Toffee is another of Cora’s bugbears. She cannot understand why I’ve lumbered her son with an ugly little mongrel, when I could have chosen a much more attractive animal with a proper pedigree.

‘No. I thought it was a bit odd at the time.’

‘Oh dear. This is very distressing. Let me get my thoughts together.’ She hands the phone over to Tim, whispering, ‘It’s about Nick, she doesn’t know where he is.’

Nick took me to meet his parents three months after we started seeing each other. He told them about Lottie in advance, wanting them to get used to the idea before they met me. He had also told them that I’d been orphaned at a young age and had spent a year in the care system. I’d argued against it – I came from a world they knew nothing about; one that they would never have expected to brush up against; a world of poverty, benefits and deprivation, but he said it was important to him that I could be myself and assured me that his mother, a lawyer, knew exactly what poverty looked like. I was pathetically anxious to be liked, so I didn’t really see the merits of that strategy. If she knew about it, then she wouldn’t want me near her son. I didn’t say that to Nick though.

Their smiles were in place when they came to the door of their pretty country house. They had left London and settled in rural Leicestershire once Nick had gone to university. Nick was hugged and kissed, and so was I, though Tim’s hug was several degrees warmer than Cora’s. I was wearing tight jeans and a woolly sweater – nothing controversial – and Nick had bought me an oilskin coat and a pair of hardy walking boots. One of the first things Cora said to me was, ‘Isn’t that Nick’s sweater?’ then, turning to Nick, ‘Didn’t I buy it for you for Christmas, darling? It was rather expensive.’ She might as well have said, ‘What are you doing with it?’

I remember the feeling of the air going out of me, of my eagerness slipping away, of my whole perspective changing. I held tight to my daughter, but any thoughts I’d had on how I’d behave, what I’d chat about, melted to nothing.