Something went wrong with their car – I don’t know what. I – this may sound odd – but I thought…’ He fell silent.

‘Thought what?’

‘I thought I saw you coming. That Maurice was driving straight at you. I thought…’ He fell silent again.