“And then he’s gone, and I snuggle down the bed again, feeling a little bit guilty, but not that much, and before I know it I’m dropping off to sleep again. I don’t know how long I’m asleep, but it’s the front door bell that wakes me. So I go downstairs, a bit fed up, thinking that Dad’s forgotten his key accidentally on purpose, just to get me out of bed, and there’s the police standing there, two of them, one woman, one man, and they’re both looking as if they don’t quite know what to say. Then the policeman asks me if my mum’s in, and I tell him that Dad’ll be back soon, that he’s just gone down the shop for some milk. I see them looking at one another, and the policeman takes off his cap and asks if they can come in for a moment.

“That’s the first time I think something’s wrong – it’s just the way they look at each other. But they won’t say what it is, nor who they want, nor what the matter is. They just ask where Mum has gone and they say they’d like to speak to her, so I give them her mobile number. The policeman goes out and leaves me with this policewoman who tries to smile at me and make conversation, but she can’t do either, not really. So we’re just sitting there, the two of us – it seems like for hours – while he’s phoning up and stuff, and still Dad doesn’t come back and doesn’t come back, and I’m wondering why, and knowing by now that something really bad must have happened to him, or maybe to Mum. I keep asking what’s going on, but she won’t say.

“Then Mum comes in and I can see she’s been crying, and she takes me upstairs and we sit on the bed together, and she tells me. It was a lorry that did it, ran out of control at the bottom of the hill, mounted the pavement outside the shop just when Dad was coming out with the milk. But it wasn’t the lorry that killed him. It was me, using up all the milk to make my hot chocolate, me staying in bed when he asked me to go.”

All the time Becky was talking the dogs’ eyes never left her face. “I’ve never talked about it to anyone else, except Dad of course. I’ve talked to him lots of times, up on High Moor, and he’s all right about it. He says it wasn’t my fault, but then he would say that, wouldn’t he? Because he wants me to feel better about it. He told me I should tell Mum, that she won’t be upset, and just to get on with my life. But I can’t forget it, and I can’t tell Mum either, because I know she’ll hate me for ever, like I hate myself. And anyway, I don’t reckon Mum thinks about Dad that much any more, not with Craig around. She hardly ever talks about him. Sometimes I think she’s deliberately trying to forget him. Maybe it’s the only way she can put up with horrible Craig. She doesn’t even like me talking about him, says it upsets Craig.