This, I was sure, was strictly for the benefit of us kids; most other Saturday nights I bet they’d have closed that door, or at least have gone out with Andy’s friends or my mom’s new colleagues at the TV station in Monterey where she’d been hired. They were obviously trying to establish some sort of domestic pattern to make us kids feel secure. You had to give them snaps for doing their best.

I wondered, as I stood there, waiting for the popcorn to pop, what my dad thought of all this. He hadn’t been too enthused about Mom’s remarrying, even though, as I’ve said, Andy is a pretty great guy. He’d been even less enthused about my moving out to the West Coast.

‘How,’ he’d wanted to know, when I told him, ‘am I going to pop in on you when you’re living three thousand miles away?’

‘The point, Dad,’ I’d said to him, ‘is that you aren’t supposed to be popping in on me. You’re supposed to be dead, remember? You’re supposed to be doing whatever it is dead people do, not spying on me and Mom.’

He’d looked sort of hurt by that. ‘I’m not spying,’ he’d said. ‘I’m just checking up. To make sure you’re happy, and all of that.’

‘Well, I am,’ I’d assured him. ‘I’m very happy, and so is Mom.’

I’d been lying, of course. Not about Mom, but about me. I’d been a nervous wreck at the prospect of moving. Even now, I wasn’t really sure it was going to work out. This thing with Jesse . . . I mean, where was my dad, anyway? Why wasn’t he upstairs kicking that guy’s butt? Jesse was, after all, a boy, and he was in my bedroom, and fathers are supposed to hate that kind of thing . . .

But that’s the thing about ghosts. They are never around when you actually need them. Even if they happen to be your dad.

I guess I must have zoned out for a little while because next thing I knew, the microwave was dinging. I took the popcorn out and opened the bag. I was pouring it into a big wooden bowl when my mom came into the kitchen and switched on the overhead light.

‘Hi, honey,’ she said. Then she looked at me. ‘Are you all right, Suzie?’

‘Sure, Mom,’ I said. I shovelled some popcorn into my mouth. ‘Dope – I mean, Brad and I are gonna watch a movie.’

‘Are you sure?’ My mother was peering at me curiously. ‘Are you sure you’re all right?’

‘Yeah, I’m fine. Just tired, is all.’

She looked relieved. ‘Oh, yes. Well, I expected you’d have a bit of jet lag. But . . . well, it’s just that you looked so upset when you first walked into your room upstairs. I know the canopy bed was a bit much, but I couldn’t resist it.’

I chewed. I was totally used to this kind of thing. ‘The bed’s fine, Mom,’ I said. ‘The room’s fine, too.’