I don’t know how I do it, but every cell in my body compels me to leap, to move, and that is what I do. Roxy tries to throw herself over the cliff edge but I get there first and pull her back. I don’t know why I do it. My actions won’t kill anyone else.

I can’t breathe, I’m almost over the edge myself, I’m falling, I can’t –

A shadow appears in the corner of my vision, rapidly approaching, and it’s Ellis ploughing into us sideways with a rage I didn’t know he had in him. I fall forward but the cliff is on an angle and I’m falling, I’m falling, I’m –

Ellis. Hot tears run down my face. He’s got my good arm in his grip and I’m sure my shoulder is out because the pain goes all the way up to my jaw. My fingernails are bent backwards. I kick my feet in the nothing. I feel the drop. I feel it in every pore of my body, every rattling bone. I try to breathe, Pull me up, but there’s nothing, and I’m looking straight at the sky, and I need to say – I need to tell you this – that I’ve never seen anything bluer in my life.

‘D-d-d-don’t look down,’ Ellis says and grunts with exertion. Up, up, up, and then I’m scrambling up the side of the cliff like an animal until my belly is flat against the ground and my legs aren’t hanging over the edge into the abyss.

Roxy’s to our side in a heap. ‘I didn’t want anyone to come looking. I just wanted to be left the hell alone. It’s all ruined. The storm’s ruined it. You’ve ruined it. There’s nothing for me here any more.’

Booker hovers over her, gripping her by the shoulders. ‘Come back with us, Rox,’ he says quietly. It’s so intimate I don’t even feel like I should be looking. ‘Come back with us. You gotta. There’s always still time.’

‘Nothin’ for me,’ she says, then rises and without even giving us so much as a parting glance steals off back in the direction of the ruined cabin.

A slight and faraway whirring.

I worry the storm has come back to claim me, but as it gets closer and closer I know what it is: the boat.

‘Thank ever-loving Christ,’ Booker mutters.

It’s a small four-seater speedboat zooming towards us. We start towards the shore.

‘What are we going to do?’ I ask Booker.