Amongst dark shuttered shopfronts with peeling paint on their signs, the tattoo parlour glows and throbs like a beacon. The curled neon tube twists into looped letters and when you stand in the doorway you can hear the hot fizz of static hissing from the CCTV. The needle whines and drills electric into her skin and she flexes her muscles against the sting; that first sharp lick of pain and heat. The tattooist inks old-fashioned swallows on either side of her spine; his instruments burn against her bones. When he’s finished she’s like a sailor from some hazy war-torn past; somebody’s long-lost sweetheart in a battered black-and-white photograph.

Outside the antique shop next door, there are shattered fragments of gold-gilded mirror all over the pavement. Hard sharp stabs of light, memories ghosted in the slip of a hand. Sundays are always infused with sadness. An abandoned velvet armchair froths gauzy white stuffing from its split seat and seams. At first we don’t notice the bedraggled fox sitting calm and quiet in this throne, and then its eyes flash like sequins and we freeze.

Don’t move, don’t breathe, don’t break the spell. She’s bandaged and taped and her nails bite into my palm as she drags me away, reluctant. The fox breaks its stare when we traipse around the corner towards home, past the pub with its screeching heavy-metal jukebox and the thick blue fog of sweet-scented smoke. Once we’re inside her mouth is all over mine, and the buses rattle the windows as they hurtle past, through the night.