5. Now

After my bath I try to eat but it's no good. I scrape my half-eaten lunch into the compost and start trawling local jobs before I buckle and google ‘Georgia Smith' and after pages of scrolling find her LinkedIn.

She studied drama at Manchester and then did an MSc in educational psychology before her teacher training. She's won awards for contributions to children's literacy. There was a string of quick promotions, first in state schools and then in increasingly high-profile private schools. The last place she worked was Redmoor College – a private school with a reputation to match that of Port Emblyn School.

I find the Redmoor College website. It looks like a five-star country retreat even though it's in south-west London. The fees are almost as high as those at PES. They have horses.

I feel like a negligent parent when I find educational blogs and school websites talking about Acting Up, a drama club Georgia started which has been credited with everything from fixing behavioural issues to launching political careers.

She runs the same club now, at Port Emblyn School. I encouraged Jenna to join a while ago, having read about it in some school literature. Jenna had rolled her eyes at the parental involvement and said she wasn't sure she needed drama club on top of her drama A level, but she joined anyway. I never once thought that it would be Georgia Smith running the drama club, teaching my little girl.

God – the thought makes me want to leap up and go get her. Is Georgia her regular drama teacher too? Mrs Haynes, Jenna's drama teacher for the last two years, was meant to be going on mat leave – is she off already?

It's the big rehearsal this afternoon. Double Drama on Fridays. Jenna said something about the other Acting Up children getting to miss lessons to join in.

My baby's in rehearsal now. Georgia Smith is teaching her now.

I clench my fists.

How had the club announcement not mentioned Georgia? Looking at her profile, she would seem quite the asset.

That's what I'd have told Mr Whitlow, the head, if not for my history with Georgia. But then maybe she wrote it. Maybe she intentionally hid her name so none of her old friends would discover she was working there.

How, how, had she got a job at PES without my finding out? I'm on the PTA, I attend every event – Mr Whitlow once made a joke about putting me on the payroll.

I read everything I can find twice and then force myself to stop and get trapped scrolling on Vinted instead.

And then I realise the time: three fifty-six. I meant to go out so I could come back at six, as if I were coming home from work. But the children will be home any minute.

I watch for Ash's car from the living room window.

I'll say I came home early to talk to my baby about her first rehearsal.

She was nervous – she pretended she didn't want to do it – but she'll have been just perfect and it will have been so good for her, got her out of her shell, let the world see the beauty hiding behind those hideous headphones.

Dust rises above the hedge that runs along the lane and I go to check myself in the mirror before heading down. I look tired and pale. A bit like how I looked after the last time I saw Georgia. I sigh and try to plaster on some freshness.

In Tristan's kitchen,Ash drinks orange juice from the bottle and Ava rummages in the fridge's bottom drawer. They have my brother's athletic build and their mother's jet-black hair and skin as tanned as teak.

‘Get me the yoghurt,' says Ash.

‘Which one?'

‘You know – with the stuff.'

Ava rummages.

Jenna isn't here.

A little itch of fear tingles at the back of my neck, which is ridiculous, and I press the smile back on my face. ‘Hey, guys,' I say. ‘Where's Jenna?'

She's in the year below them at PES and they've been giving her lifts since Tristan got them matching black Range Rovers for their eighteenth birthdays this past January.

‘Here,' says Ava, pulling out a large pot of gourmet yoghurt.

‘Ash? Ava?'

They turn to me, the fridge still open, perfect eyebrows raised. When they were babies, I struggled to tell them apart.

‘Hi, Auntie Fran,' says Ava. She smiles and I feel calmer. She's such a kind, mature young woman. She'd never let something happen to her cousin.

‘She said she'd find her own way home.'

‘Oh, okay,' I say, walking over to give her a hug. She gives me a peck on the cheek.

The cold of the old stone floor, warped like melted wax by generations, seeps up through my heels and I shiver. Jenna will be home in a minute. She just forgot to text. But she always gets a lift with her cousins. Or sometimes from Tristan or his assistant. But I always know if that's the case. She doesn't normally make her own way. Has she ever done this before?

I imagine my father rolling his eyes, and I realise he would be, of course, right: no need to lose my head. Ava has just given me a perfectly good explanation.

It's just… any other day I could relax. But after this morning, a silly little part of me wonders: will I ever relax again?