‘I’m so sick of you not taking my career seriously. I know you don’t get why I would want to work in forecasting, but I wouldn’t be going if this wasn’t really important to me. Why can’t you try to understand that?’ I sucked in a fierce breath. ‘Why can’t any of you, just once, try to understand me?’

‘No, Bea,’ Mia said. ‘You’re the one who doesn’t understand.’

‘Mia,’ Jed replied in a warning tone that sent my heart galloping.

‘Doesn’t understand what?’ I was virtually yelling now. ‘That you rate not disrupting the ridiculous Armstrong Family Christmas for a couple of days above my career, which happens to be every other day of the year? It’s Christmas, for goodness’ sake, there’ll be another one next year.’

‘That’s the point, though, isn’t it?’ Mia said. ‘There probably won’t be!’

‘No Christmas?’ Daisy and Frankie squealed in horror.

‘What are you talking about?’ I asked, even as Mum, Dad and Jed started to protest.

‘You might as well tell her,’ Mia said, waving her arms about. ‘She’s already spoiled your perfect plans.’

There was a charged silence. Mum leant on Dad’s shoulders, a tear trickling down one cheek. Jed’s face was solid concrete. Nana Joy sat at the table and sipped her hot chocolate, surreptitiously sliding the last piece of toast onto her plate.

‘Will someone please tell me what’s going on?’ I asked, voice trembling.

Eventually, Jed spoke. ‘We might have to close Charis House.’

‘What?’ I sank back against the worktop, my brain refusing to compute this information. Jed should know though – as well as teaching English and performing arts, he handled all the school finances.

‘Two more major donors have died in the past couple of years. Another one went bankrupt.’

While the council provided funding to run an alternative provision school and my parents sourced additional income where they could – for example the Christmas Spectacular – it wasn’t enough. Without generous regular donations from a group of Nana Joy’s old showbusiness friends, Charis House could never have opened, and certainly wouldn’t have survived this long. The emphasis was on ‘old’, though. Every time one of them either passed away or had to cease giving for other reasons, it left a bigger hole in the budget.

‘We need a new roof, and the heating system isn’t going to last much longer. With ongoing maintenance, it’ll cost hundreds of thousands just to keep the main house open. Let alone run a school on top of it.’ Mum’s shoulders slumped in defeat for what was probably the first time ever.

‘There must be other people you can ask.’ I looked desperately to Dad. ‘Aren’t there trusts and places where you can apply for grants?’