They hammer on our sage-green front door and ring the bell excitedly. Seconds later, the door opens and Matt peers out, his blonde hair flopping over his eyes. The kids hurl themselves at their father. I never get as enthusiastic a reception as that, but I don’t mind. They see more of me than of him.

Matt is their dad, but he’s not actually Jess’s biological father. Her ‘real’ dad, Andrew, and I split up after Holly was taken. Our relationship by then was shaky at best, and the horror and stress of losing our eldest child finished us off for good. He was a borderline alcoholic. Not physically abusive, but not a kind drunk either. He alternately blamed me for what happened, and comforted me when his words wounded, eventually giving up completely and leaving me for good.

Andy doesn’t keep in contact with us any longer, and lives in Spain. He had a high-flying job in finance and was always jetting off around the world to various destinations, but mostly to Spain. He has a whole new family and I suspect he met his new Spanish wife while he was still married to me. We were always financially well off, but he lost his job. Now Jess and I don’t receive anything from him in the way of maintenance and I don’t ask him for any. I don’t even know if he ended up getting help with his alcohol issues. Maybe he lost everything. Maybe not. Either way, I would never ask him for a penny. Not after he left us both.

Thankfully, Jess doesn’t remember him. She’s only ever known Matt as her dad, and he treats her like his own, even though she knows he isn’t her biological father. My only niggle is that Jess and I still have Andy’s surname – Farnborough. I suppose I could have changed it back to my maiden name, but I didn’t want to have a different name to my daughter, and I haven’t plucked up the courage to contact Andy and ask his permission to change her name. It’s the reason I won’t marry Matt – I don’t want Jess to be the only one with a different surname. We would all be Bernshaws while she remained a Farnborough. Although, like Matt keeps saying, there’s nothing stopping me marrying him and keeping mine and Jess’s names the same.

Charlie is Matt’s biological child and is his doppelganger – both of them blue-eyed, blonde-haired Norse giants. Our six-year-old son is the tallest in his year – taller than a lot of the boys in the year above, too. I call them my two Vikings. Jess, on the other hand, looks like me. We’re both slim with dark hair and brown eyes. Unbidden, an image of Bella Morris inserts itself into my mind, those green eyes staring, scowling, accusing.