The feeling was no better when I left the house. Every paving stone on the streets of Clapham reminded me of her, as did the smell of coffee outside Starbucks and a sign for the nearby yoga studio. I couldn’t bear to go near the church hall where we had met at The Baby Group, taking the longer route around it to Sainsbury’s, rather than be transported back to the time Jason had sat in the same room as Lucy, both of them holding this big smutty secret between them. I wondered if it had excited them at all. It certainly helped to explain Jason’s weird behaviour at the session he came to. How Lucy had showed off with her speciality salads. Who was she trying to impress really? I wondered if Oscar knew about Jason too. I doubted there was any truth at all in her IVF and anonymous sperm donor story. How could she have been such a lying bitch?

I decided to try to make life as normal as possible for Joni, so that afternoon I took her to the playground on Clapham Common. But as I pushed her on the swing I momentarily froze, imagining I’d seen Lucy out of the corner of my eye, appearing behind me with Albie. When I turned it was just a stranger. I thought about spending a few more days away from the area to escape this feeling – to escape her. I considered booking me and Joni a flight to Dubai to stay with my dad, but he had moved in with a woman I had only ‘met’ on Skype and I decided I’d feel even more alienated over there, without Tara or my flat in easy reach.

I told Dad about Jason on the phone, and his reaction surprised me. Where I’d always got the impression Dad was slightly disappointed with Jason – that he thought I should be with a wealthier man, who could keep me in the luxury in which he had kept Mum – there was genuine sorrow in his voice. Once again I was hit by the physical pain of missing Mum. I felt sure I would have confided all this in her, and wondered what her advice might have been.

‘Whether or not he’s the father of that child, he’s still the father of yours, Aisha,’ Dad said. I sensed remorse in his voice. ‘Does Joni deserve to lose him from her life as well, over a foolish mistake? We men all make mistakes. We’re not as together as you women.’

I wondered if this was his way of saying sorry for his lack of engagement in my own life. Whether he was a keeper of secrets too. I got the feeling he felt guilty, although he couldn’t articulate it.

Saturday 14^th August

The next day, after a better night’s sleep, I was feeling stronger. And as each day passed, it started to take less and less time to root myself back in reality when my eyes opened each morning.