‘He was hurting my mom and wouldn’t stop,’ I said. ‘I was screaming at him, telling him to stop, but he wouldn’t listen – he just kept on hitting her and kicking her again and again. So I picked up the knife and asked him to stop one more time.’

The lawyer’s eyes had shot up to the brass plaque impregnated into the panelled wooden wall behind the judge, as if he were silently praying for patience.

‘But didn’t your mother say, “I’m going to kill you.” Meaning that she was intending to kill your father.’

I’d looked at my father, who was surreptitiously nodding his head.

‘Your honour, the defence is leading the witness,’ said the prosecution, standing up.

‘Rephrase the question,’ said the judge, a woman with short grey hair, whose face completely changed depending on who she was looking at.

‘So what happened next?’ the lawyer asked me.

I wasn’t quite sure. It had flashed in front of my eyes so many times, but it was at such speed that I couldn’t make sense of it. I’d tried to slow it all down, but it was still chaotic.

‘I . . . I . . .’

‘Just take your time,’ he’d said, but the angst on his face suggested he meant the opposite.

‘I . . . I stabbed him with it,’ I said, as quiet as a mouse.

‘She’s lying!’ my father yelled, gesticulating as he leapt up.

The judge slammed her hammer down on the desk. ‘You will refrain from speaking out unless asked to do so.’

I’d sat on my shaking hands, watching my father shrug off the security guard who was standing by his side.

The lawyer returned to where my father was seated and whispered something in his ear.

Dad’s mouth was pulled tight and he glared at me as he nodded in response.

‘Naomi. May I call you Naomi?’ asked the smug man, as he returned to stand in front of the witness box.

I didn’t want him to call me anything. I wanted to go home.

‘What has happened to your mother – to your family – is something no young girl should ever have to go through.’

The threat of tears pulled at my throat.

‘But I’m sure that you don’t need me to remind you that if your father wasn’t protecting himself against your mother, he can no longer cite self-defence for the crime he has committed.

I’d nodded, fully aware of what I was doing, if not entirely sure what it would mean for me. But I didn’t care – as long as he got what he deserved.