‘Is that such a bad thing?’ he asks, and I think before I reply. It is true that the idea of being home for the festivities with David – but no Anna – filled me with enough dread to embark on this trip in the first place, but I am also unnerved by the prospect of being completely alone, too. Before I can say as much, though, David beats me to it.

‘We can Skype on the day,’ he suggests. ‘And afterwards you can sunbathe. Think of that!’

‘I never sunbathe,’ I remind him, but I appreciate his attempt at jollying. I only have to get through two potentially difficult and isolated days, really – and Queenstown is a party town. There are sure to be places open on Christmas Day, so drinking myself into oblivion is a viable – if foolhardy – option.

‘I can get through Christmas,’ I say determinedly. ‘But what am I going to do until then?’

I curse the words almost as soon as I utter them, because I know what David will say. I wait for the indulgent chuckle that always pre-empts any utterance relating to his beloved storybook character, then clench my teeth together in anticipation.

‘Well, that’s easy,’ he says, all chirpy now. ‘You just have to ask yourself what Evangeline would do.’

11

Bonnie

Exhausted from her long journey and soothed by half a bottle of very good red wine, Bonnie had forgotten to close the bedroom curtains before she got into bed the previous night, but it was not the light that woke her. A message had come through from Tui at around five a.m., saying that she loved and missed her – and that Beavis had chewed a big hole through the toe of one of her shoes, so could Bonnie bring her a new pair back from England. Bonnie had got her daughter a mobile in case of emergencies, and as far as she knew, Tui only had three phone numbers stored in there – her dad Simon’s, Bonnie’s and Kit’s. No doubt Kit was mainly subjected to lots of texts telling him to bring her a ‘surprise’ from the shop. He had been treating her to toys, chocolates and trinkets since she was a toddler, and the habit had stuck.

Leaving Tui behind in New Zealand to come here to England was the hardest thing that Bonnie had ever had to do. Well, she countered internally – the second hardest. She had been absolutely fine, right up until the point when the plane began to taxi to the runway, and then she’d started to panic. A cold sweat had crept over her in seconds, and her hands had begun to shake so violently that the man in the seat next to her, presumably thinking that she had a severe fear of flying, offered her a sip of brandy from a hip flask in his inside pocket.