‘Tell me honestly. Is it a bit short?’ Louisa looks at herself in the rear-view mirror and touches the softly layered hair at the back of her head. ‘I think it suits me. What do you think?’

Isla smiles because she doesn’t know what to say. She has envied her mother’s long, dark hair her whole life. Without it she is no longer remarkable. She could be any woman in her fifties. You might think, if you caught her eye in the street, that she must have been beautiful once.

Louisa is waiting for a reply. She fluffs her hair up at the sides.

‘It must be easier to manage,’ Isla says. ‘With you swimming every day.’

‘Exactly. It’s dry by the time I’m back inside.’ Louisa nods at her reflection and inches the car forward. ‘I like it. I was sick of all the combing and blow-drying.’

The lights change. Isla watches a man in a suit and tie push himself along the footpath on a shiny, adult-sized two-wheeled scooter. It looks like a monstrous version of the one Isla had when she was six. He weaves through a group of pedestrians, smiling broadly. Isla wonders if she is hallucinating.

‘You look thin,’ Louisa says.

‘Do I?’

‘And pale.’ Louisa’s eyes move over Isla’s hair and face before she turns back to the road. ‘Are you taking care of yourself?’

‘I just spent twenty-four hours on a plane.’

‘Don’t be clever. You know what I mean.’

Isla stares at the road ahead. Her teenage self wants to jump from the car.

‘I’ve been going to the gym,’ Isla says. She is thirty-five years old. She has a career and a life and will soon own an overpriced apartment with a Juliet balcony. ‘I’ve been swimming every morning before work. Getting fit.’

Louisa nods and frowns, glancing again at Isla as she changes gear. ‘The sun will do you good,’ she says.

An empty bottle of orange juice rolls back and forth by Louisa’s feet as she drives. Isla’s feet are pushed to one side by the shopping bags, old newspapers and unpaired shoes in the footwell. She wonders how her dad tolerates the state of the car. He is a man who hates mess, and her mum – contrary to her stylish appearance – is a woman who would happily live in total disorder. They have argued about it their whole marriage.

‘I’m looking forward to Dad’s party,’ Isla says.

Louisa brakes and they both fly forward, slamming against the seat belts. An empty sandwich carton joins the orange juice bottle at Louisa’s feet.

‘Sorry.’ Louisa swears quietly at the van driver in front of them, who is sounding his horn at a kid on a skateboard. ‘Sorry,’ she says again. She looks at Isla and blows a strand of hair out of her eyes. ‘I wish I hadn’t invited half the street to the party.’

‘I’ll help you,’ Isla says. ‘Let me take care of it.’

‘I don’t know what I was thinking.’