OK, I have to say that Christmas Day in Marjorie Maloney’s house went a lot better than I’d been expecting.

The day started off well. Dad and I made smoothies for breakfast, with bananas and honey and yoghurt. I added a teaspoon of Nutella to mine, which made it a weird muddy colour, but it tasted pretty good. Then after breakfast I gave Dad his aftershave and he gave me the new mobile phone I’d been begging him for forever. He said he only got it so he’d have a bit of peace. I said he’ll have plenty of peace as long as he keeps me in credit, and he groaned and asked how many more years before I could leave school and get a job.

He’s good fun sometimes.

I tried not to think too much about Mam not being there, and he probably did too. When she was around we always had omelettes for breakfast on Christmas morning.

I think that’s why we did smoothies this time instead.

Mam phoned around two, earlier than usual, because I’d told her that Dad and I were going out for Christmas dinner. She probably thought I meant to a restaurant, and I didn’t mention Marjorie. It’s got nothing to do with Mam who Dad and I celebrate Christmas with any more. I listened to her wishing me Happy Christmas and telling me how much she missed me, and after a while, I told her that Dad was waiting, and hung up.

I told her about my new mobile, and she took the number. Big deal.

At about half two, Dad and I went across the road to Marjorie’s, and I must say the dinner was excellent. This was the menu:

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For dessert, which I barely had room for, we didn’t have plum pudding, which was a big relief because it’s my least favourite dessert ever. We had a kind of rolled-up chocolate cake, which Marjorie said is called a roulade, filled with whipped cream and topped with some kind of roasted nuts. I’m not sure, but I think it might just be the best dessert I ever tasted.

One thing about Marjorie Maloney, she sure can cook. No wonder her bum is quite big.

Her brother Kevin was great fun, organising loads of games and stuff. And her dad was a bit drunk, I think, because he kept falling asleep in an armchair, and even during dinner he nodded off for a few minutes. Nobody noticed until all the talking stopped for a second, and then we heard him snoring. I don’t know how he didn’t fall off his chair – I’m sure I would have.

I must practise sleeping in a chair and not falling off. You never know when it might come in handy.

The two kids were OK too, a five-year-old girl called Sarah and a three-year-old boy called Luke. I painted Sarah’s nails and dressed her up in an old evening dress and high heels that Marjorie gave us, and then Luke began to cry because he wanted to be dressed up too, so I put his grandad’s hat on him, and an old green raincoat I found in Marjorie’s utility room.

Their mother said I’d make a good big sister, and for some reason Marjorie went scarlet.

I found out a lot about Marjorie over dinner, actually. It turns out she was an au pair in France for two years, and now she works from home as a translator. She speaks Spanish too, but she likes French better. I almost told her that French is one of my worst subjects in school, next to history, but I stopped myself just in time. She might have offered to give me a grind, which of course Dad would have jumped at.

But even though she’s a lot nicer than I thought, I still don’t want Dad to get too friendly with her. We don’t need anyone getting too close – we’re managing fine on our own, Dad and me.

Anyway, we stayed until about nine o’clock, when Luke and Sarah were put to bed in Marjorie’s smallest bedroom. Then Dad and I walked back across the road, and when we got inside, Dad said, ‘Will we sit in the garden for a little while?’

We used to do that all the time when I was small, me and Mam and Dad, just wrap ourselves up in rugs or blankets and sit outside at night, after the dinner stuff was cleared away. I’d be tucked in between them, leaning against Dad’s shoulder or pressed up to Mam’s arm, sniffing her almondy smell.

They’d usually do most of the talking, grown-up stuff that would float away into the dark, and sometimes one of them would laugh, and I’d tilt my head up and try to count the stars, and it would feel so safe and cosy.

I can’t remember when we stopped doing that.

The weather was nice last night – cold, but very starry and still. So we took two blankets out of the airing cupboard and we went to sit out on the garden seat to look at the stars, which were all out by then.

We could see our breath in front of us. It looked like we were smoking. I thought about saying that to Dad, but then decided not to. (And just in case you’re wondering, I only had a few puffs once, and it made me feel like throwing up – yeuk. Smoking’s for idiots.)

So there the two of us were, wrapped in our blankets looking up at the zillions of stars, and remembering when it used to be three of us. At least, I was remembering, and Dad probably was too.

And because it was dark all around, I asked Dad if he missed Mam at all. I didn’t look at his face, just up at the sky. And I had time to count seven stars before he said yes, sometimes.

And then, maybe because it was dark all around, Dad asked me if I was OK about it being just the two of us now, and it took me a lot longer than seven stars before I said that sometimes I was still lonely, but mostly I was OK.

It was sad, on the garden seat. I told him about Bumble and Catherine, and he teased me about always wanting to be the one to open the door when Henry the pizza delivery boy came, and I said that we must try and make Marjorie’s chestnut stuffing some time, and we found the Plough and the North Star in the sky.

But it was still sad.

After a while we went in, and I said goodnight to Dad. And as I was undressing, my new phone started to beep, and I opened my very first text message, which was from San Francisco and which said:

Happy Christmas my darling girl xxx.

I didn’t answer it.

Now it’s the day after Christmas, and I’ve just got back from Chloe’s house. Her Dad made the curry, and they had all the proper Indian stuff like poppadums and naan and everything. Her little brother was a bit of a nuisance, though. He’s seven, and a real baby. He kept banging on Chloe’s bedroom door when we were trying to listen to her new Norah Jones CD after dinner.

Maybe it’s just as well I don’t have a little brother or sister.