I walked past a church as I made my way to my destination. It was modern, and from the outside you wouldn’t believe it was a church. But I knew it was, because it had replaced the one I had gone to when I was a little girl.

For a moment or two I debated whether or not I should enter through the large doors and find the confession box I knew was in there somewhere. But the small voice in the back of my mind laughed cruelly. ‘Why bother? God abandoned you a long time ago. You have a black soul’

But that was why I was doing what I was, why I was taking the familiar walk to the house I grew up in. It was why my hands were washed raw, but I still saw red stains. All I saw was red.

God was mocking me as I knocked on the bright red door, she had always liked red. And she always had a smile on her face, so it was no surprise when she answered the door smiling.

But it was a surprise when the words came stumbling out of my mouth.

“I killed Toby”

My mother never smiled at me the same way again.