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To this day, she doesn't know what made her do it. Feminine intuition perhaps.

The day started the same as any other. Jo was rushing around getting the kids ready for school; Jeff was rushing around thinking only of himself. As usual, he had already asked several moronic questions as if he were merely a guest in the house in which they'd lived for four years. "Where are the clean towels? Is there any milk? How does the central heating timer work? We're running out of toilet paper" And so on. It was a never-ending assault on Jo's senses, like having a third child.

Trouble was, Jeff was one of those men who had grown up with a mother who did everything for him. All his life, he had been accustomed to just dropping an item of clothing on the floor and not seeing it again until it miraculously reappeared in his closet, washed, ironed, and hung neatly on a padded hanger. Jo suspected Jeff's mother prided herself on being there to catch her son's discarded clothing before it touched the floor. There was little doubt she had been disappointed by her son's choice of such a shambolic, disheveled wife.

This morning, the Planet Hollywood T-shirt Jo had worn in bed the night before was tucked into a pair of baggy-bummed, black tracksuit bottoms, and her dark-blond hair was scraped back into a messy ponytail. On her feet were a pair of those flat airline socks designed for people with no ankle, heel or arch.

Thomas and Sophie were sitting at the breakfast table. Thomas, who was eight, wore only the bottoms of his Batman pajamas; the top was tied around his head like a pint-size commando. His shock of blond hair was in its early morning Woody Woodpecker style, and he was spilling cornfl...