‘I’ve got some news.’

I chew on burger. I imagine how many cows it takes to stock the new Tesco’s with burgers. There’s cows in the fields beyond our village, but I’ve never looked at one up close. In the butcher’s round the corner sometimes you see half a cow hung up in the window. A side of beef. Two fat legs and bloody meat on the ribs. I’ve watched mince turn brown in the pan when Mum cooks it for mince and mash. Dad’s favourite. One minute it’s pink and soft, the next it’s brown and hard.

‘What news?’

Before she can answer, his Volvo pulls up and she’s out the door, running down the path like he’s come home from the war. I go to the living room window and look out. Her flat brown hair flies out behind her as she runs to him. He gets out of the car and puts an arm round her. After he’s patted her on the arse, I hear him say, ‘Have you told her?’

Mum looks back at the house, so I duck down from the window and get back to my burger. I pick up a blackened chip and bite into it. It’s hard and sour.

There’s a lot of banging as he brings his suitcases into the hallway. They feel the need to whisper as he does this. Bang, crash, whisper, whisper. Bags scrape along the wallpaper. We’ve got the bobbly stuff you paint over. Dad was good at that sort of thing, anything with ladders and brushes and screwdrivers. In the summer holidays he’d let me help, and when we sat down for our tea we’d both have paint in our hair. Once we painted my room all different colours: one wall blue, one red, the other white. It was Jubilee year.

‘Joanna. Simon’s here.’ Mum stands in the kitchen doorway, all pink up her neck. You can tell when she’s lying or embarrassed, because a pink blotch spreads right up her neck, and she puts her hand there to try to cover it up. But I can still see it. It runs up to her ears and over her jaw and onto both cheeks, like a spilled pot of blusher.

I put down a cold chip and look at her. She wraps her cardigan around her middle. For a second I wonder if I should cry. Whether that would stop him.

‘Hi, Joanna. Remember me?’ He’s still wearing his raincoat, sticking one hand out towards me. That watch pokes through his cuff.

‘Of course I remember you. You were here this morning. At breakfast.’

‘That’s right! I’m the muesli king! How could you forget?’

He looks at Mum, who nods. He takes a step closer and glances at my plate, still holding out a hand. ‘Shake?’