I always know when I’m feeling insecure by what I eat – it’s called comfort eating for a reason – and I’m halfway through making meatloaf before I even realize what I’m doing. I chop an onion whilst trying to dislodge the fear that my father and sister have formed an alliance to wreak revenge. I crack an egg whilst imagining one or both of them in my office this morning and the next thing I know, I’m knuckle-deep in mince, whilst desperately trying to stop my over-active imagination from running away with me. Though there’s no denying that the door was open, a dead bird lay on the threshold, and at least one client’s file is missing.

I will myself to stay calm, telling the part of me that’s prepared to listen that this is crazy. After being inside for a quarter of a century, the last thing my father’s going to want to do is waste the precious time he’s got left coming after me.

I can’t remember the last time I made my mother’s signature dish, but just the smell of the sage and mustard takes me back to sitting around the dinner table in our Colonial out on Long Island.

When I was younger, when I thought the only nutrition I needed came in the form of Twinkies and peanut butter sandwiches, my father would make me sit at that table until I’d eaten all my greens.

Looking back, I’m sure I only ever had four mouthfuls to endure before I could get down and go and join my cabbage-loving sister in the yard. But at the time, it felt like an eternity, and I would retch and gag whilst my father kept a watchful eye on any scraps I was managing to feed the dog.

It shouldn’t be a memory that reassures me when I feel unassured, yet just the thought of the four of us being together, before our world was blown apart, wraps itself around me like a weighted blanket.

I’m still kneading the mixture when the shrill ring of my phone transports me out of my childhood home and back into the one I sometimes still don’t feel grown-up enough to live in.

I brace myself for Aunt Meryl, having remembered to tell me something else I don’t want to know. But as I quickly rinse my hands and take the tea towel across to the island where my phone is charging, I’m surprised and mildly alarmed to see Jacob’s number flashing incessantly on the screen.

For a split second, I consider not answering it. And perhaps, if Leon were here, I wouldn’t feel able to, but Jacob and I have already crossed into a more personal relationship and I can’t expect the blurred lines to come into sharp focus whenever it doesn’t suit me, or Leon.