Secrets are taboo for young lovers, or so I thought when we threw ourselves so tightly together. I wantonly told him all about my previous liaisons as we grew closer and portrayed myself as an icon of interest and intrigue as Mitch listened intently. I believed that any omissions from his own history would have been oversights and, being his ‘first real love’, I naively suspected that there was nothing more to tell. I’m not sure if this was innocence or a desire to ignore anything untoward that might challenge the strength and longevity of our new-found relationship.

I discovered a file jammed in at the back of the cupboard. I lifted it out onto the bed. Dividers had been neatly inserted, each one labelled with a woman’s name: Jan, Shirley, Felicity, Gabriella and Natalie.

I sat on the bed and scanned through heartfelt messages from a motley array of lovesick women, letters dating back over the last ten years starting when Mitch would have been only fifteen.

I suddenly heard the front door opening.

‘Rebecca?’

I heard my boyfriend go into the kitchen and I quickly pushed the file back into the wardrobe.

‘Hi. Sorry but the door was open. I was checking you weren’t asleep.’

‘I wasn’t expecting you till later.’

Mitch clutched a pint of milk and a packet of biscuits. He stood and stared at me. He didn’t seem irritated by my unannounced appearance. But still I worried.

‘It’s Roger.’

‘What’s happened?’

‘He’s dead.’

If I’d wanted an excuse to elicit attention and sympathy then I’d played the ace card. I cried, loud explosive sobs, as Mitch took my hand and led me back into the lounge. He caressed my damp hair and held me tightly, silently, until I was able to speak again.

I milked the drama for every last ounce of affection. I cried buckets, as much for the unknown life of my boyfriend that I’d discovered in the bedroom as for the despair which had led Roger to hang himself.

‘What’ll happen next? Will you be going back to work after Christmas? Christ, what a nightmare.’

Mitch stood up and returned to the kitchen to rustle up warm sugary cups of tea. My mind, however, was already working overtime in another direction. My random discoveries in the bedroom needed explanation.

The white powder didn’t worry me as much as the gold chain. We were a generation that didn’t do drugs. I pretended that the white powder was an analgesic for pain. Mitch had a niggling sore shoulder.Even through my fuzzy headache, I tried to explain away the letters. They were from a bygone era, long before we met. I was good at finding self-serving justifications for all the doubts.

But the small gold chain by the bed, with the letter ‘T’, was harder to explain.