“Jake! Jake! . . . Guess what? . . . Nory and Ameerah are going to be at that house party Thomas was talking about . . . I know . . . Yes, I told her they have to come down to see us . . . Hang on, I’ll ask . . . Dad says will you be bringing one of your Tory capitalist boyfriends with you?”

Nory rolled her eyes. As far as her dad was concerned, any man earning a living in London must be a Tory capitalist.

“No, tell him not to worry, no boyfriends this time.”

Nory had given up introducing boyfriends to her dad. He was a fiercely proud working-class man, originally from Yorkshire, and no matter how left leaning Nory’s boyfriends were, somehow, they never measured up to her dad’s standards. Even if their politics aligned with her dad’s own views, the dinner table discussions would soon become a competition of who was more working class. (Her dad always won.) Unless Nory could produce a man who strode into the kitchen with a pickax over one shoulder and hands callused to the point they resembled tree bark, they were unlikely to impress her dad.

“Do you want Thomas to pick you and Ameerah up from the station?”

“No thanks, Mum, we’ll make our own way.”

Ameerah had a brand-new Mini Countryman sitting in the garage below her apartment block in Mayfair that saw very little use, since parking in central London was horrific and you could get everywhere you needed to faster by Tube.

“Okay, love. It’ll be lovely to see you. And then it’ll only be a few weeks till Christmas, and we’ll see you again! What a nice treat.”

London was less than two hours by train from the small village of Hartmead, but it might have been another country as far as her mum was concerned. Her parents rarely visited Nory, and each time they did, her mum marveled anew at how tiny her flat was and the enormity of her rent.

“It’ll be lovely to see you too, Mum.”

“I’ll tell Thomas he was right about that Pippa. Jackson lost a tooth last week, did Thomas tell you?”

“Erm, no he didn’t, Shelley sent me a photo.”

Shelley was her sister-in-law and the only person with the power to make her sullen brother smile, or maybe he smiled at everyone and reserved his scowls for his kid sister.

“Bless him, you can see the new tooth already, it looks like a big one, I think he might have buckteeth like you did before your braces. Do you remember Thomas used to call you Bugs Bunny?”

“Yes, Mum, I remember.”

Occasionally he still called her Bugs even now. Nory and her brother’s relationship was equal parts affection and low-level resentment. There were times when she just couldn’t be arsed to deal with the latter.