‘What?’ I say, intrigued, tucking my feet underneath me. I adjust the phone, hugging a cushion to keep me warm. The huge sitting room is always chil y.

‘Our headmistress,’ Mum says. ‘Stupid bloody bitch. Do you know what she said to me and Cecily? In front of the whole school, at assembly?’

‘No, what?’

Mum recites, as though it’s a lesson. ‘“Girls like you with darker skins wil feel the cold more than the English girls.”’

I’m so shocked I don’t know what to say. ‘Real y?’

‘I hated that school, hated it. I was useless. They hated me, too. You know, one of the mistresses at school, she made me wash my mouth out with bleach. Made me scrub my skin with it, too. Said it’d lighten my dark hair.’

‘No, Mum.’

Mum is such a drama queen, but for some reason I believe her.

‘It’s actual y true. Hah.’

‘What happened?’

‘I’d final y had enough when that happened.’ Her voice is dreamy, as though she’s tel ing a fairy story. ‘I went to ring up Mummy that evening in floods of tears, to tel her to take us away. But the phone lines were down,’ Mum says flatly. ‘And I had to stay anyway. There wasn’t anywhere else for me to go. When I did final y get through to Mummy, she wasn’t pleased. Said she didn’t know why I always had to mess things up, that I deserved it. Oh, I behaved real y badly that term. I nearly got expel ed. Awful.’

Yes, I want to say. I know al about what you did. About you and Annabel Taylor, about how you nearly kil ed her. A shiver runs through me. I don’t know whether to be proud of her for her bravery, or afraid. My God. I realise I don’t know her at al .

Mum says, ‘Then we got home for the summer, and . . .’ There’s a silence. ‘And what?’

‘Wel , that was the summer she died,’ Mum says. ‘August 1963.’

‘Oh. Of course. I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘So—’

‘Natasha?’

I am completely absorbed by the conversation and her voice in my ear, but the noise, someone cal ing my name, somewhere nearby, makes me jerk upright and I remember. I didn’t close the door.

‘Hel o?’ I cal suddenly. There are feet in the hal way, and I hear a sound I haven’t heard for a long time: the clatter of keys being thrown onto the hal table.

‘Who’s that?’ Mum says. ‘Hel o.’

Oli appears in the doorway. I draw back. ‘The door was open,’ he says.

I stare at him. ‘Mum – look. I have to go.’

‘Is that Oli?’ Mum says. ‘Yes,’ I say, staring at him, at his trainers, his jeans, his smart shirt, his jacket, his face, his ruffled, boyish hair. This is my husband, this is our home. ‘I have to go,’ I say, as Mum starts to say something else.

‘Why don’t you come round next week?’ she says. ‘Come and have some supper here.’

‘OK,’ I say, my hand on my cheek, not real y listening. ‘Look—’

‘Wednesday, darling. Come round next Wednesday?’

‘Yep, yep,’ I say. ‘See you then. I’l come round on Wednesday. Yes. Bye.’

I put the phone down and turn to him, my heart thumping almost painful y in my chest.

‘Hi,’ I say.

Chapter Twenty-Four

I’ve seen Oli once since he left. We had a drink two weeks ago at the Pride of Spitalfields on Heneage Street, down the road from us. We picked a

‘neutral spot’, like characters in a TV soap. It was awful. It’s one of my favourite places, a friendly, old man’s pub, an oasis in the increasing Disneyfication of Spitalfields, and people kept saying hel o. ‘Hi, you two, haven’t seen you in here for a while, what have you been up to?’

Oh, this and that! I wanted to answer. Oli shagged someone else and I’m working on a new autumn/winter range of bracelets, thanks for asking!

Then, Oli was broken, quiet, weeping, wanting to know how I was. I said I needed time. Trouble is I didn’t use that time. And now I am no closer to knowing what on earth comes next.

‘How did you get that huge bump on your head?’ Oli asks now, shoving his hands deep into his jacket pockets, his thin shoulders hunched. It is such a familiar gesture that I want to laugh. ‘What happened?’

‘Oh. That.’ I keep forgetting about it. ‘I fel over. It’s fine.’

‘You fel over?’

‘Yep.’ I bend over a little bit, miming the act of fal ing over and he nods, as if this clarifies it for him.

We’re both standing in the doorway, as though neither of us wants to be the one to control the situation, suggest a move somewhere else. I am terrified of offering an idea in case it’s the wrong one.

God, it is so weird, seeing him again. I know him so wel , better than anyone. I’m married to him. I love him. I loved him so much before this happened. When we were first together, five years ago now, I used to lie awake worrying about him. What if he got knocked off his scooter on the way in to work? What if he developed a terrible degenerative disease? What if I did? Why would someone give me someone, give me this happiness? To take it away, that’s why. I would listen to him in the night, his light snuffling breathing like a baby, and stare up at the ceiling, praying that he’d be al right, praying that we’d make it, that I was worrying for nothing.

‘Glad you’re OK.’ Oli nods. ‘Thanks,’ I say. ‘Nothing serious, honestly.’

As if by mutual consent, we go into the living room. He looks round. There is no way to describe how bizarre it is, how we should just be chil ing out on the sofa, not standing up awkwardly. It’s our sitting room, it’s both of ours. There’s a big red rug from a junk shop near Broadway Market on the floor, a rubber plant in a wicker container on the floor nearby, a blue corduroy sofa, deep and comfy, and the huge red and blue abstract print by Sandra Blow that we bought in St Ives, the first time I took Oli to Cornwal . The wal by the door is lined with our books and CDs and DVDs. It’s stuff like that. It’s our home, our life together. It would be real y hard to unpick.

‘Do sit down,’ I say politely. ‘Thanks,’ says Oli. He sits on one of the oatmeal low-slung armchairs, which look as though they should be in the lobby of a seventies LA hotel. He loves those chairs. He looks round the sitting room, his hands restlessly stroking the fabric of the arms. The rain has started again. There’s a silence.

‘Look, Natasha—’

‘Yes?’ I say, too quickly.

He stops. ‘Wel , I wanted to see you. Find out how you are, al that shit.’

I half-stand up. ‘Do you want a drink—?’

Oli waves me down, almost crossly. ‘No, thanks. So – how’s it going?’

I touch the bump on my head. ‘Oh, fine, as you can see.’ He sounds impatient. ‘I meant yesterday. I mean you. How you are. If you’re OK.’ He nods.

Suddenly I can feel anger rushing into me. ‘Wel – I’m not OK, no.’

He looks a bit surprised. ‘Real y?’

‘Oli, what do you expect me to say?’ I drop my hands into my lap and look at him, wil ing him to understand. ‘Of course I’m not OK. My business is on the verge of going under. My grandmother’s just died. My whole family’s going into melt-down –’ I begin, and then stop, I’m not getting into that now. ‘And my husband’s left me.’

‘You threw me out, I didn’t leave,’ he says promptly, as if it’s a quiz and he knows the answer.

‘Grow up, Oli,’ I say, feeling a release of anger and riding it, loving the sensation of feeling something, anything again. ‘Is that al you’ve got?

Stil ? “You threw me out.”’ I am mimicking him. ‘You’re such a fucking child.’

He stares at me and shakes his head. ‘Nice.’ He looks as if he’s about to say something else, runs a hand through his floppy brown hair, stops.

‘Never mind. I’m sorry. Shouldn’t have said it, OK?’

‘No.’

‘No, it’s not OK? Or no, I shouldn’t have said it?’

‘Both. You pick.’

It has become so easy for us to start sniping at each other, these past few months. I don’t know where it came from. We know each other too wel and take no pleasure in that familiarity. It’s little things but they grow. I am bored witless by his al eged devotion to Arsenal. I don’t believe it either, he was never into footbal at university or when we were friends in our twenties, and al of a sudden he’s their number one fan, along with every other media wannabe in his office. No chance he’d support Grimsby Town, for example, who happen to be the nearest team to the vil age where he grew up – no, not nearly sexy enough.

While we’re on the subject, I hate the way he always orders pints now when he’s with blokes. He doesn’t like beer that much. He likes wine. He actual y used to love cocktails, but he has to be seen to be one of the lads, to fit in with the metrosexual guys in his office who think it’s fine to look at porn and find Frankie Boyle hilarious. I think that’s pathetic. Be a real man. Have the courage of your convictions and order a damn Southern Comfort and lemonade, you big pussy.

I shake my head, ashamed I’m thinking these things, and I look at him. He has his arms crossed and his face is blank, as though he’s shutting down, just as he always does when we have a row. Perhaps he doesn’t want to push it, but I can’t help it.

He changes the subject, wisely. ‘How’s your mum?’ he says. ‘Is she al right?’

Oli is very good about my family. He gets it. His father left his mother when Oli was eight, and she raised him pretty much by herself.

‘Mum’s OK. Ish.’ I wonder what’s going on at Summercove tonight. I hope Mum is keeping it together and hasn’t gone mad and attacked Louisa with a silver candlestick. Like Cluedo. I smile, and then I think, That’s not funny. I feel a bit mad al of a sudden. I look at him, at his face, the face I know so wel . His glasses are crooked, his hair is sticking up on end. I smooth my skirt with my hands. ‘She’s Mum, you know. A bit of a nightmare. But I think she’s holding it together. I hope so.’