Then her face clouded over with confusion. She looked down at her hand and seemed surprised to see the knife. Her muscles relaxed as her tension visibly eased. She took a couple of unsteady steps towards the pool then her knees buckled. As they did her fingers loosened and the knife fell, clattering against the terrace. She crumpled, dropped to her knees, her head in her hands. ‘I’m… I…’

‘You’re all right, Eleanor.’ Max’s soothing voice talked over her feeble whimpering.

‘All right?’ It was Edie. ‘Are you insane?’ She walked towards her mother and stood over her. ‘Jesus, look at yourself. You’re pathetic.’

‘Edith,’ said Max, in a low warning rumble. ‘Your mother’s tired. She’s feeling unwell. She needs to sleep.’

‘Tired and unwell?’ Edie laughed bitterly. ‘She’s a fucking junkie.’

‘Edith, this is not the time.’

Edie turned on her father then. ‘Why are you always making excuses for her? You think that helps her? Is letting her drink herself into a coma every day then carrying her up to bed so much easier than helping her? Do you care about her at all?’

A strangled broken sob came out of Eleanor then.

Edie began to cry bitter tears which she swiped at with the back of her hand. ‘Do you know what it’s like living with an alcoholic mother? Being sent away at eight years old and the last thing I remember being the fumes on your breath when you tell me to stop crying and be brave? Hating school but feeling relieved to get back because watching you drink yourself stupid was living hell? Never knowing which version of my mother I’d get?’

Eleanor lifted her head and looked at Edie with red-rimmed, puffy eyes.

‘Alcohol stole my mother. Every memory I have of you comes with the stench of it.’ Tears spilled down Edie’s face, dragging her mascara into long black lines. ‘All I ever wanted was a normal mum. Someone who brought me soup when I was ill or gave me advice about boys. A mother who worried about me. Not the other way round. I hate that I wasted so much of my childhood terrified, picking up leaflets on addiction from the doctor, trying to find AA meetings to fix you, just to have you shout at me. Because you don’t want fixing, do you, Eleanor?’

‘Edith—’

‘I don’t want to hear it, Max.’ Her voice was softer. Resigned. ‘It doesn’t matter anymore. You can do what you want. You can let her drink herself to death for all I care because I’m finished here.’

‘What do you—’

‘I’m leaving.’

‘Leaving?’ said Max.

‘With Jay.’

I inhaled sharply and looked at my brother, but his face registered no surprise or protest.

‘We’re leaving this afternoon. I’ve packed my bags and you can’t stop me.’

Eleanor slowly focused her faltering gaze on Jago.