‘Why don’t you go look for them? Hurry up, we have to leave soon.’

‘I don’t have any socks,’ he shouted. ‘Why do you have to be so mean? You’re not the boss of me.’

Tears. My tone was shitty, my parenting shitty, everything shitty.

‘OK, look …’ I crouched in front of the table, cuddled him side-on. ‘I just need you to get your socks, Olly, please.’

Tears in his eyes. ‘I can’t find them. I’ve looked everywhere.’

‘I love you, Olly.’

‘You’re the worst dad ever.’

‘OK, come on, we’ll look together. Sophie, go put your jacket on.’

Oliver followed me into my room, stood behind me at the wardrobe.

‘Look, there are socks right there, next to the bed.’

‘They’re Zac’s,’ he said, still teary.

I crouched down, held him. ‘Olly, the sad truth is that I can’t find my socks either. Like, ever. I haven’t even packed my bag yet and I’m going to be really late for work. Could you please just keep –?’

A kid-sized sock on the floor. I lurched across to get it, threw it up to him.

‘That’s Sophie’s,’ he yelled. ‘I hate you.’

Stress, I’d read, could bring on a nosebleed. I wished it would – a bloodbath to balance my humours.

I ran around looking for their school hats and suncream, finished making their packed lunches, found their readers, filled their water bottles, said ‘fuck’ repeatedly under my breath, then louder, ‘chaos’.

‘What’s chaos?’ Sophie said from the bathroom.

‘This.’ I motioned around. ‘All of this is chaos.’

‘Like dirty?’

‘Not necessarily. Here, let me wipe your face.’

She came to me, tilted her head back, coughed, screwed her eyes while I wiped her cheeks, nose and chin with a warm facecloth. She was beautiful, small and precious. Five, alive.

‘It’s more that things don’t behave the way you think they should. It can make you feel like punching yourself in the face because everything’s such a massive effort.’

‘You and Mummy are chaos.’

‘Are we? Yeah, maybe. But people can’t really be chaos. They can bring chaos.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means get your shoes on. Daddy’s late, there are people waiting for me. I’m going to lose my job if we’re not out of here in the next five seconds.’

‘I can’t find my shoes. I think Olly hid them last night.’

‘Olly,’ I shouted.

‘What?’ he shouted.

‘Can you come through here?’

‘No.’

‘Don’t be cheeky. Come through, I need to speak to you.’

‘No.’

I kept my eyes peeled on the drive to school, did sixty-five in a forty-kilometre-an-hour zone with cars parked either side and regular blind spots. If anyone stepped out unexpectedly, there was every chance I’d kill them, making me even later for work.