When she was eight, Sylvia walked home from primary school to Maggie’s house one day to find Maggie’s mother sitting in the kitchen drinking tea with two other women. All three were pregnant, their bellies in various degrees of expansion, but all, to Sylvia’s eyes, weirdly, grotesquely bloated. One was balancing a mug on her belly, the steam rising into the kitchen. Another was so big she couldn’t sit right up against the table because her bump was in the way. As for Maggie’s mother, when she saw them she stood up and her large stomach momentarily threw her off balance so she swayed backwards and steadied herself against the kitchen worktop. Whoopsadaisy! she’d said and laughed, because it was funny, or at least Sylvia could see now, looking back, that it was. But back then, aged eight, she didn’t think so. The women’s overblown bellies shocked her, bewildered her, their laughter was confusing. Soon they descended into hysterics, tears rolling down their faces, and Sylvia remembered being appalled. It wasn’t funny, this strange inflation act that had somehow been performed on all three of them. It wasn’t funny at all.

The memory came back to her as she stood in the apartment, listening to Evelyne explain how Daniel and Anna had arrived that morning and needed to stay with her for a while. Something about having run away, left the family farm. She remembered what Evelyne had told her when she’d first met her brother: He’s had a falling out with our father. Again. It happens a couple of times a year at least. She guessed it was just a repeat performance – only this time he had his pregnant girlfriend in tow.

‘I’m so sorry,’ Evelyne said in a quiet voice, though Sylvia was sure from Anna’s blank expression that the girl couldn’t understand French in any case. ‘I didn’t know they were coming, it’s all a bit of a shock…’ she trailed off, her eyes flicking to Anna’s belly, as though she couldn’t quite believe what she saw. ‘Monique will put you up. She’s just around the corner. Would you mind? We’ll still spend the weekend together, go to the festival. I can’t throw them out and there’s no space for another guest.’

‘No problem at all,’ Sylvia said. She put her hand on Evelyne’s arm, keen to quell her obvious stress at these unexpected guests. ‘I don’t mind where I stay.’