‘Michaela!  MICHAELA!’

Mum was calling up the stairs for my little sister.  It was ridiculous.  A week of this and they still hadn’t learned.  I sucked in my breath and yelled, ‘MIKE!’

Moments later she toddled in wearing jeans, a t-shirt of mine and a pair of Dad’s socks.  She had to, really, because everything of hers was pink and girly.  She went and stood by the highchair and looked expectantly up at Mum.  But Mum didn’t move.  She was just staring, and so were my dad and Nicola.

That morning, Michaela had had beautiful long brown hair.  Now most of it was gone, and what was left looked like it had been hacked off with a kitchen knife.  It couldn’t have been a kitchen knife, though, because Michaela couldn’t reach those.  She must have used those practically blunt plastic scissors that Nicola gave her.  I thought it was a stupid idea - Michaela wasn’t even two yet - but that’s big sisters for you.  She said she wanted Michaela to have the power to express herself, even if that meant being destructive.  I didn’t know what to say to such a weird remark, so I dropped it.

I stared too, but only because I was surprised - I didn’t disapprove.  Actually, I thought she had guts.  Nicola didn’t seem bothered either.  She had a magazine - one of those ones about boys and makeup - and she went back to it as soon as she’d taken in what had happened.

Dad spoke first: ‘What in God’s name have you done to yourself?’

Michaela looked at him for a moment.  Then she turned away, and started trying to climb into the highchair.  Mum went to help her, but Dad waved her off and said, ‘Answer me, Michaela.’

‘Mummy!’ she said, stretching her arms towards both Mum and the chair.

‘MICHAELA!’

‘My name is Mike!’ she yelled suddenly, and then she turned round and hit him on the leg.  Dad looked shocked, though goodness knows why.  Michaela had got into the habit of hitting people shortly after Joshua was born.

‘Your name,’ said Dad, ‘is Michaela.  You’re a girl.  And little girls don’t hit people!’

Nicola popped up from behind her magazine and said, ‘Is it okay for boys to hit people?’

‘Well of course not!’ said Dad.

At the end of the room, Joshua started crying.

‘I’ll go,’ said Dad, and he went.

Mum picked up Michaela and put her in the chair.  Then, while Mum was dishing out lunch, Michaela stared over her shoulder at Dad and Joshua.  I could see that there were tears in her eyes, and I really felt for her.  Trying to be Mike hadn’t just failed to get Dad to love her more - it had actually made him cross with her.

Honestly, I couldn’t blame her.  I knew more or less how she felt.  Dad had always loved Nicola to pieces, because she was ‘his girl’.  Then I was another girl.  I’m sure they were hoping for a boy.  I don’t know anyone else called Olivia, and I don’t think Mum and Dad would have done that if they didn’t want an Oliver.  Maybe they even wanted a Nicholas too, but a girl was okay the first time around.  They could always try again.

They waited eleven years after me, before they had Michaela, and then - oh dear - another girl.  She was obviously more of a disappointment to Dad than I ever was.  It was like he wouldn’t give her the time of day.  And then when Joshua was born…

Dad must have climbed on top of Mum to try again for a boy practically the minute Michaela popped out.  Not that she would have realised this, exactly, but she knew she and Joshua were both babies and she knew Joshua was the better loved.  That was why it was harder for her than for me: I never had a brother to contend with.

After lunch, Nicola and I took Michaela to the park to cheer her up.  When we got there, she beckoned Nicola down to her level and whispered, ‘Mummy.’

Nicola stood up straight again, her eyes suddenly wide, and said, ‘W-what?’

‘Be my Mummy,’ said Michaela.

Nicola shook her head.  ‘Mickey, no…’

Michaela looked at me.  ‘You be Mummy.’

‘I’m not really old enough,’ I said.  ‘I don’t think anyone would believe it.’

‘Bad Mummy!’

She hit me on the arm, and then she hit Nicola.  It wasn’t the first time Nicola had been slapped by Michaela, and it wasn’t as though it hurt, but this time when it happened she burst into tears.  Then she turned and ran away from us.

‘Mummy!’ Michaela said to me.

‘All right,’ I said.  ‘I’ll be Mummy.’

She wanted me to push her on the swing.  As I pushed, barely hearing her shouts of, ‘Higher, Mummy!  Higher!’, my brain was working overtime.  I saw Nicola come back from wherever she had gone, sit down on a park bench and stare at Michaela.

When Michaela finally tired of the swing, I persuaded her to play on the slide.  She didn’t need my help for that.  I went and sat with Nicola, and said, ‘Wouldn’t you like to hear her calling you Mummy?’

Nicola stared at me, and I wondered whether or not I should go on.  I could have been wrong.  I hoped I was.  I’d seen it on soap operas, and heard stories about it in Victorian times, but these weren’t Victorian times.

Still, Nicola was only just sixteen.  She had been fourteen when Michaela was born.  I looked into her eyes and said, ‘You went away for a few months before Micks was born.’

Nicola nodded slowly, and turned her gaze back onto the little girl continually climbing up and sliding down the slide.

‘Residential drama programme,’ she said.

‘Is that really where you went?’ I asked.

She stared at me for a moment.  Then her lip curled and she said, ‘Of course it is.  Don’t be stupid.’

It was so obvious.  I mean, a residential drama programme?  Actually, it was very thorough - I’d seen the brochures and everything.  But when Dad planned it, I don’t think he expected her to come back with a baby.  I could just imagine him wanting to get rid of it… of her.  It would have been Mum that persuaded him to do it like this.  She loved Michaela as much as she loved any of us, or at least she acted like she did.

Michaela ran towards the steps of the slide, tripped and fell.  She began to cry, and Nicola was at her side in moments.  It was so weird.  I was right in the middle of a cheesy storyline from a soap opera that was reaching for ideas.  But I suppose they have to get even those ideas from somewhere.  I guess these things do really happen.