‘She was the most alive person I’d ever known.’

‘Some of the time.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘She adored you, Chloe, but she only showed you some things. She didn’t show you what she was like in between bouts of being wonderful. She’d lie in bed for days, smash things up, break things. Shoplift for fun. Drink until she threw up. Threaten to kill herself if I did anything that upset her.’

Chloe shook her head. ‘You’re exaggerating.’

Max said nothing.

‘You really hadn’t spoken to her?’

‘No. The first person I’ve spoken to who had anything to do with her was her father, yesterday.’

‘Do they still hate you?’

‘I don’t think so. Not sure they were thinking about anything other than her.’

‘Zadie said they didn’t like you because they were snobs. Because your parents were “trade”.’

‘They didn’t like me because they were worried about her, and because I helped her hide things from them. She liked to believe it was about snobbery, but it was about trying to keep her safe. That’s all they ever tried to do.’

Chloe tried to dismiss a vision in her mind of Astrid and Bob, older, Zadie’s siblings, now adults, standing around in the hall of their enormous house, dressed in black, waiting for the cars to arrive to take them to the church. Cars which would never have needed to arrive if she had done things differently, or if Max had. They could have saved her, if it hadn’t been for everything that had happened at Max’s party. Chloe was sure of that.

‘Was it you?’

Max turned to look at her, noticed that her glass was almost empty and refilled it. ‘Was what me?’

‘The night of your birthday. I found her bleeding and bruised. Her dress was all ripped up. Someone had beaten the living hell out of her. Did you hurt her?’

He put the bottle down heavily. ‘Are we really doing this again?’

‘We were so young. You’d have been scared. I know she could be horrible to you. I know she tried to wind you up and needled you.’

Max shook his head.

‘It’s okay. You can tell me. It’s been fifteen years. But you should tell me.’ Chloe could hear her tone getting shriller. She stopped, trying to calm herself. She must not lose her temper. She must not lose her cool. This entire evening depended on her ability to keep her calm. To make Max feel safe.

‘I only feel guilty about one thing that happened that night – and you know what it was.’ Chloe tried to shake the picture from behind her eyes: Max’s white shirt, his lips tasting of red wine, her party dress around her waist.