The Silent Wife(108)

‘Izzy, so who are you friendly with now? Hannah? Isn’t her mother the one with a stud in her nose? I wouldn’t bother with her. Don’t you see anything of the little girl whose father’s a surgeon in London, what’s she called, Alexandra?’ – followed by Izzy disappearing upstairs with the insolent stomp of a thirteen-year-old.

If Jamie wasn’t quick enough to evaporate at the same time, the focus would switch to him. ‘I hope you’re going to join the orchestra? It’s a very good way to get to know the right people.’ Which was enough to make him sever a few fingers so he’d never have to pick up his saxophone again. Luckily, at sixteen, Jamie had mastered the art of the grunt that could be construed as a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’.

As usual, my mother heard what she wanted to hear.

Eventually the conversation came full circle, a rainbow of Battenberg crumbs flying out of my mother’s mouth as she made the point – again – that ‘after all that business’ I’d been lucky to end up with a husband and family.

After thirty years, the only reply that allowed us to grind along without bloodshed was ‘Another piece of cake?’