And then my sister, Chloe, and her husband, Julian, had asked to stay.

Just for a couple of weeks, they said, just until they got back on their feet, in the guest suite, out of the way.

My mother, who had never once in her life turned away family, said yes.

Of course she said yes.

They never left.

Slowly, over two years, they had done the thing that this kind of person always does, not in one dramatic move but in a hundred small ones, each too small on its own to fight about.

They moved out of the guest suite and into the master bedroom, the best room in the house.