Moving in together was tricky. It was also unusual. Most of her college friends remained in shared houses. They ate takeaways, drank in Bad Bob’s and spent any spare money on clothes and cassettes. For once, her father was vocal in his anger, his dark warnings about reputation and respectability slamming against the walls. Her mother talked him round, with soothing words about the ways of the modern world. ‘Twenty-year-olds don’t get married, these days,’ she said.

‘Fathers still worry about their daughters,’ he replied.

Fortunately, that very week, Tess appeared on The Late Late Show. She was chat-show catnip: witty, articulate – and gorgeous. She charmed the audience with her well-practised anecdote about being discovered while picking up litter outside a London burger bar. And she sidestepped the inevitable ‘Kilmitten, isn’t that the place where …?’ question with a careful answer about how young she’d been at the time. Chastened by Tess’s success, Nina’s dad responded with a muted ‘Who would have thought?’ He was subdued for some time afterwards.

Tess. How come none of them had seen what was in front of them? Presumably that was why Estelle Lonsdale was an internationally renowned model agent – a star in her own right – and the rest of them led more humdrum lives. Even Estelle must have been stunned by the speed and scale of Tess’s success, and by the way that success appeared to polish and enhance her natural beauty. Two months after signing with Platinum Model Management, she was tearing down the catwalk at London Fashion Week. Before long, she was in the style pages of The Face and i-D. Then she was on the cover. Other covers followed. She was in Milan, New York, Paris, Rio. She rarely returned to Ireland but did make occasional calls to fill them in on her adventures. And, of course, they could see her in countless magazines. ‘Here she is again,’ Tom would say, when he returned from work with a monthly glossy. Nina would gaze at the familiar heart-shaped face and wide green eyes with mystification, pride and – let’s be honest – not a little envy.

When they were children, Nina had been considered the pretty one. At primary school, she’d been the girl the others had gravitated towards. She supposed that when you were young you had one definition of beauty. Charlie’s Angels were beautiful, as were the bouncy-haired women on Dynasty and Falcon Crest. Beauty was tanned and big-toothed and Californian. Then you grew up and appreciated that beauty could be different. It could be pale and snaggle-toothed and Irish. It could be Tess.