My sister kissed my husband in front of thirty people at her own anniversary party and called it a joke. Her husband had a wrapped present in his hands and an envelope she had never opened.

New Year, 2016.

Romy was twenty-four. We were at Kirsten Vale’s house, and at about half past one in the morning I found my sister in a utility room with Kirsten’s husband, and nothing had happened yet and something was about to.

And I got her out of that room and into a taxi and I dealt with it.

I told Kirsten that Romy had drunk far too much and had gone to find the bathroom. I told our mother, who was ill that year and who I was protecting from everything, that Romy had been fine.

And in the taxi Romy cried and said she had not meant anything by it, and I put my arm round her and said — and I can hear myself saying it — it’s all right. We’ll say it was a joke.

I gave her the sentence.

Nine years before she used it in a garden with my husband’s mouth on hers, I handed my little sister the exact words, in the back of a taxi, at two o’clock in the morning, because it was easier than having a family Christmas about it.