“So, everybody, I got a message back from the first...er, from Dan McLachlan last night.” When she said it Leonard didn’t even care about the fried egg information anymore and did one of his fist pump thingies and went, aha, do tell! But I didn’t really know what to say or do. I mean, I sort of wanted to try a fist-pump too and I guess if I was ever going to do it that was the time. But I didn’t have a proper technique ready and Mum was looking at me a bit funny so I knew I had to come up with something quick or she’d start getting worried she’d done the wrong thing. Which is how she thinks. So I just said the very first thing that came into my head, which was I’m starving.

It’s not that I didn’t want to hear about what Dan said in his message and when we’d be meeting him and all that. It’s just that I really and truly was starving, which was quite weird for me, and there was no sign of Bill coming back with our bacon. I guess maybe I was a little bit scared of what Dan McWhatsy might have to say, as well. Because the thing is, like I said, I’m not even 100 percent sure wanting to find my dad was actually my idea. I’m not saying it was definitely Jax that changed the Five-Year Plan on the wall or anything, but you know, one never knows and all that.

Anyway, once everyone had agreed that they were all starving too Mum asked me if I wanted to listen to the message, and as soon as she said that I knew it wasn’t going to be great. Because Mum always says that bad news is better coming straight from the horse’s mouth and not secondhand. Which made me think straightaway that it was probably going to sound better coming from Dan McThingy himself that he was busy or out of town, or that we’d made a big mistake and he wasn’t who we thought he was. Only it was worse than that.

Mum put her phone on speaker and we all leaned forward and, right at the minute when I heard Dan go, “Hello? Look, hello, ummm...” Bill came back and slammed the front door so loud that we couldn’t hear and Mum had to start the message again. But straight after I did hear it I really wished that instead of Bill coming through that door it had been some robbers who stole Mum’s phone and then made us all lie facedown on the floor while they burgled Toad Hall. Because that Dan McNasty was a lot worse than a whole gang of robbers.

What he said was that he wasn’t interested and he didn’t want to know anything about me and Mum. Nothing, nada, nyet. Which I think is even meaner than if he’d said all those other things like being away or pretending he was someone else. Because by just saying he’s not interested what he’s really saying is, well, lady, maybe I am your kid’s father and maybe I’m not. Who knows. But whatever. I don’t care and I don’t want to meet you or your son. Ever. Sorry. I have a very important job and a wife and I already have a family, and actually you can scratch the sorry because he didn’t say sorry.