Lana, he realised, had enjoyed giving him the truth about the situation. Lana had never really been right with him since before his marriage to her only daughter. She had seemed to change overnight. He had put it down to his own mother’s interference, and Lana’s natural concerns for her only daughter. Now, though, he couldn’t help wondering if she just didn’t like him. She had once been his biggest fan – now she had no real care for him at all. Every time Josephine had lost a child, Lana had been there, holding her daughter’s hand, and he had seen her watching him closely, as he grieved the loss of his child with his wife. He had felt her blaming him for each one, even as he guessed that she didn’t want her daughter to carry his spawn.

While they were childless, Lana felt that she had the upper hand. As though the marriage wasn’t really consummated and, therefore, it could be dissolved. She didn’t understand that, as much as he wanted a child, he would always want Josephine more. She was everything to him, and she always would be. It was Josephine who craved a child. He didn’t care any more one way or the other. He just wanted his wife, his Josephine.

He smiled amiably, unwilling to let this woman know that she had affected him in any way. ‘Well, Lana, that’s told me, all right. In future, I will keep my fucking trap shut.’

Josephine could sense the animosity coming not only from her mother, but also from her husband. He had every right to feel aggrieved. Her mother had no right to treat him as she did, to show her contempt for him, and the life he lived. He provided her with everything she could want and more. Josephine knew that she had to say something to her mother. She had to show Michael that she understood how he was feeling, that she was on his side, as she always had been and always would be.

‘That’s enough, now. I think it’s time you went home, Mum.’

Lana looked at her daughter in disbelief. She was being asked to leave, told to leave. It wasn’t a request, her daughter was aiming her out the door all right. It was a dismissal.

Michael smiled genuinely then. He was pleased that Josephine could see his point of view, understood how he hated it when her mother treated him with such contempt in his own home.

Lana felt her face flush with humiliation. Josephine treating her so shabbily hurt her deeply, but she couldn’t retaliate.

‘Come on, Mum, Dad will be wondering where you are.’