I sat on the sofa, and stared into the fire, and drank my beer, and thought. I hardly noticed when Jude sat down beside me until she said.

"I know what you're thinking about." she said, with a sad sweet smile. I looked at her sharply. "Josh." she said simply. I grunted non-noncommittally as she put her arm around me.

I hadn't been thinking of Josh. I hadn't even been thinking of the footsteps and the door. Given time, I suppose I could have deduced a rational explanation for them, but I couldn't be bothered. I was thinking of seven different glasses full of wine, and a woman with startling blue eyes draining the contents one by one. I was thinking about the time, a year and a half ago, as she lay dying in my arms.

Dying. Dead. She'd been dead. I'd felt the life leave her and I'd been devastated. I remembering screaming and crying and begging her to come back, come back to me. I'd pulled her up, and clutched her to me, grasping her, trying to force my life into her. I'd dragged her back to life. I'd called her, and she'd come back to me, and then I'd left her alone.

What kind of bastard was I? And what the hell was happening to Alison?

I got up, ignoring Jude's protests, and put on my coat.

"I'm just going to office." I lied. "Last minute marking."


I didn't care if Alison pushed me away. I didn't care if she swore at me and refused to see me. I wouldn't even care if she hit me. I was going to do the one and only thing I'd ever been able to do for Alison. I was going to protect her.

The problem was, where to start? I couldn't just walk back into her life again and demand to know what was going on. But there was no-one she confided in, as far as I knew. The only person she'd ever talked to about her experiences, about the more disturbing side of who she was, had been me.

I'd kept a copy of my book in my office, and all the notes to go with it. For some reason I hadn't wanted any trace of my relationship with Alison anywhere near my home.

No – Jude's home. That's why I'd kept them here, far away from Jude, separate from our life together. Alison didn't belong in our very normal middle class existence. She was too disturbing, in so very many ways.

I'd delved into my notes for hours, re-listening to the tapes I'd made with Alison, listening to her very ordinary voice telling me the most extraordinary tales. I was there for hours, trying to find some clue as to who or what had been banging on her door. I was only interrupted by Barb popping her head round my door and asking me what I thought I was doing.

"Have you heard from Alison?" I asked. She came in and shut the door behind her.

"No, and I know you haven't either, not after that book."

"The book's not that bad." I said defensively, leaning forward to switch off the tape.

"Robert, you called her delusional."

"I didn't call her delusional. I never said she was lying, or that she didn't believe in the truth of what was happening."

"No, you just said it was all in her head, buried deep in her subconscious and any shared experience others had with her was down to mass hysteria."

"Barb..."

"Okay, you didn't put it like that, you wrapped it up n all kinds of academic language, but that was the gist of it. It surprised me, actually. I thought you were coming round to her point of view."

"I was. I just..."

"Ran away from something that scared you, that was beyond your understanding. God knows I don't believe in what she was doing, Robert, and ..."

"She's in trouble." I said flatly, breaking into her psychoanalysis of me.

"How do you know? Have you seen her?"

"Yes..no...I don't...don't ask me how, Barb, I just know she's in trouble, and I have to help her."

"How?"

"I've no idea."

She stood up.

"Go see her, Robert. God knows, whatever she says, you can't be more miserable than you look right now." she paused on her way out, then turned back to me. "I did see her, actually. I bumped into her in the street. She looked awful. Drawn and tired and..."

"And?" I asked, eagerly.

"Haunted. Yes, that's the word. Haunted."

"Did you ask her what was wrong?"

"I asked how she was. She just said 'The walls are coming down." but before I could ask her what she meant, she left."