I set Mina up in the garden with a plastic paddling pool and a tiny watering can. The sight of her sitting in just a couple of inches of water is enough to make my blood run cold after the previous evening, and I have to keep telling myself that it wasn’t real, that Mina was never in the pond. Even so, I drag the pool close to the edge of the border where I weed between the plants, close enough so that she is in my eyeline the entire time, and far away from the mirror that leans against the wall of the house. She sings as she plays, water sparkling in her hair, as I prune and weed, pausing only momentarily at the oleander tree, at the snipped ends of the stems where flowers have been cut. I shake away the memory of the scent of them on my skin, instead focusing on Tara. Clearly Tara and Naomi are more friendly than either of them cares to admit, and when I think of them standing together in the street earlier, I feel a crawling sensation like ants on my skin. Tara hasn’t asked me for the blue blanket back – it is still tucked away in the drawer of the spare bedroom. Why do I see that blanket in my dream? Is Tara the one who has put the idea in Naomi’s head that I am going mad? Everything feels as though it is connected but I can’t figure out how. I sit back on my haunches, my eyes going to the mirror at the other end of the garden, expecting to see Agnes’s face reflected back at me.

‘There you are, I was knocking and knocking, and you didn’t answer. I knew you must be home.’ My eyes fly open as Avó waddles into the garden, looking immaculate in a gold and red sari.

‘Avó!’ Mina jumps from the paddling pool and barrels into her, wrapping her arms around Avó’s knees and soaking the fabric of her sari.

‘Avó.’ I get creakily to my feet, dusting my hands over my shorts to hide my displeasure at Rav calling her behind my back. ‘I didn’t know you were coming. And how did you get here? Is Rav here?’ Avó doesn’t drive, can’t walk far and flat out refuses to take the bus, although she will occasionally deign to take a taxi. When Rav is home – and sometimes, even when he is not – he is summoned to drive Avó to the various places she wants to go to, while she phones through her shopping requirements to me to drop off on my way back from the supermarket.

‘I brought her over.’ Naomi appears behind Avó, looking fresh and perfect in a short linen dress, her hair tied back in a swishy ponytail, her lips painted a nude pink.