Ava brought down a vase and a jug from the cupboard and put them on the kitchen table.

‘Sometimes her clients send her things.’

‘No way,’ I said. ‘They’re definitely from an admirer.’

Over the years, Mum had brought back an odd assortment of gifts from grateful people whose hair she had cut. As well as the bottles of wine and boxes of chocolate, there had been more unusual offerings: a framed picture of children in a forest created by snipping holes in folded black paper, a miniature chest of drawers formed of matchboxes glued together, and, once, a full set of old encyclopaedias, which someone had given to us because Mum had told them how brainy Ava was. Ava hadn’t been in the least grateful and had pointed out that they were out of date and it was all online now and we didn’t have space for them anyway, and the encyclopaedias had ended up going to the charity shop.

Once someone had given Mum a primrose in a pot that had died the following week. But no one had ever, ever sent her red roses.

Ava had a quick look at the card too.

‘I think someone’s fallen in love with her,’ I said.

She turned and shot me a look that fell somewhere between You don’t know what you’re talking about and You might be right, and just at that moment she looked sly and lovely, with her big eyes and smooth cheeks and slightly unruly blonde hair. Like a girl who would be the main character in a film, while the other girls who didn’t quite match up had to be her friends or rivals or comic light relief.

Ava was really pretty, but when you lived with her all the time, you tended to forget about this and just notice whether she looked tired or whether her hair looked good that day or if she had a spot on her nose. But sometimes other people commented on it and then you remembered. And sometimes you just looked at her and the light hit her face in a certain way and you just had to admit it – it was a fact of life, like bananas growing on trees or the North Pole being cold.

In one way it wasn’t great for me, because I wasn’t especially pretty myself – my eyes were too small and my nose was too big and everything else about me was middling and nondescript. On the plus side, though, I saw an awful lot of her, and you might as well have someone good-looking around the place as not.

Ava said, ‘Someone’s definitely interested in her. That doesn’t mean it’s love. It could just be some creepy old guy with a fetish for hairdressers. Ellie, one of these days you’re going to wake up and realise the real world isn’t as sweet and innocent as you think it is.’ She started running water into the sink. ‘I’m going to put them in here for now. Mum can split them later. She might as well get the full effect first.’