‘After everything she’s done for you! You got it from your father. Bad genes. I am so ashamed of you, Tim. I can’t bear it.’ In her rage, her accent has got stronger and her voice louder, and people are looking at us.

Over the years, I’ve trained myself to let her cruelties wash over me, but she’s never said these things in public before. ‘That’s not why. She’s . . . we’re . . . we’re not sure anymore. About marriage.’

‘But you’re made for each other. You always were.’

‘All done?’ the waitress regrets her question as soon as she sees Mum’s face, and snatches away our plates before scuttling back to the kitchen.

‘Mum, I’m trying my hardest to make it better, but it might not be enough—’

‘Trying your hardest? That’s defeatist talk. You need to fight with all you’ve got.’

‘Sometimes you can fight and you can fight but it won’t change someone’s mind.’

I never told her I heard the rows. She fought for my father. Cajoled and seduced and wept and raged and begged and it made no difference. That’s how I learned that telling someone how you feel is not enough. It simply piles humiliation on top of pain.

On the journey back, Mum’s hostile silence seems bigger than the car. She maintains it all the way back to Brighton. I park Kerry’s mother’s Fiesta in their driveway but when I try to persuade my mother into her wheelchair to get across the road, she shrugs me off and stumbles painfully back to the bungalow.

Kerry isn’t due home till late. Mum pushes open the door to her bedroom but I catch it before it slams behind her.

‘I know you’re upset but—’

‘You’re risking everything, Tim. What would you be without her? Nothing, that’s what.’

It’s the kind of thing I heard her shout at my dad before he left. ‘Do you really mean that?’

Doubt crosses Mum’s face, and shock at being challenged. ‘Maybe I’m too harsh, sometimes, son. But it’s always because I want you to be the best you can be. And I know you need Kerry a hell of a lot more than she needs you.’

She waves me out of the way and closes the door.

In the kitchen I pour myself a shot of cooking brandy. It tastes disgusting but not as bad as knowing my own mother – who adores me more than any other person in the world – thinks I am doomed without Kerry in my life.