Her face brightened; she had wanted to see the butterfly exhibit for months.

After she went to bed, Dad and I sat at the kitchen table drinking tea.

He told me something I’d never known about my childhood: when my mother took a job that required night shifts, I’d begun keeping an old scarf under my pillow.

I remembered the scarf only vaguely.

He said he’d once tried to throw it away because it looked worn, and my mother had stopped him.

‘She told me it wasn’t about the scarf,’ he said.