When I was thirteen, my spine developed a curve. I stood up nice and straight; but somehow, my back didn’t. I’d learnt about how straight the spine was meant to be several years earlier because someone else in our family had developed scoliosis and needed to have a steel rod fused to their back. The doctors assured me there was no evidence that the condition was genetic, however. It just happened, they said, randomly. So, I didn’t worry. My mum did though. She worried enough

It was New Year, over eighteen months ago. Time for a spring clean, even in that baking summer heat. Perhaps it was the heat that had got to us: why else would we decide to tackle the area that never got tackled? That we'd never felt the need to tackle? The area I refer to is the bookcase – that big wooden temple with all its sacred idols lining the shelves. We’d always assumed those great tomes would stay put for as long as we lived here, secure in their sturdy positions, be