I found my mind flicking back to Clio quite often that weekend. For all her big house and what sounded like a celebrity lifestyle, she seemed adrift somehow, like she really didn’t know where she fitted into the world at all. Of course, that might just be because her dad had died. Losing a parent can knock you for six. I know. I was only eighteen when Dad left and then Mum died. I was pretty much abandoned to get on with life on my own and it was touch and go for a while.

But I’d had the house and that was my salvation. Somehow, God knows how, my parents had owned our tiny terraced house outright, so there had been no mortgage for me to cover, just the bills. That was struggle enough, but at least I wasn’t catapulted out on to the streets.

I did have to rethink my life plans, though. I was in the middle of my A-levels when it all happened. Mum could never understand why I wanted to stay on at school. To her way of thinking, getting an education was a form of torture that had to be endured rather than a ticket to a new world. But even though she thought I’d be better off leaving as soon as I could, she did try to be supportive. Whenever I got into trouble, she’d storm down there to defend me, but she often ended up getting into a row with the teachers and making things worse. Dad seemed to get it more, but then he wasn’t always there so that didn’t really help. I knew, though, that if I was going to do the stuff I dreamed of then I needed to get myself to university.

All that went out of the window when Mum died. How could I afford university when it was just me? So I left school, got myself a job as a cleaner and worked myself up from there. I thought I’d get back to my plans once the dust had settled, but then I was pregnant and that was that. For a while I still dreamed of finishing my A-levels but it’s been fifteen years now and I’ve never done anything about it, so I think I’ve probably blown my chances. Not that I regret anything – well, not often, anyway. I wouldn’t be without the kids and I may still find a way of travelling. Never give up hope, that’s what I say.

That night we’d gone down to the beach for an end-of-weekend run around. Poppy was chasing her little brother across the beach. She was thirteen going on sixteen most of the time but out there running across the sand, her hair flying out behind her like ribbons, she looked like a little girl again, which was absolutely fine by me. Girls grow up way too fast, in my opinion.