There is blood on the stairs.

Not that anyone can get near it to clean it up because there are roped off areas and people in uniforms telling us we can’t go in there.

No, ‘roped off’ isn’t right. I mean it’s what they’ve done, to keep people, to keep us, out – they have cordoned off the house – but the ‘rope’ isn’t actually rope. It’s plastic tape. They’ve ‘taped off’ the area is, I s’pose, more accurate, but it doesn’t sound as final as ‘roped off’. ‘Roped off’ to me, has a much stronger ‘keep the fuck out’ vibe out about it, which is exactly how it feels.

Not that anyone is in a hurry to go in, to clean off the blood.