One

      ‘Your parents ruin the first half of your life,’ Cat’s mother told her when she was eleven years old, ‘and your children ruin the second half.’

      It was said with the smallest of smiles, like one of those jokes that are not really a joke at all.

      Cat was an exceptionally bright child, and she wanted to examine this proposition. How exactly had she ruined her mother’s life? But there was no time. Her mother was in a hurry to get out of there. The black cab was waiting.

      One of Cat’s sisters was crying – maybe even both of them. But that wasn’t the concern of Cat’s mother. Because inside the waiting cab there was a man who loved her, and who no doubt made her feel good about herself, and who surely made her feel as though there was an un-ruined life out there for her somewhere, probably beyond the door of his rented flat in St John’s Wood.

      The childish sobbing increased in volume as Cat’s mother picked up her suitcases and bags and headed for the door. Yes, thinking back on it, Cat was certain that both of her sisters were howling, although Cat herself was dry-eyed, and quite frozen with shock.

      When the door slammed behind their mother and only the trace of her perfume remained – Chanel No. 5, for their mother was a woman of predictable tastes, in scent as well as men – Cat was suddenly aware that she was the oldest person in the house.

      Eleven years old and she was in charge.

      She stared at the everyday chaos her mother was escaping. Toys, food and clothes were strewn across the living room. The baby, Megan, a fat-faced little Buddha, three years old and not really a baby at all any more, was sitting in the middle of the room, crying because she had chewed her fingers while chomping on a biscuit. Where was the nanny? Megan wasn’t allowed biscuits before meals.

      Jessica, a pale, wistful seven-year-old, who Cat strongly suspected of being their father’s favourite, was curled up on the sofa, sucking her thumb and bawling because – well, why? Because that’s what cry-baby Jessica always did. Because baby Megan had hurled Jessica’s Air Stewardess Barbie across the room, and broken her little drinks trolley.