The Machine at 14 Aldous Close

I never let the tape finish on its own. I stop it before the beep. That's the rule and I don't know who gave it to me, only that I've kept it since my first week clearing houses, and I'm not about to test what happens if I don't. First time at Aldous Close, the power's already cut. Sean from the agency told me that on the way over, chewing the cap off a biro he never once used, said the electric's been off since the tenancy ended in March. I believe him because the fridge is warm and the clocks on the oven are dead, both of them, stuck at 2:14. But the answering machine on the hall table has a red light blinking, steady, one new message, and when I lift the handset out of habit the dial tone's there, flat and ordinary, like nothing's wrong with the line at all. I press play. A woman's voice says my name. Not Dave, not mate, not love, which is what Sean calls me. My actual name, the one on my invoices. She says it twice, the second time quieter, like she's turned her head away from the receiver to check something behind her. Then she starts describing the room I'm standing in. The water stain over the door. The coat hooks, fi