‘Eleven. And I’m really cold.’ Even my teeth are chattering now.

She sighs. ‘All right, you better come back to my place. Stop sapping my energy though, will you? I barely have any energy these days but whatever you’re doing is making me feel sick.’

‘I’m not doing anything!’

‘You are,’ she snaps. ‘Stop it. It reminds me of my mother.’

I do my best to imagine a bubble around me and hurry to keep up with her. We stride down a quiet street where two-storey brick houses are squashed up against one another.

‘Who’s your father?’ she asks.

‘Dave. Dave Banham.’

‘Oh. Dave and I were just friends. I left the circus a few months after he joined us …’ She gives a small smile. ‘Dave Banham, huh?’

As we climb wide stone steps to a red door, she takes off her gloves and fumbles in her bag. She’s wearing big chunky rings on nearly every finger, like Sylvie. My real mum doesn’t even wear her wedding ring.

She unlocks the door and we step into a warm, brightly lit hallway with patterned floor tiles. There’s the smell of something delicious cooking and a scruffy black dog scampers towards us. ‘This is Percy,’ she says, as the dog wags his tail madly and nudges my leg. ‘Let me take your jacket, and I’ll get you a nice dry jumper to wear.’ My mother never uses this super-polite, formal voice. It’s so unsettling to be talking to someone who looks like my mum, but is not loving and warm like my real mum.

She hangs my sodden jacket on a hook as I undo my shoes and peel off the special red socks I wear for our magic act. They land on the floor with a wet plop.

‘I’ll be back in a moment. Have a seat.’ She points through an open door to a room where a fire flickers in the fireplace. A blue velvet couch is piled with cushions and there’s a huge bunch of flowers on a wooden sideboard. I can’t imagine my real mum choosing anything in this room. She prefers a folding chair by a campfire and a bunch of wildflowers. Or weeds.

I perch on the couch and listen for sounds of other people in the house. If Meredith has kids, are they technically my brothers and sisters? Percy flops at my feet and has a bit of a scratch. The snow’s making a light thwacking sound on the window.

She returns with a light-blue woollen jumper. It’s the softest thing I have ever touched; it’s like wearing a cloud. But I’m still cold to my bones.

She sits beside me and passes me a pair of grey woollen socks. ‘Is Sylvie running the circus in your universe?’