That year it started early — on Christmas morning itself — with the sound of glass smashing. Then a heavy thump as my father stumbled drunkenly against the kitchen table. Raised voices, Mum screaming, ‘You always manage to ruin it! I hate you!’
Later, Mum sitting in her red paper crown, tears rolling silently down her nose and onto her untouched lunch, Granny gamely organising a round of crackers to maintain the lie that we were all having a wonderful