‘We’re going to get you proper help,’ she said, the words whispered into my smoke-stink hair. ‘I’ve had her number in my phone for months now, but I was too frightened to call. To make all of this real.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Her name’s Amber. She’s got… – well, apparently she’s a miracle worker. She’s an angel for addicts. All the people I’ve talked to can’t stop raving about how she changed their children’s lives.’ She manoeuvred my tear-stained face upwards with a light touch of her hand, looking into my swollen eyes. ‘What we need right now is some divine intervention.’

Addict.

I couldn’t quite screen out those two harsh syllables, but nor was I ready to accept them. I knew better than to challenge her, however.

Divine intervention. That was one phrase for what was coming.

LILY

I thought it would be a comfort. Her childhood bedroom, freshly ironed sheets, home-cooked meals. But of course ‘gratitude’ has never been Rachel’s middle name. She was surly and combative when she returned home. Nick was too infuriated to bother with her after a day of it, so I was left to take the flak. She holed up in her bedroom watching endless episodes of American dramas, tinny and nasal, through her battered laptop, ignoring the surround-sound TV in the living room. ‘Binge is such an unattractive word, isn’t it?’ I prompted her, but she kept her eyes trained on the screen as if my voice was the buzzing of a fly she was too lazy to swat.

The truth was that it hurt me. I would never have told her that – a fatal mistake perhaps – but every time I sent a spiky dart in her direction it was my heart that it pierced. I don’t know what I’d expected – your daughter being scraped off the pavement, unconscious, drooling tequila, is hardly the perfect precursor to quality mother/daughter time – but clearly some part of me was as deluded as she was. By the time the doorbell rang out on day five I was desperate for someone to break the spell.

There was something about the way she stood there that unsettled me – the sureness of her stance, as if the doorway was a gilt picture frame and she was a priceless piece of art. She didn’t speak immediately, just smiled.

‘Amber?’