On my wedding night I hid under the bed to surprise my husband. His mother came in instead, sat down on the mattress above me, and put a call on speaker.

And I laughed.

Not unkindly. I laughed the way you laugh when somebody says something a bit odd at a party and you want to move past it without anybody being embarrassed.

And then, within about an hour, I told Grayson.

I told him in the car park while we were waiting for a taxi, as a funny thing that had happened.

He went quiet for a second and then he was very good about it.

He said she has a problem about money. He said she has been strange since their father passed. He said it sadly, and he looked out of the window, and I put my hand on his arm.

I felt sorry for him.

I did not just ignore a warning.

I took it, within sixty minutes, straight back to the two people it was warning me about, wrapped up as a story about how difficult his poor sister is.