When the mother isn’t looking, Anastasia makes a gun of her fingers and pretends to shoot the kid in the back of the head. Liam laughs, but is a little shocked all the same, despite himself. The boy’s only about seven, after all. But she does make him laugh, even if sometimes her edginess takes him by surprise.

Soon it is their turn and she pulls him into the photo booth, wrenching the curtain across so savagely it screeches on the runners.

He sits down and she turns and straddles him on the seat, so he gasps and says, ‘We can’t, not here,’ and she sighs and calls him a spoilsport again, climbing off.

She sits demurely on his lap the right way round but they both crack up laughing because it’s not exactly comfortable for either of them, thanks to her behaviour a moment before, and they are still laughing when the camera goes pop, pop, pop, pop and takes their pictures.

AUTUMN 2018

ELLIOTT

It was early October. So far on my enforced absence from work, I’d mended a squeaky wardrobe door, sorted out some boxes that hadn’t been opened since we moved in, cooked a range of new dishes (with varying degrees of success) and been running every day.

The worst time was around four pm when I would normally be leaving school and I’d see and hear local kids arriving home. It was hours until Anya would be back. It was the time of day, now autumn was kicking in, when the walls seemed to close in.

I had written my apology to Bennett and was waiting for a formal hearing in a week’s time to find out what was ultimately going to happen. Anya and I’d had several late-night conversations about what I would do if things didn’t go my way, which usually ended up with her suggesting we borrow money from Julia and Patrick so I could ‘retrain’.

As what? I only wanted to be a teacher. And the thought of living off my in-laws for the foreseeable future made me want to gnaw off my own arm in frustration. Anya claimed not to understand this attitude and called it ‘macho bullshit’, at which point I would usually sulk in a different room for a while until we made up again.

So things were strange at home. We hadn’t yet worked out the new shape of our life together after it had been thrown into the air and scattered in pieces.

The letterbox clanged and, keen to avoid my run on what was turning out to be a cold day, I went into the hall to collect the post.

There was a Visa bill for me, and what looked like a card. It wasn’t either of our birthdays.