My outfit from last night lay in a wrinkly heap on the floor and I threw it into the laundry, picking an almost identical ensemble for dinner. If all you own is black jeans and black tops then you never have to worry about what to wear. I didn’t bother trying to tackle my hair. It’s long and thick and takes years under a hair dryer to dry. Besides, although I pretend like I don’t care about such things, in fact, my hair looks its most fabulous when I let it air dry. It’s deep brown and goes halfway down my back. My mother used to trim the fringe when it got out of hand. She was really good at stuff like that. One Sunday a month she’d collar me. Right, you, time to do your fringe, it’s so long I don’t know how you see out of it. I’d protest but I’d always end up in the same place, on a chair in the kitchen with a towel around my neck. She’d snip the split ends and little clumps of my hair would fall into my lap.

I let my fringe grow out a long time ago. It’s a small thing to lose, but I’ve been losing something small every day for years and years and they all added up to something really big.

Dad had his happy face on when I limped downstairs. I tried to muster up a smile, a gift courtesy of the vague guilt I felt for throwing Mum in his face, even though he did it to me first. I’m too good for this world.

“Thanks for dinner,” I said, sticking my fork into a piece of unseasoned, grilled white fish. We ate in silence. I could tell he wasn’t mad about earlier. He probably felt guilty about what he said too, but neither of us are the type to actually apologize. We sweep it under the rug.

The rug had got awful lumpy.