‘Go away,’ he’d muttered.

‘Zach! Come out and talk to me.’ My heart had been breaking for him. ‘No one who knows you would say that—’

‘They don’t know me,’ he’d said furiously through the door. ‘That’s the whole bloody point.’

‘We can complain,’ I’d said, but even as the words came out, I’d known it was futile. To who? About what? I’d seen one name though, clearly. Jan Vermaak.

Sitting by the green outside the flats in the dusk, watching the dog sniff mournfully at an empty chicken box, I watched a mother with a toddler get off the bus, hurrying home with a bag of shopping, and I thought of Zach at that age.

He had been positively knock-kneed, both of those knobbly little joints always grazed from running too fast, from constant falling. He was fearless; he was the light of my life and the apple of my eye, along with my beautiful Ali, of course.

Zach, though – he’d always had a particular innocence that exuded from him, an utter wonder at the world. ‘Look, Mummy,’ he’d cry, showing me a ladybird, a spider, an ‘aunt’, as he called the black ants he’d feed with sugar in Gloria’s kitchen, until Glenmore would carry him into the garden to help him hoe the narrow vegetable bed.

I startled as my phone rang.

Ali, at last. I fished it out eagerly. She must be nearly at St Pancras.

But I didn’t recognise the number.

I hesitated, my finger poised over the screen. I answered.

‘Mrs March. Ruby?’

‘Yes?’ I was nervous, I realised; braced for attack.

‘It’s Paul Peterson. How are you?’

‘Oh.’ My mind went blank. ‘Sorry, I—’

‘Vicar from St Ethelred’s?’

‘Paul.’ I was taken aback. ‘All right, I suppose.’ I looked at the dog, now peeing for the seventeenth time on the same clump of grass. ‘Well. Not great, to be honest, Paul. Zach’s been charged with’ – the words stuck in my throat – ‘with—’

‘Yes, I’m sorry to hear that. I’ve heard a bit from Pat. We were wondering – can I pop over for a chat? Or come to us, if that suits you better?’

‘Oh.’ I wasn’t sure I was after spiritual guidance right now, kind as the offer might be. ‘Thanks, Paul. It’s just, I’m waiting for my daughter to arrive, so I’m not sure I can right now. I’ll try and pop in soon.’

‘It’s just, it’s not – it’s not quite that simple, Ruby.’

I felt the ever-present fear scurry up my back. Was he going to accuse Zach of something too now? Was I the world’s most naive mother?

It took me a few seconds to register that the vicar was still speaking.

‘I think – I think perhaps we need to talk, quite urgently.’

Melissa

I thought I’d done it.

Thought I’d managed it in time.

But as I opened the front door, he was on the doorstep, with his keys.

I mustn’t get trapped on this side with him.