I always wondered why Mum and Dad never had another child. I remember asking them once, separately. Mum said I was all she needed. Dad said Mum didn’t want go through it all again. I knew I wasn’t exactly a planned baby, and sometimes – usually when I’d had a row with Mum over homework or chores or how late I could stay out – I wondered if perhaps she’d have preferred not to have had me. Once, in a fit of rage, I slung that accusation at her like an uppercut. I remember how she flinched like I had physically hit her, how she put her hands on my arms and looked me right in the eye and said, No, never, not for one second.

Growing up, it didn’t really matter to me not to have a sibling. I had plenty of friends, a conveyor belt of piano lessons and netball games and drawing classes to keep me entertained, sporadic but thrilling excursions with Maggie, and the undivided attention of my parents when they were home. But now I yearn for a brother or sister, someone who could really understand what it might feel like to be told your parents aren’t your own.

<From: [email protected]>

Dear Mr Buchs,

I can’t really explain on email why I need to find Brigitte/Anna – it’s a long story. In short, something happened to my mother in 1976, and I think Anna may know what that was. Please, are you able to give me her number or email address?

I sit back in the garden chair and survey what I’ve written. And does she have a daughter living in Montreux? That’s what I want to ask. The thought of her name – my probable biological mother’s name – on the letter in Julia’s drawer makes the skin on the back of my neck prickle.

Admittedly, my internet search for Anna Meier turned up millions of page results, so there’s clearly more than one out there. But can it really just be a coincidence that Julia knows an A. Meier, that her own maiden name is Meier? I stare at her through the window, pottering about the kitchen, going to the fridge, grabbing glasses from the cupboard. I can’t face the idea that she could be…