‘I’m fine now.’ But I’m not fine. I want to scream and shout at Tom, tell him what I think about his deception. He’s obviously been in contact with this kid for a lot longer than he admitted so what else is he lying about?

The front door is two feet away from me. I want to open it and run out. Leave this lying man behind me, but I can’t, I have two little boys asleep in bed, dreaming good dreams, I hope. And Amber walking past me in her fluffy slippers heading towards her dad in the kitchen.

All these chains holding me here, forcing me to deal with this disaster when all I want to do is run. But from what? What else is Tom hiding from me? I cannot trust this man. Maybe he’s known about his son all along. I shouldn’t have thrown the phone at him. I should have held on to it and searched to see how long that contact number has been in his phone. When Amber goes to bed I’ll make sure he tells me the truth.

Standing in the hallway I hear Amber and Tom talking. The door is closed so I don’t know what they’re talking about. Probably me, how unstable I am. At fifteen she doesn’t realize women don’t slam doors for nothing in their own home, they are driven to it. But if I know Amber, she’ll be comforting Tom. Telling him everything will be okay while I stand here feeling like an outsider. Amber might not be so willing to comfort her daddy when she hears the truth. Which she is going to have to now. Anything could leak into the papers. Oh Christ. I never thought of that. We’ll be bait for the media if they get wind of Tom being Kenny’s dad. This weekend I’ll find an opportunity to sit her down and tell her what’s going on. It will be hard but it will be harder if I don’t. I have to deal with this.

And then there’s Tom’s mother, Ellen. What will she think when she hears she has another grandchild? I’ll leave that for Tom to deal with. I’m not going there.