Henna, satisfied with her reflection, picked up her handbag and went to the door. ‘We won’t have to soon. Just make sure your father comes back; he’ll listen to you. The sooner he leaves his silly fairy-tale idyll in England and comes back to Dhaka, the sooner everything will be back to normal.’ She walked out of the door, saying crossly, ‘You’ve made me late for my appointment now. I’ll be back for dinner.’ She marched off purposefully, leaving Shona in a crumpled heap of linen on the divan.

I can’t do this, Shona thought, exhausted. I was telling myself that the truth was overrated, but the real truth is this: I can’t pretend any more, for someone else’s sake, that things are the way they should have been rather than the way they are. She stood up unsteadily, and went to pick up the photo of her mother and Uncle Aziz on the dresser. Her unanswered question echoed insistently through her mind: who would they be protecting by bringing Papa back to play-act at happy families twenty years too late? Not herself or Amma, who both knew the truth about Papa’s double life already. Not Uncle Aziz or Ammie, who couldn’t care less about Papa and would prefer, as Amma knew well, that Papa remain where he was and the status quo remain unchanged. Not Verity or Candida, who would lose their husband and father, just so that Henna could gain back her trophy husband for appearance’s sake, and so Shona could maintain the cheap, flimsy pretence that her parents were happy. And this was worthless now that she could no longer deceive herself that they had a satisfactory, if unusual, arrangement.

Omar knocked softly on the door. ‘Hey, Amma, are you OK in there?’ he asked.

‘I’m fine, darling,’ replied Shona, replacing the photo and smoothing her hands over her face before opening the door.

‘You don’t look fine,’ commented Omar. ‘Have you and Nanu been arguing again?’

Shona shrugged, and nodded.

‘Something of a record, I guess. You managed to hold off for four hours,’ Omar teased gently. ‘Do you want to go for a walk before dinner? Head out to the bazaar or something.’

Shona nodded again, and managed a weak smile. She remembered something from the teatime, and said apologetically to her son, ‘I’m sorry about the set-up, I had no idea they had that planned. You don’t have to go, just to be polite.’ Shona paused, and then picked her words carefully. ‘What I mean is, I don’t want you to have to pretend to go along with things that Nanu might have planned, just for appearance’s sake.’