My stomach lurches. Suddenly I’m dragged back to that moment all those years ago. The first time I saw the bruise on Mam’s face. A dark circle of hatred, right above her eye. I didn’t know what to do. Mom was cowered on the floor in the corner of the bedroom, tears flowing down her ashen face. There had been arguing, shouting – I did what I had learned to do. Grab my headphones and drown out reality. After a while, I finished nodding my head to the rhythm of Take That making all sorts of promises and lifted the earpiece. Silence. It was over. My cue to go back asleep. But this time I heard the front door banging closed, I was scared. I went in to see if Mom was crying again, she did a lot of crying. When I saw the bruise, a part of my childhood flew away.

‘Anna.’ I move towards her and lift her hair back. The water had removed her make-up revealing a bruise at the top of her cheek. ‘What happened?’ Anna pulls away lowering her head. ‘Anna?’

‘It was just an accident. I opened a door and whacked my face.’ Ah, the door, the broken step, the falling box, the ice, I’d heard them all. Something in my face must have given my thoughts away because Anna says, ‘Jesus, Sal, don’t be such a drama queen. It was the door, I was getting into Gary’s car, the door flew open into my face, it hurt like fuck.’

‘Is it okay now?’ Moving closer I inspect her face. Anna is right, I am being a drama queen. It probably was just an accident, I know I shouldn’t be jumping to conclusions but it’s hard, experience has hardwired my reaction.

‘You’ll be fine… in a couple of days you’ll be as ugly as ever.’

‘Bitch.’

Leaving the staffroom, still not convinced that Anna is telling the truth I tell myself I have enough problems to be dealing with, no need to invent more.

Out on the floor people are chatting; one common theme floating through the air. The dead woman. Everyone is shocked. Domestic murder holds so much more intrigue than the everyday gangland murders that plague our city – live and die by the sword and all that but an innocent woman in her own home, well, that’s a different story and one everyone wants to hear.

So far the information filtering through suggests the body was found with stab wounds to the chest in the kitchen of the house. The police aren’t saying much but the neighbours are. They’re saying what a lovely quiet lady she was. Kept to herself. A great mother.

‘They always say that.’

‘What?’ Amy is putting rollers into a woman’s hair at the next station.

‘They always say they were nice… quiet… minded their own business.’