And it was. I certainly feel free of it. Free of the fear that it’ll fly out of my mouth one day, at church or when we’re sitting at the dining table at Aunty Lalita’s house, passing around a plate of dhal puri.

Poppy’s frown becomes noticeably deeper. ‘Was she weird with you after you told her?’

‘Not weird, just careful. I mean, I know we live in Brighton and it feels like everyone is a rainbow-flag-waving liberal, but it’s hard for her. It’s still illegal in Guyana.’

Poppy blinks at me again, her blue eyes wide. ‘What? Even now?’

I nod. ‘So if you throw the whole Catholic thing into the mix, I’m asking a lot,’ I concede with a small shrug. ‘I’m asking her to ignore everything she’s ever been told. Everything she’s ever been taught.’

‘Do you think she can do that?’

‘It’s not that she can’t, it’s that she doesn’t know how yet.’

‘But you’re her daughter,’ Poppy says, her eyebrows almost meeting, she’s frowning so hard.

I don’t know if she’s angry or shocked, but her cheeks are suddenly bright red.

‘I know,’ I tell her with another shrug. ‘But trust me, it’s the best possible outcome.’

Maybe not the best possible outcome – I still lie, still hide that side of me – but at least things almost feel normal again. Maybe my mother’s happy to keep it that way as long as I don’t embarrass her. Or maybe she just doesn’t want to be the first. The first in our family with a gay kid. She isn’t – she can’t be – but she’d be the first to say it out loud.

So while I want more than anything for her to stand up for me – stand by me – I get it. She doesn’t want to be different. She doesn’t want Aunty Lalita to tut and say what a shame it is. She doesn’t want to be whispered about, felt sorry for. She doesn’t want anything to change and why should it?

She’s not gay, I am.

I wonder sometimes if she looks at me now and sees everything she’s lost. The big wedding, me in a white dress walking down the aisle of the church we go to every Sunday, my aunties singing Ave Maria while my uncles will the service to end so they can have a drink. She can still have that, of course, and the grandkids and the rowdy Christmas dinners with everyone squeezed around the table, talking at once.

The picture just won’t look the way she thought it would.

‘I’m sorry,’ Poppy says, taking her hand out of the back pocket of her jeans to reach for mine.

When she squeezes it, I squeeze hers back. ‘Thanks.’

‘Do you think she’ll come around?’