‘Now,’ Robin says, nerves bunching in his stomach, ‘we go in.’

Everything is exactly how he remembers. Even the wallpaper is the same. Freya pushes the back door closed behind her, and they stand in the tiny kitchen.

‘Where do you think they’ll be?’ she asks.

He looks around. Coming here feels ridiculous. Josie has never been tidy, but in the intervening years the mess seems to have raged out of control. There is stuff everywhere. Piles of magazines stacked on the floor. Drawers full to the brim, some open slightly, their contents preventing their closure.

‘You start down here. I’ll take upstairs,’ he replies.

‘Okay…’ Freya says.

He knows what she’s thinking, and she’s right. They should leave now. Get out of here, go and do something nice. Freya is supposed to be on a break from this shit, after all. But instead, he leaves her staring at the mess and trudges towards the staircase.

Upstairs is no more than two bedrooms and a bathroom. Robin’s childhood home was exactly the same, except they’d split the larger bedroom into two, creating precious privacy for both Robin and Georgia.

He pushes the door open into Finn’s room, his senses immediately assaulted by reminders from his youth. The room hasn’t changed, even down to the same posters of Nirvana and Smashing Pumpkins thumbtacked to the wall. The only difference is the bed is now a double and the smell is distinctly more pleasant.

Robin remembers Finn’s obsession with Kurt Cobain, his long-held conviction that the musician’s death hadn’t been a suicide. Evidence of his single-mindedness was clear even then, although maybe it hinted at the darker side of Finn’s psyche. The drinking and depression to come.

He can almost see Finn here, lying face down on his bed, his long limbs hanging off the edge. Reading some book or other while Robin bounced a ball in the doorway, desperate for his company. He never made an effort to find a different friend to hang out with, despite their disparate interests. Why would he? Finn was his best mate. What else mattered?

Looking at the room now, Robin wonders why Josie has never redecorated. Was it a desire to keep a place that felt like home for her only son, to hold onto the past? Or simply a lack of time?

He stops for a moment, thinking. There’s no way he and Freya can search the whole house. But equally, seeing this – the level of preservation of Finn’s room – Robin has a strong feeling that Josie wouldn’t have thrown any of the diaries out. His eyes drift up to the loft hatch over the landing.