‘Yeah. Me too. She died just six months ago. Her heart. Mum thinks it was the worry and the strain of it all, but she’s like that, my mum. Everything has to be someone’s fault.’

‘She blames herself for your nan dying?’

‘Oh, no. She blames Dad, and his fancy woman. Lauren, she’s called. He’s married to her now. The wicked stepmother! You can imagine what Mum has to say about that.’

‘It can’t have been easy though. A divorce, and then the accident. On her, or on you. God, I can’t imagine what it must be like, losing your sight. And with a teenager to take care of too. I guess it explains a lot about you not really knuckling down at school. Too much going on at home.’

‘Exams seemed like the last of my worries.’

‘Have you always lived here?’

‘No, we came here after the divorce, when our old house had to be sold. The previous tenant of the flat here had just died, which was lucky. Well, no, I don’t mean lucky that she died. She was a nice old lady, from what I’ve heard. Some sort of dancer, in her day. But it was good timing for us, stopped us being homeless! The block had been owned by my grandad way back, see, but Nan sold most of it off to some property company bloke after he died. She had to, to clear his debts I think. He was a bit of a gambler on the quiet, my grandad, although he died before I was born, so I never actually knew him. He had no head for money, apparently, even though he’d earned a shedload of it over the years. Lost most of it on dodgy stocks and shares, days at the races, being over-generous to his friends, that kind of thing.’

‘If I’d known there was gambling in your genes I’d have kept you away from those fruit machines!’

‘Pennies don’t count. And I’m sure we must be the only people to have ever walked away from one of those arcades in profit!’

‘It felt like a good time to stop. While we were ahead. I can’t have your mum blaming me for you losing your life savings.’

‘What? All fifteen quid? No, seriously though, Nan sold the block, or most of it, just before prices went sky high. If only she’d hung on, we’d probably be millionaires by now! She held on to three of the flats though – the bigger, better ones at the back – including ours, and Madi’s here.’

‘Ah, your nan was the mystery owner Simon mentioned to me. His uncle’s none too keen on not owning the whole block.’

‘I think she got quite a lot of pleasure from knowing that! Anyway, the flats were her nest egg, as she called them, and she always said they’d be Mum’s inheritance eventually. And mine, I guess. She said Grandad owed us that much, for all the good he’d been when he was alive. I don’t think theirs was the happiest of marriages, and he was away a lot working, but I guess this was her security, her retirement fund, not that she ended up with much of a retirement, running about looking after us. It was only meant to be a temporary thing at first, us living here, but then Mum had her accident and she couldn’t go out to work any more, and there wasn’t any compensation or anything, seeing as she’d caused it herself, so we’re still here. We own our flat now, of course, since we lost Nan. And the other two she’d hung onto. Mum spent ages with the solicitor, going through Nan’s papers, sorting out about the rents and everything, but she won’t sell. Or can’t. I’m not sure which. She doesn’t talk about it. But they were her dad’s after all, so there’s a bit of sentimental value attached, and she doesn’t have much else that was his.’