A light of what was probably misplaced understanding glimmered in her eyes. “Ah, bon. Then, yes, it is about being, as they say, friends with a jigsaw. One is not efficient when one is being friends with a jigsaw. Now”—her tone grew brisk—“help me be friends with this jigsaw because I am quite stuck.” She squinted at her various clusters of Moomin. “I am looking for the last piece of Papa’s hat.”

“And you don’t think it’d be better to—” I let it go. And started combing through the nine hundred and twenty-six pieces that remained in the thousand-piece jigsaw to find the one bit that had a fragment of Moomin top hat on it.

To Mum’s credit, it was quite a relaxing process. I mean, I don’t think I became friends with the jigsaw. But I did get to know a reasonable amount about it.

“So,” asked Mum, holding a piece to the light like she was checking it wasn’t a forgery, “what has happened with you and Oliver?”

Obviously, it was complex, and there were two sides to every story, and Mum cared about both of us, and if I wanted her to give me good advice, I’d present the situation in the fairest, most impartial way I could. “He was just a dick,” I explained. “He’s been a dick for months.”

There was a pause, Mum carefully finishing Moomin Mama’s bowl of fruit. “Are you sure? Because you know I love you, but between you and Oliver, if I had to guess who was the bigger dick, I would not normally expect it to be him.”

“Thanks. And…and…I’ve been very reasonable. While he’s turned into some kind of steamrollery wedding tyrant.”

Another pause as Mum either thought about this or got distracted by weird blue-eyed children. “Marriage is complicated, and weddings are complicated, but most importantly weddings are not marriages.”

“Are you sure?” I demanded. “Because you know what they say. Steamrollery wedding tyrant me once, shame on you. Steamrollery wedding tyrant me for the rest of my life, shame on me.”

“I do not like that idiom as much as be friends with a jigsaw.” Mum sighed. “I can see why you are concerned, but you have been with Oliver for more than two years, and he has never been like this before—”

“Actually,” I admitted, “he’s quite like this. But I thought I liked it.”

“And you don’t anymore?”

I tried to wedge a piece of top hat into place, but it turned out to be part of a cat’s arse. “It just feels different now. Everything is all…I don’t know.”

“He’s also just lost his father,” Mum pointed out. “That can be very hard.”