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though she was ashamed of us. I accepted it, though, as I accepted everything, and for a while I was satisfied just to run to the front door to greet her as soon as I heard the sound of her footsteps coming up the garden path. Eventually, however, after repeated rebuffs and the hurt and disappointment that brought hot tears to my eyes each time she flicked her wrist irritably to loosen my grip on her hand, my eagerness to see her dwindled to a self-protective indifference. And then I barely lifted my head to look as she flung open the front door and ran up the stairs, shedding dirty clothes in her wake.
    Sometimes, I’d be playing in the garden with a friend when my mother came home from work and walked straight past us without any sign of acknowledgement. Then my stomach would start to churn as I waited for the argument that always started as soon as she set foot inside the house.
    ‘You just don’t want me to enjoy myself,’ my mother would scream. ‘You can’t bear the thought that I’ve got friends. If you don’t want to look after the kids, send them back to their useless bastard of a father and let’s see how he likes not being able to go out in the evenings.’
    My grandmother would sound angry and there’d be a sharp tone of exasperation in her voice that I only ever heard when she was arguing with my mother, as she answered, ‘For pity’s sake, Judith! You haven’t been home for the last three nights. And now you’ve only come to get a change of clothes. Surely it isn’t too much to hope that you’d want to spend just a few minutes with your own children?’
    Then someone would remember we were playing in the garden and a window would bang shut, muffling the sound of their voices.
    I’d continue to play as if nothing had happened, avoiding looking at my friend so that I didn’t have to see the embarrassment on her face. And, after a while, the front door would be wrenched open and my motherwould march past us again, before setting off down the road towards the pub, while I blinked back my tears and pretended I didn’t care.
    I did care, though – at least, to begin with – and one day I ran down the road after her, asking where she was going and begging her to take me with her. But she just kept on walking, waving her arm to brush me aside and hissing at me angrily, ‘Get back home to your grandmother.’ So I stood and watched her walk away, finally accepting the fact that the only thing that really mattered to her was drinking with her friends.
    As well as being an alcoholic, my mother became addicted to laxatives and diet pills and developed bulimia, making herself sick every time she ate or drank anything. I grew used to the circus of emotions that accompanied her wherever she went. Nothing about her was ever calm or reasonable; every aspect of her life was steeped in the drama of confrontation and resentment. And then, when I was five years old, I came home from school one day and knew immediately that something more serious than usual was wrong.
    My grandmother was waiting for me at the front door, her face red and blotchy. I felt my heart lurch with fear, because it seemed that in the space of just one day, since I’d left the house for school that morning, she’d suddenly become old. She bent down to hug me and then took myhand and led me into the kitchen, where she pulled out two chairs from beside the kitchen table and said, ‘Sit down for a minute, Anna. There’s something I have to tell you.’
    She turned to look out of the kitchen window and then dabbed impatiently at her eyes with the corner of her apron before turning back towards me again.
    ‘Your mummy isn’t very well,’ she told me. ‘She’s had to go to the hospital.’
    She must have seen the alarmed expression on my face, and she took hold of my hand as she added hastily, ‘She’s going to be all right, though. She may have to stay in the hospital for a little while. But there’s nothing for you to worry about.