Things have happened to me over the years. Ever since I was a little girl, it seems that I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. That misunderstandings and accidents have happened around me, and somehow I’ve been to blame. I know that this is why my mother was so horrible to me. Tried to push me away.

But Daddy never did.

After that horrible incident with Ophelia Morgan in sixth form, I was as traumatised as everyone else – but for some reason I was eyed with suspicion, just because I happened to be there when she’d decided to jump off the clock tower. I’d been trying to coax her down, not wind her up. But then it all happened so fast. Daddy paid the Morgans off so that they wouldn’t investigate further, and I had to leave school just before my final exams, but I didn’t care about that. What I cared about was how everyone was so quick to judge. Ophelia had been my friend. OK, so it had to be in secret because the rest of her stupid little clique hadn’t approved, but that doesn’t make it any less real. It was real to Ophelia and it was real to me.

I’m not sure I’ve ever really gotten over that.

Daddy was the only one who gave me support, stepping in when Mummy stepped back. He was the practical one. He’d accepted my grief without question. He’d sorted everything out. When I left home, I tried hard not to call on him for anything more, knowing how much it upset my mother, but I’d had to call him after Michael, and I realise that I’m going to have to call him now.

Thankfully, my mobile still has charge.

I drop my rucksack onto the floor, and sit down on top of it. It’s midday, so that means it’s 11:00am back home – too early for golf, but he might be in a meeting. The phone rings a few times and I’m about to give up, when he answers.

His breathing is fast, rasping, as if he has had to move quickly to grab the phone before it rang off. I try to picture him in his office, or maybe he was in the kitchen making tea. Mother would be out at one of her classes, I imagine. Not that she would answer the phone anyway, if she saw my name flash up on the display.

His breathing slows at last, and then there is a small sigh, before he says, ‘Veronica? Is that you?’