had so many great plans for our journey home.

Stops we were going to make through London, museums we could pop into, interesting architectural details I intended to point out (the geometrical staircase in St Paul’s Cathedral being just one).

I immediately abandon all of them.

By the time we get to the next station, Rin is culture-shocking so badly it’s clear I need to get her to the safety of my home as fast as possible, before she shrinks so small I have to keep her in my pocket for the rest of the holiday.

As it is, we don’t escape the van driver.

“Oy oy!” he yells out of the window as we trundle Rin’s many suitcases down the street towards my house.

Rin jumps so far she ends up in a bush.

“I’m not knowing oy oy,” she says to me when I’ve pulled her gently out again. “Is this new English greeting?”

“Sometimes,” I growl, making a face at the van receding into the distance.

By the time we get through the front door, Rin’s such a jittery, discombobulated mess she only just about manages to bow shyly to Dad and Annabel, nervously pat Hugo and greet my grandmother again with tiny, shaking hands.

It’s only when she sees Victor that her little inner Rin-light begins to glow.

“Oh Harry-chan!” she breathes happily, grabbing him off my bed and holding him tightly to her face. “He is just like my neko-baby, Kylie Minogue. Ne?”

Victor looks furious but hangs there limply while Rin covers him in thousands of tiny kisses.

Then she plops abruptly to the floor in a puff of lace, rummages through her third suitcase and drags out four teeny socks, a miniature pink dress and a tiny strap-on tiara.

“Don’t worry,” she tells Victor as he scrabbles urgently towards the door and gets dragged back into her lap, still scrabbling. “You will be kawaii in no times!”

With renewed vigour, she energetically forces a tiny white sock on to each paw.

Then – with Victor tucked tightly under a surprisingly strong arm – she reaches into her suitcase and begins distributing Japanese things around the room: a ruffled duvet cover and comforter on the air bed, heart pillows, a dangling mobile with tiny photos of Kylie the cat and Rin’s family hanging from it.

“I think maybe I will like England,” she says with forced chirpiness, not quite meeting my eyes. “Maybe I will be very happy here in Harry-chan’s England bedroom.”

“Rin …”

“Don’t be worry!” she says earnestly, looking up just in time to see my distraught expression. “If Wilbur has job for me I will be coming out. I promise I will be help.”

That’s not what I’m worried about.

My bedroom is basically Rin’s version of the fridge, and she’s just disappeared right under it.

“Sure,” I say desperately, giving Princess Victor a sharp look that says, You owe me and this is your karmic punishment. “Whatever will make you happy, Rin.”