‘You told me once that this was where you escaped to.’

I drag my fingers through my hair.

‘Look, I need to be alone right now, Alice.

I need you to –’

‘Leave?’

He slides a look at me. For a moment, our eyes meet, and I feel my heart skip.

I smile. ‘I’m not leaving, Rowan.’

My gut wrenches because

this is what I chose for myself, isn’t it?

Her.

Her over Jonah.

And I can feel myself still wanting to

choose her again,

despite everything.

He doesn’t take his hands from his hair.

‘Why did you run?’

I turn away.

‘You saw.

You sent me that text.

I said I’d protect Jonah

and I didn’t.

I was late picking him up

and then he climbed that tower

and now the social are asking questions

and they’re going to –’

My words choke.

The whole world is crumbling out from under me.

And I can’t get

how the floor I’m sitting on

hasn’t moved.

I want to reach out and put my arms round him, but they don’t seem to want to move.

‘It wasn’t your fault.’

It was. It was. It WAS.

I feel the guilt tsunami-ing

up through my bones,

making my fist

T H U M P

on the castle floor

so the whole thing finally starts

earthquaking.

I jump and dart a look down at Dad, who’s staring up and trying to pretend that he isn’t.

‘Rowan – it isn’t your fault. It isn’t. You weren’t there. You couldn’t have stopped him from climbing –’

‘Exactly!’ I spit.

‘I wasn’t there, was I?’

I’m shouting and I can’t stop.

‘Just – go away, Alice.

I need to think.’

I put my head in my hands.

His voice is splitting spoons, but I’m clinging on.

‘You can be there for someone without being present,’ I say quietly. But the n – if that’s true – what on earth am I doing in the middle of a children’s playground, as my parents huddle together on a bench waiting to scrape what’s left of me off the floor?

I turn to him. Now his feet and hands are planted on the floor, like he might spring up at any moment, his hair out of its band now and wild. And he has holes in his shoes and dirt on his hands and a mad look in his eyes – but I know him. I know him like he and I are the same.

‘You don’t have to do this alone.’