to discuss minutiae with the coiffed and toned mummies. He was in complete control of all he surveyed, a very happy man.
Kathryn, however, upon taking up residence in the ‘big house’, had felt her refuge diminish until it was non-existent. Earlier in Mark’s career, when they had lived in rented accommodation in Finchbury, she at least could spend the daytimes away from his obsessive gaze. Until he returned from school, there was no one to watch her, no eyes waiting to see how she did things, what she wore, what she said or ate, who she sat with, spoke to, when she arrived and when she left. Life in the head’s house was very different; the list of things that were forbidden, permitted and expected was long and ever changing. It was in this fluid environment of constant scrutiny that she existed. ‘Existed’ was the word Kathryn used when thinking about her situation – ‘lived’ would imply that she had a life, and she did not. Kathryn had no life at all.
As she scraped the breakfast detritus into the bin and loaded the plates into the dishwasher with the rest of the china, her mind flitted back to the early hours of that Thursday morning in June, nineteen years ago. She had been twenty-one, her sister Francesca nineteen. They were both still living at home with their parents, occupying adjacent bedrooms in the cramped, semi-detached house.
Kathryn had padded into Francesca’s room and gently shaken the blanket-wrapped shoulder of her sleeping sibling. She hadn’t wanted to wake her, but knew if she didn’t share the news that was threatening to burst from her, she would very probably explode.
‘Francesca, are you asleep?’
‘Mmmmnnnn… Go away…’ Francesca mumbled.
‘Wake up! I really need to tell you something.’
Even in her semi-conscious fog, Francesca knew from her sister’s tone that resistance was futile. She reached out an arm and snapped the lamp on the bedside table into life.
‘For God’s sake, Katie, this better be good.’
Rubbing her eyes, she focussed on her sister’s blushing face.
‘Well, go on then!’
Francesca’s irritable prompting rather robbed her of her moment, but she proceeded nonetheless.
‘Guess what?’
‘What?’
‘Francesca, you’re supposed to guess! Come on!’
‘For God’s sake, Katie, you’re really annoying me now! We’re not children any more; it’s three o’clock in the bloody morning. I’ve got to be up for work in three hours. So, you either tell me now why you’ve woken me up or bugger off and leave me alone!’
‘Okay, grumpy, you are not going to believe this, but Mark has asked me to marry him!’
Kathryn clapped her hands together and let the news hang in the air. Francesca reached over and located her glasses, perching them on the tip of her nose. She leant forward as though improved visual focus would help her mentally focus as well.
‘He has asked you to marry him?’
‘Yes! Can you believe it?’
Her sister thought for a few seconds. ‘Frankly, no. I thought you were going to say you’d shagged him.’
‘Oh for goodness sake, Fran, you are so gross! Isn’t it wonderful?’
‘Truthfully, honey? I don’t know.’
‘What do you mean, you don’t know?’
‘I mean… Look, Katie, I love you, but you are a bit like a character in a Famous Five novel who doesn’t realise that there is a big bad world out there. Even though I’m the youngest, I’ve always felt as if you needed my protection. We all do, in fact.’
‘Do you?’ It wasn’t exactly news to her that Francesca felt that she was a total idiot, but her parents as well?
‘Yeah, kind of. And this Mark… It’s great that you’re so happy, but he’s your first proper boyfriend, you’ve only known him five minutes, and you haven’t even, you know… Sex is very important!’
‘Oh for goodness sake, there has to be more to a relationship than sex!’
‘There does? Okay, don’t look like that, I’m kidding, kind of. I am happy if you are happy, but I don’t think that you should be rushing into anything.’
‘Actually we have been going out for three and a half months and I love him, Fran, and he loves me.’
Kathryn chose not to divulge the frenzied kissing and aggressive smooching that left her more excited and alive than she had ever felt. This she knew boded well for a satisfying love life in the future.
‘Blurgh! Pass the bucket!’
Kathryn punched her sister on the arm.
‘I’m truly chuffed for you, sis, but there’s something about Mark that I’m not quite sure about…’
‘What do you mean?’ Kathryn’s voice was a high-pitched squeal, she looked