It felt for a moment as though we were all suspended in time. Even Kate stopped caterwauling to look, somewhat bemused, at her older sister as she lay in her bed covered only with a duvet and the body of a young man I could only assume was the elusive Andrew. Nobody spoke for a long moment. Nobody seemed to want to be the first person to break the horrible spell of discovery.

"Dad..."

I could feel rather than see Ben's anger. I didn't want to say anything, didn't want to try to tell how I thought he should feel or react. I could only hope that he wouldn't do anything stupid or rash and I silently begged him not to lay hands on anyone. But I needn't have worried and, knowing him as I did, I should have realised that grabbing Andrew and hauling him out of his daughter's bed wasn't his style.

"Get up and get dressed," he finally said, his voice quiet yet steely then he turned away from the door and moved back into the living room.

Pamela and Andrew both continued to gape at me, until I stepped forward and drew her door closed again, in order to give them the privacy to do as her father had asked, before following him over to where he was now standing by the window looking down to the street below. "Do you want me to go and put Kate down?" In light of our discussions over the last few days, I honestly wasn't sure if he would want me involved in what was about to happen.

He turned to look at me, his jaw set grimly and I could tell that he was battling with himself internally. "No. Stay where you are."

"Ok..." I hoisted Kate further up into my arms as Pamela's door opened again and she and Andrew slunk out, both now fully dressed. He looked understandably sheepish and though Pamela also looked worried, there was a certain defiance in her eyes that I knew Ben wouldn't miss and which would probably only succeed in angering him further.

"You...get out," he said motioning to the door.

"Why should he?" Pamela said, reaching for Andrew's arm. "If you want to say something to me you can say it in front of him."

Ben ignored her. "Leave. Now."

Andrew said nothing, merely turning to Pamela and kissing her quickly on the cheek before heading for the door at a pace somewhere between jogging and sprinting. I could tell from her expression that she was hurt by the sudden desertion, but by the time she looked at us again, the emotion had clearly passed.

I held my breath and waited.

Ben's voice shook slightly when he spoke and I knew he was trying desperately to control himself. "Give me one good reason why I shouldn't call the police."

Pamela gaped at him. "The police? You caught me in bed with my boyfriend and your first thought is to threaten me with the police?"

"Not you, him. Andrew. I take it that's who he is."

"Of course that's who he is! What do you think I am, some sort of slut?" Her eyes flickered to me momentarily. At least, I thought they did, but in the heightened tension of the moment I knew that I could have been mistaken.

"Pamela...you are a minor..."

"I'm sixteen!"

"And the age of consent in this state is seventeen! Your boyfriend broke the law the moment he..." he waved his hand at her, clearly unable to formulate the words.

"The moment he what? Stuck his dick in me?"

"Pamela!" I gasped before I could stop myself. She swivelled her gaze to meet mine and I found myself wondering, not for the first time, what had happened to the loving young girl who used to hold my hand when we went out walking together, or who cuddled into her father in front of the television at night. She had seemingly been replaced by some sort of angry, dysfunctional alien, a transformation that we had clearly been blind to.

"What?" she demanded petulantly. "How old were you when you lost your virginity?"

"A good bit older than you," I replied.

"How many times has this happened here?" Ben asked, causing her to look at him again. "How many times have you lied to us...?"

"Once or twice," she shrugged casually. "It's no big deal."

"On the contrary, it is a very big deal! I have trusted you..."

"You treat me like a kid!"

"You are a kid! An irresponsible, immature kid!"

"Please tell us that you've at least been practicing safe sex," I said, Ben visibly shuddering at my words.

"Why?"

"Why?" I shook my head, baffled by her apparent naivety. It was the last thing I would have ever thought of her. "Because it's important! Because if you don't use protection you're potentially looking at teenage pregnancy or some sort of sexually transmitted disease! Is that what you want?"

She folded her arms and held my gaze. "Of course we use protection. I'm not like you."

I stared at her, feeling as though I had been suddenly slapped in the face. Perhaps it was my own self doubt, not to mention shame, that made me feel as though she was personally attacking me for things long passed, but she wasn't stupid and something in the way she was looking at me made me feel as though we were thinking along the same lines. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"I'm not an idiot. I know where babies come from and I know all about HIV!"

"Oh well, you're a fully fledged adult then!" Ben snapped. Pamela rolled her eyes and he let out a long sigh. "I don't understand what's been going on with you lately. I don't understand why you've been lying to us like this. Is it Peter being away at college? Is that what's making you...?"

It was clearly the wrong thing to say. An expression of outrage slid across her face and she uncrossed her arms and balled her fists at her sides. "Jesus, this is not about Peter," she spat contemptuously. "Not everything is about fucking Peter! I knew you'd somehow manage to bring him into this! I'm surprised you even remember that I'm here! If it's not Peter, Peter, Peter then it's Kate, Kate, Kate!"

As I subconsciously clutched my daughter tighter, I thought back to Elizabeth's comments over brunch and realised that she had most likely been dead on the money in her suggestion as to what was behind this. Pamela was in the middle of the sandwich, bookended by a seemingly successful older brother and a doted upon younger sister. Having never been in that situation myself, it was impossible to know how she would be feeling, but I could at least try to empathise. "Pam, if you've been made to feel that way by either of us, then we're sorry."

"No you're not," she snapped. "Neither of you give a damn about me! You can't wait until I get out of here so that the three of you can just be alone together. Your little second family! I hate you! I hate both of you!" Without waiting for any further discussion on the matter, she turned and raced back into her room, slamming the door behind her and causing Kate to start wailing again.

After settling Kate to sleep in her crib, I found Ben in the kitchen, leaning back against the counter, arms folded across his chest, a pained expression on his face. "Is she right?" he asked as I moved over to stand beside him. "Do we focus all our energies on Peter and Kate and neglect her?"

"No, I don't think so," I replied. "They're just all at different stages right now. Kate obviously needs a lot of input and it's only natural that we think about and worry about Peter because he's not here..."

"She's always been so good, so level-headed...I just don't know where all this has come from. The dressing in black, the attitude, the sex..." he shook his head. "I still see her as my baby."

"She still is."

"I should call the police."

"I don't think that would be a very good idea."

"She's only sixteen! He's nineteen and there are no Romeo and Juliet exemptions in this state!"

"I'm aware of that but..." I sighed. "Don't you think that by doing that you'll just end up pushing her further away? We don't want her suddenly deciding that life here is too tough and she's going to go and live with him, do we?"

"No, of course not. Maybe you're right...but she's grounded from now until the end of the month."

"Well, that's up to you."

"Thanks for the support."

"Hold on..." I turned to him again, suddenly angered by his convenient forgetfulness. "A few days ago you were telling me that you had to be the one to set the rules and the boundaries, not me. Now I'll obviously back whatever punishment you want to give her but don't accuse me of not supporting you."

"I'm sorry," he said, stepping forward and sliding his arms around his waist. "You're right. This whole thing...I don't know...it's just knocked me for six a bit. She's a child and she's having sex...I didn't think I'd have to deal with this for a few years yet."

"And would you have reacted any differently if it had been Peter instead of Pamela?"

He pulled back and looked at me. "You know...I don't know."

"Well, maybe you need to think about why that is," I said, turning to the coffee machine and switching it on. I paused for a moment, the question on the tip of my tongue. It may well have just been my imagination, but I really couldn't help but feel as though Pamela had been projecting her thoughts onto me more than I had thought she reasonably should. "How does she know?" I asked finally.

"How does she know what?"

"About London."

He turned to look at me, "She doesn't know about London."

"Then why did she direct her comments about safe sex towards me?"

"I'm assuming because Kate was a surprise and she's too immature to realise that pregnancy can sometimes happen even if you are using birth control." He stared at me. "Why, what are you suggesting?"

"I'm not suggesting anything."

"I haven't said anything to her about London."

"I know."

"It's hardly something that I would bring up in conversation with my teenage daughter, is it?"

I knew it my heart he didn't mean it the way that I had taken it, but I almost couldn't resist the sarcasm of my response. "No, of course not. It would be too shameful."

"That's not what I meant and you know it! I've never held anything about London against you at any time! I've never brought it up in conversation, I've never used it to hurt you in an argument and I sure as hell haven't discussed your personal business with Pamela! If you really think that I have then there's something far wrong between us!"

I instantly felt bad, knowing that this was a part of myself that I didn't like and that I had hoped I could learn to control. It was all so easy, faced with a situation like this one, to bring it back to my own actions and to flagellate myself for things done in the dim and distant past. When I had been in regular therapy, there had been a buffer there, someone to talk things out and reason with. Rightly or wrongly, I didn't want to do that with Ben. He was my husband after all, not my therapist and though I had made so much personal progress over the years, it sometimes felt as though the overall battle would never be won.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I know you wouldn't have said anything to her. It's just...the way that she looked at me...it made me feel as though she knew something about me that I'd rather she didn't. I can live with the kids knowing that I was unwell and drinking but..."

"I understand that," Ben said. "But I've never said anything to her or Peter about it and unless she's been having secret phone calls with Sarah, I have no idea how she would even know."

"You're right," I shook my head as if to clear it and then poured myself some coffee. "Maybe I just imagined it."

We drank our coffee in silence and then Ben ventured to Pamela's room to advise her of her punishment. I listened to the muffled sounds of them arguing for a while before the door flew open and Pamela came rushing out only to throw herself down onto the couch next to where I was sitting. "Evelyn, please!"

"Please what?" I asked, playing dumb.

"He can't ground me, he can't!" she exclaimed. "If I'm grounded then I can't go to my art class and I can't see Andrew!"

"That's the whole point," Ben replied sharply as the phone rang and he moved to answer it.

"You lied to us Pam," I said calmly, "and your father is entitled to punish you how he sees fit."

"It's not fair! So we've slept together a few times. What's the big deal?!"

"The big deal is that you're underage and very young to be dealing with the emotions that having an adult sexual relationship bring. Plus, what your father said was right, Andrew technically broke the law."

"He didn't rape me!" she exclaimed before looking at me hurriedly and this time, I knew it wasn't my imagination. "Sorry, I didn't mean..."

"It's fine," I said. "I know that. Maybe if you had let us meet Andrew first and talked about how you wanted to take the relationship forwards then we might have been able to help you make a proper decision about whether or not to sleep with him."

"He's a nice guy!" she protested earnestly. "Really he is. He said we should use a condom...he's not horrible and he didn't force me...he's nice!"

"You met him at the art group at the museum?" She nodded. "Did he just come over and start talking to you or...?"

"No, the first day they put us alphabetically in pairs so that we could get to know different people and his name was the closest to mine so we ended up together."

"I guess that's a good idea when nobody knows anybody," I nodded. "What is his name anyway?"

"Swann," she replied. "Andrew Swann."