I was angry. It was like it wasn’t a big thing, it was almost dropped in conversation. I don’t think she appreciated that.”

I got a suspicion that she was up to something by her facial expressions and the way she’d look at her phone when she was reading something. I’d never really seen her do that before. Afterwards, when I told a couple of friends what had happened, they scrunched their noses up. "You let him do what?” It’s basically taken over my life. I sit in the same seat every day with my laptop on my lap, and I’m thinking and thinking and thinking and looking at family trees, looking up old newspaper cuttings, and it makes me feel better to be working on it. That’s my fix. My mother’s whole family, they all knew. All her brothers knew. And my dad knew. Everyone knew except me. Even my dad’s sister knew evidently. How didn’t I know for the whole of my life?”

6. Prue’s family secret

It didn’t ruin our relationship but it definitely altered it. If she had said, ‘I’m sorry I probably should have told you, but I felt I shouldn’t, can you forgive me?’ then it might have been different.” crying into the house, passing over the unholy mess her killers made and found you in our bedroom. You were in your crib, next to your mother on the bed. She'd been..." He cleared his throat before moving on. "The blood had even sprayed you. The police came and took their reports but I knew who was responsible." My husband and I had let our marriage die a slow, insidious death. Only when it was finally cold and lifeless on the floor, did we decide we needed to have an exit plan. Except we had no real plan at all. My husband moved into his father's house and I stayed with the children during the week, but nearly every weekend he would come and stay with the kids at our house, so that they would have the stability of being in their own home, around the things that made them feel the calmest. Other people point out to me what damage he did as a father by not being there, how terrible it was for my mum, and I should really be very angry with him but I can’t. When the arrangement ended a few months later and my husband bought his own house, I missed those times at my mother's house dearly.

I wear yoga pants, but I hate yoga. I know I’m not alone but I take yoga pants wearing to shameful new levels. I buy yoga pants with the precision and meticulous research normal people save for purchasing their first home. They’ve got to have the right cut, stretchy fabric, and some sort of stomach panel. I can’t remember when I realised the disturbing intentions of his action. Maybe it was when I discovered porn by accident. Maybe it was when I studied Chapter 4 of Science in Form 3. Maybe it was during “girl talk” with my guy friends in school.You like it, eh?" Her father bestowed on her his secret smile. In truth it was more of a smirk. Right lip raised slightly to expose an endearing dimple beneath his moustache, his cupid's bow lips pursed so it looked like he was pouting. "I forget you are fierce, like she was."