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threw that in her bag with her exercise book and pencil case, which had been so new and full at the beginning of term and now barely contained a workable pen and had ripped at the seam. A ripple of excitement danced through her as she made her way downstairs—today was the day—but she had to contain it. She had to deal with her mum first of all, if she was even going to be allowed out after school.
    “Special treat today,” Kathy’s mum greeted her as she walked into the kitchen with her bag slung over her shoulder. The kitchen smelt of home cooking—bread or cakes—although there was no sign that any had happened; perhaps it was a trick of the décor, which included wallpaper with a food motif and framed pictures of banquet scenes. “Your favourite,” she continued, “Weetabix with sliced banana.”
    This had been Kathy’s favourite when she was about eight years old but she would never have the heart to tell her mum this. “Brilliant! Thanks, Mum.”
    The enthusiasm in Kathy’s voice made her mum look over for a moment, questioningly; her daughter wasn’t normally this happy with her treats, which occurred a good few times a week. “Are you okay, sweetheart?”
    Kathy saw what had happened immediately; she was overdoing it. She quickly switched down her behaviour, plunged her spoon into the cereal and grunted a few times, but her mother was at her side with her hand on Kathy’s forehead.
    “You look a little pale this morning, love.”
    “I’m fine, Mum,” Kathy told her. She couldn’t say anything like ‘stop fussing’ or ‘I’m thirteen years old, Mum’ because her mum never took that kind of thing too well. She just had to go along with whatever kind of fuss her mum made and hope to get out as soon as she could.
    Her mum seemed satisfied and returned to the sink, washing up the few bits that the breakfast preparation had left behind. But then she said, “I’ve got shut of the microwave.”
    Just as Kathy opened her mouth to respond, her dad breezed in and said, “Don’t ask,” while kissing his daughter on the forehead.
    “What’s that?”
    “Nothing, dear,” he told his wife, but then turned to his daughter with the ‘Mum is clearly nuts’ expression on his face. “I’m off. Stay out of trouble,” he said cheerfully.
    “She’s never in trouble,” Mum said defensively.
    “I was talking to you,” her husband told her and it almost made her smile.
    When adult Kathy thought back to those times, she pictured her parents as something from the fifties, although she grew up in the nineties. The mum of her mind has post-war hair and a floral pinafore, maybe bright red lipstick. Dad is wearing a suit and bowler hat, gripping a briefcase and umbrella and balancing a little tash under his nose. If there were a Nineties equivalent of this image then this would be her parents; her mother was always immaculately presented and her dad really did breeze in and out of the house as if he found humor in the responsibility of winning the bread, while taking it seriously enough to devote the majority of his time to it. Kathy had grasped even at her young age that he simply preferred being away from home to being there. So did she.
    The way her parents interacted was like something from a retro fridge magnet: the fifties couple and the one-liner. But outside of this captured picture was a darkness as black as the sky at night. Her dad would make his escape just six months later and as hard as Kathy tried, she couldn’t blame him for it. She made her own escape when she was just fifteen—moving in with her nan—a departure of which she was far less forgiving.
    “Bye, Dad,” Kathy said, predicting his next move, and Dad picked up a piece of toast to go and was out of the door.
    “Bye, girls.”
    Kathy and her mum were quiet for a few minutes, each withdrawing to their own worlds until Kathy couldn’t stop herself from asking, “So why’ve you got rid of the microwave?”
    “Radars and