Ever since she got here Alice has played the role of the enigmatic, slightly scary loner, though that is not at all what she is. In London she had friends coming out of her ears. More friends than she knew what to do with. She was a party girl, a come-over-later-with-a-bottle-of-vodka-we’ll-put-the-world-to-rights girl. She’d been the kind of mum to stand at the school gates after drop-off and say, come on then, who’s up for a coffee? And she’d be there at the heart of them all, laughing the loudest, talking the most. Until she pushed it too far and blew her life open.
