Carly was their half-sister, but it had never made a difference before. She had never seemed any less. Now Marie wondered if she’d gone off her and Leah – often she rolled her eyes if they asked her to perform with them. ‘It’s adolescence,’ their dad said, ruffling Marie’s hair when she had cried after Carly had again snapped at her to go away. ‘It’ll happen to you and Leah soon enough.’ The thought that Leah might start to prefer the company of boys to her own sister seemed ridiculous, but still a piece of string wiggled around inside Marie’s belly until it tied itself in knots.

Why couldn’t things remain exactly as they were? She wanted them to stay together forever. She’d even imagined the sisters sharing their own house one day. Instead of a boring dining room they’d have a room with a stage where they’d sing karaoke after a hard day at work.

Marie thought back to the last time Carly had babysat her and Leah. Marie and Leah had leaped around the kitchen, pretending to smooch with the backs of their hands – ‘Carly and Dean sitting in a tree, K.I.S.S.I.N.G.’ Carly had burst into tears and pounded up to her room, and when the twins had shuffled in shamefaced to say sorry, she had flung her mobile phone across the room and shouted, ‘Get lost.’ Later Carly had come back downstairs and microwaved some popcorn before melting butter and coating the kernels. The girls had snuggled on the sofa and watched The Parent Trap – a comedy about identical twins being separated at birth that made them laugh but also made Marie sad the girls in the film weren’t being raised together.

She wanted a cuddle.

Marie considered waking her twin but if she told Leah her innermost fears she knew her twin would become anxious too and she already worried too much – but then she was the baby of the family; Marie was a whole twelve minutes older. Instead, Marie cracked open the bedroom door as quietly as she could, her socked feet swallowed by the thick-pile carpet as she crept downstairs.

The lounge was in darkness but there was a sliver of light spilling out from under the kitchen door. Marie wrapped her fingers around the handle but before she could press it down she heard the sound of her mum crying.

‘There has to be another way?’

‘Feel free to think of one.’ Marie could tell her dad was trying not to shout but she could hear his crossness nevertheless. It was the stern tone he frequently used for Bruno after the dog had shaken his head, coating the walls with his slobber.

‘I can’t agree to it. It will be emotionally damaging and terrifying and… it’s wrong.’

‘It’ll be over so quickly. It’ll be an adventure… Don’t look at me like that. Okay, “adventure” is a bad choice of word, but is it really so terrible if you look at the bigger picture? We know there is no real threat. No one will be hurt. It’s for the greater good really. A short-term sacrifice for a long-term gain. Isn’t it worth it? To get our security back? For the years of happiness that will lie ahead. I promise you we will all quickly forget.’