‘No, twats will be twats,’ I sighed, throwing down my trowel and wiping my sweaty head on the edge of my gardening glove. ‘What all-nighter?’ He threw me his usual zipped-mouth and I went back to digging my borders. ‘Well, I’m fed up. They’ve eaten all my Pop Tarts—’

‘Paco doesn’t like synthetic food.’

‘No, the other Chipmunks – Alvin, Simon and Theodore.’

He chuckled. ‘I’ll order more Pop Tarts.’

‘—and the empanadas I made you. And Paco always drinks the milk out of my cereal bowl, I mean, what the hell is that about?’

‘I said they could have the empanadas. I’ll talk to Paco about the milk.’

‘I don’t want them here. I don’t want their feet on the furniture, their sticky beer marks on the coffee table, their stinky cigarette smoke, their thumping music, their mud-spattered hatchbacks on our driveway—’

‘It not your house, Rhiannon.’

‘I’m well aware of that,’ I spat. ‘Sorry.’

‘You need to cool off,’ he said, his car keys in his fist. ‘You’ve worked hard today. The flowers look wonderful. Now you should rest up, big day tomorrow, huh?’

‘Thanks.’ I rubbed the centre of my chest. ‘I’m all acidy.’

‘Come on. I’ll take you to town. We’ll get an ice cream.’

It was such a Dad thing to do – take me away from the situation and buy me an ice cream – and although it was slightly patronising, I went, if only to get out of the house for a while. He made me wear sunglasses and one of Marisol’s straw hats so I could hide my face and dropped me off on the beachfront, unfolding a wad of notes and shoving it into my hand as I closed the door.

‘Go shop, buy things… I got some business to take care of. I’ll pick you up in an hour at the bakery.’

I looked at him. ‘What’s this, pocket money?’

‘You’ve worked hard for me this week. Buy yourself some new clothes.’

‘I don’t want new clothes.’

‘Stay out of trouble. I’ll see you in an hour.’

Dad would say the same thing – Here you go, treat yourself to some sweets, I’ve got to take care of some business. Or, Wait here in the car, I won’t be long, read your comic. I’m just gonna go in here and beat this guy to a pulp with my mates, but don’t tell your mother. Nothing had changed. Nothing had fucking changed since I was in single digits.