Childhood treasures. Familiar still, even though it’s years since I’ve seen them. I glimpse a ticket to Cinderella at the Albany Theatre. My mother took me when I was eight or nine. A postcard I bought during a holiday in Cornwall. The uneven rectangle of my grandmother’s death notice, cut out from the newspaper. But I make myself stop. If I wait until I get back to Aunt Peg’s, I can pore over these forgotten gifts one at a time, savouring the memories.

We drink our tea. We don’t talk, but then we never did. I don’t need to look at my watch to know it’s time to leave.

‘Is it all right – I mean, can I use the toilet?’

‘Upstairs,’ he says.

I remember, but I don’t say so. Memories nudge me with their sharp elbows, and I need to get out now, to breathe the clean air of my future, not the stale odour of my past.

The carpet on the upstairs landing is cream and thick. I don’t recognize it. Wedding pictures of Maureen and my father line the walls, but there’s none of me or my mother. A bedroom door is ajar and I glimpse a flowery bedspread and silk cushions.

The door to my old bedroom is shut.

A telephone – the landline – rings. ‘Can you get that, love? I’m making pastry and my hands are dirty,’ calls Maureen from the kitchen, and I hear my father shuffle into the hall to answer it, the rumble of his voice.

From the top of the stairs. I can see the rounded ends of his slippers. He’s sitting down. My sense of curiosity – a blessing and a curse – starts to smoulder, and before I can change my mind, I push open the door to my childhood.

Except it’s not my bedroom anymore. This doesn’t come as a surprise. Aunt Peg always said he let me down quicker than a puncture.

There’s a sofa, and a potted plant and desk with a computer. A waste paper basket. A lamp. My bedroom is now an office and there’s not a single trace of me. I suppose I should feel sad, but I don’t. My father is not a part of my life, and it’s clear I’m no longer a part of his. All those years wondering whether he missed me, and the answer is here in a few paper clips and some box files.

The only thing that hasn’t changed is the door embedded in the opposite wall.

We used to play in there, the Carter sisters and I. It was larger than a cupboard, but not as big as an extra room. My winter clothes were stored there, and the family suitcases. We called it our den.

Our hiding place.