It had never been any different in their entire marriage. Her mum up at 5 a.m. to make the bread, her dad teaching at the grammar school he’d joined as a trainee when he’d first arrived in London. He was the deputy now, having worked his way up doggedly over the decades, still hoping for the headmastership that would never be given to him. He was not English, not even after thirty years of citizenship, and it made no difference how carefully he pressed his tie or how straight he kept his back. She could see that, even if he couldn’t. But retirement was still ten years away, as they sat on their inappropriately bright striped deckchairs on the concrete. They were intelligent people, she knew. So what was it that made them both fall into these roles? What was it that made them both cringe and dismiss her views when she used the word feminism?

‘Don’t you want to do something else?’ she asked her mother quietly, when her dad seemed to have closed his eyes.

Her mum smiled and shook her head.

‘You could do anything,’ Holly said, trying to imagine it. ‘You could …’

‘Oh, Harshini,’ her dad said, opening his eyes.

‘Holly,’ said Holly.

Her dad sighed. ‘These roles, as you call them, are useful. We’re doing what we want to do. Someone has to earn money, and someone has to stay home with the children – that’s how it works in a family.’

If he’d stopped there, she might not have lost her temper. But he went on. Told her the story of how she and her brother had been such different children. How she had been too scared to go on the climbing frame at the park – your brother would just run off, he said, he was fearless! But you preferred to stay close to your mother, play with your dolls.

‘And that’s OK,’ he said, as though trying to get her to accept who she was and just be happy. As if this story was proof – imagine it! – that little boys and little girls were intrinsically different. No acknowledgement of learned behaviour, of the impact of society, of school friends, of the clothes they were dressed in, of the way her brother had been thrown into the air and told he could do anything, while she was told to be careful, always, be careful. No, as far as her parents were concerned, boys and girls were simply different. That was what they actually believed.

She’d argued. She’d shouted. She’d felt something slipping away – she was sixteen years old and that was the moment when she realised that despite her love for them she fundamentally disagreed with her parents.

‘Keep your voice down, dear,’ her mum had said, and Holly’s reply had felt like it defined her:

‘I do not keep my voice down.’

Her dad had stood, turned his back, and walked away.