“Ow!” Before I can think straight, I’ve tripped over a metal pipe, which seemed to loom up in my path out of nowhere. （Or maybe I wasn’t concentrating.） As I hurtle helplessly toward the open trapdoor space, I feel both winded with shock and strangely calm. So, this is it. My life ends here. I’m going to fall through the gap and tumble down ten feet and break my neck and I’ll never know what Joe was going to tell me…
“Thank God!” With a gasp, I manage to break my fall, grabbing on to the frame of the trapdoor space just in time. I scrabble, trying to find firmer ground…but I’m stuck. My shoelace has snagged on something. I’m caught in a crouching position, perilously situated right above the open trapdoor, with only a wooden ladder to catch me if I fall. Gripping on for dear life, I joggle my foot, trying to free it, then stiffen as I hear voices.
Dad. Krista. Shit.
“Here we are,” Dad is saying as he ushers Krista into the room. They’re both wearing silky dressing gowns and holding glasses of what looks like Buck’s fizz. Is that what they have for breakfast every day? Or are they just carrying on with their all-night party?
Either way, I need to get out of here. Urgently. But before I can move a muscle, Dad turns to Krista, his face flushed, and declaims, “I am Julio, a rich Colombian drug baron.” He waggles his eyebrows. “Enchanted to meet you, pretty lady.”
I freeze in icy horror. Why is Dad calling himself “Julio”？ And what is that terrible accent?
“Julio!” Krista simpers at him. “How lovely to meet you! I am called Greta. Tell me how rich you are,” she adds breathily. “I love a wealthy man.”
Oh my God. I’m trapped above my dad and his girlfriend embarking on some dodgy role play. It’s like a bad dream. I have to escape. Silently, frantically, I tug my foot again—but I’m stuck.
“I have many thousands of money in the bank,” says Dad with a sexy swagger.
“Only thousands?” Krista bats her eyelashes at him.
“I have…six hundred billion pounds in the bank,” Dad hastily amends.
“Tony!” snaps Krista, coming out of character. “That’s too much! It’s not believable! Even Jeff Bezos doesn’t have six hundred billion pounds! It needs to be believable!”
Honestly, she’s quite fussy, Krista. What’s wrong with 600 billion pounds?
“I have 2.4 billion pounds in the bank,” ventures Dad warily. “And a yacht!”
“A yacht!” Krista’s breathy voice returns. “And such delicious champagne, Julio. They don’t let us drink at the nunnery.”
The nunnery? Is she kidding?
Oh God, I mustn’t laugh—
“Krista!” Lacey’s nasal voice penetrates the room. “Fashion emergency! Can you come here a sec, love?”
Both Dad and Krista start, and I send silent, fervent messages of gratitude to Lacey.
“Bloody hell!” says Krista, moving away from Dad, her voice normal again. “It’s Piccadilly Circus in here! Coming!” she calls back, then makes a last seductive shimmy toward Dad. “Hold that thought, Tone. I mean, Julio.”
I’m fervently praying they’ll both leave, but to my dismay, Dad lingers, directly below me. My legs and arms are juddering by now, but I manage to stay noiseless, breathing in tiny gulps of air.
As I gaze down, still desperately trying to free my foot, I notice the hair thinning on Dad’s head. He doesn’t look like Julio the drug baron, or even Tony Talbot, the genial host. He looks tired. The book I made him, A Boy from Layton-on-Sea, is propped up on the mantelpiece, and nostalgia washes over me. I remember Dad’s face bursting with pleasure when he first saw it. I felt at that moment I really knew Dad. I’d really got him.
The atmosphere is charged with memories as I struggle silently to get my foot free. It’s just Dad and me. When was it last just Dad and me in a room together?
And although I’m really not a woo-woo person, I find myself thinking: Can’t Dad sense I’m here? Can’t he feel my presence hovering above him, like some sort of deranged angel?
It’s me, Effie! I mentally cry out. Your daughter! I’m here! Right above you!
Almost as though he can hear me, Dad tilts his head, and I watch, transfixed. Slowly, he gets out his phone from his dressing-gown pocket, hesitates, then summons his contacts list. He pulls up a name, and my heart jolts as I see it. Effie. Oh my God.
Suddenly my eyes are hot. I didn’t actually expect…