‘Oh, come on, Tom. I saw you at the concert … Remember?’

He cackled then. ‘The concert! Of course, the concert you didn’t actually see because you were so late. Is that the concert you’re referring to? The concert you ran off from, to go back to work – to a job that means more to you than your family? That concert?’

‘Oh, fuck off, not all of us get to spend our day lording around between drop-off and pick-up, spending someone’s else’s money …’

He stood up then, leaning into her. ‘No, fuck you, Gabriela.’

He slammed his palm on the table and she saw a curtain twitch in one of the neighbouring houses.

For the first time in her life, she cowered away from him.

‘I mean, wow, you really have no idea why we were talking, do you? Not even an inkling?’

Tom’s eyes glistened and she felt herself lean backwards in her chair.

‘That woman is the mother of the girl who has been bullying our daughter so badly that most afternoons after school she shuts herself in her room and cries.’

He was whispering now, but with an intensity that lit his face. ‘That woman is the person I’ve been having hour-long conversations with on the phone, when I’m not pissing about, trying to work out how to help fix things because you’re so busy, so fucking stressed out, that I’m worried if I share this problem with you that you might break. The reason, Gabriela, that we were so involved in conversation is that our daughter is so stressed that I’m worried she is going to be irrevocably damaged at a time when she is also in mourning for her mother, who might as well be dead for the amount of attention she gives this family!’

His voice hummed with quiet rage, his face pulsing with it.

‘Why do you think I keep whisking the kids away at any given opportunity, subjecting them to endless bloody car journeys to my parents’, to Saoirse and Jim’s, to anywhere where we can actually breathe? You think that woman is the threat to our family, Gabriela? You think some mother from school is what is going to be the end of all this? You, Gabriela – your fucking job—’

He was laughing, his eyes full of rage. ‘You know what, I wish I was so simple! I wish I could go around shagging other women, that it was that easy. But you know the sad truth of all this, Gabriela, is that I could never do that to you. Never.’