I Owe You One: The Number One Sunday Times Bestseller

Poor legs. I send them a quick message, saying, Do this for me and we’ll have a hot bath later.

I used to yearn so hard for the sunshine of Jake’s approval. But now I’m feeling a different kind of glow. Conviction that we’re doing the right thing.

I try to focus on a beach, but the only beach I can visualize is dry and scorching and kind of dystopian-looking, with blinding white sand and harsh cliffs and a vulture trying to peck bits out of my eyes while it screeches in my ear.

‘You forgive the person and you endlessly rationalize and you forget

I just feel kind of rueful. Because how much of my life have I spent comparing myself to Jake? And how utterly pointless was that?

Because that way I feel like I’m in control of something, even if it’s just my own story.

She’s so self-possessed.

has decided to bring up her children as Danish–French hybrids. Apparently then they’ll be super-relaxed, stylish and eat their vegetables. (I said once, ‘Why not bring them up British?’ and she stared at me and said ‘

Whenever Mum smiles, lines appear all over her face. They stretch like sunrays from her eyes, they score her cheeks and mark out her forehead in deep creases.