Edie and I spend a lot of our time not telling Mum things. Our mother has had a very difficult life and we try to protect her from as much unpleasantness as possible. This is mainly because she can rant for England. My father, when he was around, was a serial philanderer—her term, not mine. Throughout their marriage, he worked his way through a succession of neighbours until he found one young enough and compliant enough to agree to run away with him. My mother, Cecilia, has never recovered. She was left alone to bring up my sister and me. More often than not, she took to her bed with an attack of the vapours or a migraine and left me, a rather world-weary nine-year-old, to bring up Edie, a beautiful, confused four-year-old with a penchant for climbing trees and, subsequently, falling out of them. In the twenty-several years that have passed, my mother has grown ever more bitter and twisted. There are hundreds of taboo subjects—babies, money, lawyers, divorcées, newlyweds or anyone too obviously happy. She detests Posh and Becks, simply because they are phenomenally wealthy and look as if they idolise each other to boot. Though there was never the slightest hint of a custody battle over us children, even now both Edie and I dread Kramer vs Kramer coming on the telly at Christmas. The smallest thing can start her off. And Jake expressing his discontent by buggering off for a few days would be like applying jump leads to a long-dead battery.

Up until now, I’ve given my mother relatively little cause for concern. I’ve been an ideal daughter—if you overlook my inability to produce grandchildren for her. But then, with my sister’s brood she has more than enough to keep her occupied. It’s only due to the fact that all of my sister’s children are unspeakably adorable, with the possible exception of a teenage tantrum every now and then, that my mother has forgiven Edie for not being an ideal daughter.

Every family survey undertaken now seems to take great delight in stating that the children of single parents will go on to have underage sex, form unsuitable attachments, achieve less at school and turn into juvenile delinquents. There weren’t heaps of condemning statistics back then, but unfortunately my sister and I weren’t the exceptions that proved the rule and Edie obliged by becoming pregnant at fifteen and leaving school before she sat any of her exams. She also stole sweets from the corner shop, but to this day we’ve managed to keep that from my mum. Edie’s pregnancy, however, was rather more difficult to conceal.