‘No, it’s not,’ said Tess. ‘What about his family?’

‘What about them? They’re nothing to do with us.’

‘When did he die … and how?’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ said her mam, in a staccato voice. ‘Now, I’ve said more than enough. Leave me be, okay?’

With that, she’d abandoned her half-made cheesecake and hurtled out of the kitchen like a sulky teenager. Three hours later, she’d reappeared, the filmy look in her eyes revealing that she’d been crying. Tess tried to say something, but her mam didn’t want to listen. ‘We’ve got to go to dinner,’ she said. ‘Please don’t let me down.’

The evening was awkward. It might have been like that anyway. Twenty-four hours earlier, Conor and Tess hadn’t known that their parents were seeing each other. Now, they were sitting around the dinner table, eating roast chicken and discussing baby names and wedding venues. They were going to move in together, they said. Conor teased them, then gushed about how delighted he was. Tess stayed quiet. He gave her a nudge.

‘Fantastic,’ she said. ‘Just fantastic. I take no one minds if I smoke.’ Although she could tell that Conor was annoyed with her, she didn’t care. She didn’t want to be there. She wanted to be alone so she could digest what her mam had told her.

Her father was gone. She would never meet him, let alone get to know him. He would never see her in a magazine or on the TV.

For the remainder of the weekend, barely a word passed between mother and daughter. Before she left for New York, Tess did make one further attempt to talk about her father. Her mam responded with a funny look, like she was chewing something sour, and Tess swallowed what she’d wanted to say.

Since then, they’d spoken only once. Her mother had rung to say she’d left Pearse Terrace. Tess’s belongings – some clothes, a prehistoric cassette player and a box of assorted trash – were in Paula’s old room. ‘We’re doing up Conor’s for the baby,’ she said. ‘It’s bigger and brighter, but there’ll always be a bed here for you. You know that, don’t you?’

‘I’m likely to be busy over the next while,’ Tess replied.

‘Suit yourself. I’ve got to go. I don’t want to be hogging the phone.’

Then her mother hung up without saying goodbye.

Belinda told Tess to look up so she could apply some eyeliner. A crescent of ooh-ers and ah-ers peered on, while the photographer, an overbearing character called Rik, adjusted the lighting. ‘World class,’ everybody said about Rik. ‘A genius.’ He was also a legendary name-dropper, and Tess knew she’d have to endure a stream of comments about what Christy, Cindy and Naomi were up to.