Nobody is going to come.

It seems bizarre that after over a decade, this thought is only just percolating in Simone’s mind, but as soon as she considers it, it hits her like a fist: nobody is coming, nobody is coming. The rhythm of the words beat around her brain, undulating and hypnotic. She repeats it to herself over and over in the unusual quiet of the flat. And the realisation of it is unexpectedly, overwhelmingly empowering. If nobody is coming, then it is up to her to rescue herself. It is up to her to change things. To make decisions. It is all up to her.

She starts to make lists. The first priority is clear: she must get away from Terry. For the first time ever, this simple truth is razor-sharp, slicing effortlessly through reservations; but complications remain. She must get the kids away from Terry too, and they must go somewhere he cannot find them. She’ll need money for that, but he’s never given her access to his, and he commandeers everything of her own – it was years ago that he took charge of her benefits, ‘helping’. Whenever she’s attempted to put some aside, he’s found it and spent it. Perhaps she can open a new bank account and start channelling her wages there. But he’ll notice that. And there might not be time. What has she time for? If he’s going to kill her today, then time has run out anyway, but if he doesn’t, she’ll need to be smart about things, play at compliance, act normal.

As she thinks about this, a nervous energy builds inside her, a fear-laced, hope-tipped momentum, growing exponentially with each passing second, a call to action almost bursting through her skin. It is powerful, that feeling. Unfamiliar. Dynamic. Nothing is going to stop her. Nothing will stand in her way.

Except that she is tied to a chair.

Simone laughs.

As though catching sight of her reflection in a mirror, she sees the futility, and for a moment there is a danger of everything unravelling, there is a risk of submission – habitual, easy. But no. She is laughing, not crying, and the juxtaposition of her mindset with the physical reality she finds herself in, only reaffirms the need for action. This is not a way to exist. This is not normal. This is not something that Terry can convince her was justified, or her fault, or the unintended upshot of love.

Simone does not know how many hours pass before Terry returns to the flat with Jasmine. She suspects he’s been drinking because his voice is even louder than usual and for the first twenty minutes or so he is raucous and enlivened, chasing Jasmine around the living room with noisy delight, and then quite abruptly growing bored of this and turning on the television. For the next hour or two Jasmine is either inaudible, or crying, and he is either silent or shouting at her to shut up. Simone can hear hunger in her daughter’s cry. She can hear fear in her silence. Until eventually Dominic arrives home and sees to her.