Tuesday, 25 June

Alix meets Josie outside the estate where Josie grew up and follows her to the community hall to interview Josie’s mother, Pat. Pat is unexpectedly polished, energetic, and self-important, contrasting sharply with Josie’s stiffness. Because Josie has asked Alix not to reveal the real premise of the podcast, Alix presents the project as an exploration of birthday twins, chance, and nature versus nurture.

Pat quickly centers the conversation on her own life, explaining that she once studied Social Anthropology at Goldsmiths but became pregnant with Josie at twenty and abandoned her degree. Pat frames this as a sacrifice that allowed her to devote herself to improving the estate, while also directing pointed, dismissive remarks toward Josie. Alix senses that Pat resents, even loathes, her daughter, which gives Alix a new context for Josie’s damaged manner.

When Alix asks about the day Josie was born, Pat says she had been in denial during pregnancy, was still focused on an unfinished essay during labor, and felt terrified when she first saw Josie. Pat cannot remember Alix’s mother from the hospital, and reacts sourly when Alix notes that her mother had children later because she was building a career. After Pat leads a tour of the estate dominated by accounts of her own achievements, Alix privately concludes that Pat is a narcissist and that Josie could not have escaped such a childhood unharmed.

At Pat’s flat, Josie shows Alix her old pink bedroom and says it is where she first saw Walter through the window. In the kitchen, Alix asks whether Pat knew anything would happen between Josie and Walter on Josie’s fourteenth birthday; Pat angrily denies it and points out that Walter was older than Pat. Alix sees Josie’s distress and stops herself from pressing further.

That evening, Alix is at home with Nathan, who has been unusually attentive since losing control the previous Thursday night. Nathan says he will work from home the next day, forcing Alix to mention that Josie is coming for an interview. Alix gives Nathan the sanitized birthday-twin explanation and withholds the troubling details about Josie, deciding that Nathan, who has his own secrets, does not deserve full access to hers.