I glanced out of the plane window and into the rising sun, it dazzled me. I remembered my mother telling me that I must never look at the sun directly, for what I considered at the time to be another empty reason, designed to cement her dominance over me and satisfy her need to control and punish. She may have been right. Kaleidoscopic shards bounced around my retinas as I brought my face back into the cabin. No, I didn’t have to follow her rules any more, she was dead, and I no longer had anyone to answer to. As I accepted a glass of orange juice and a soggy croissant from the flight attendant, the purple-green splashes gradually faded from my vision . I realised I had been right all along, that this was just another of her deceptions. My sight was fine and clear.

I turned my head to the world again, and stared at the sun as hard as I could, feeling my optic nerve set alight with the fire of defiance.