Hey Dad, do you remember the time you hid in a green wheelie bin? For, like, 2 hours or something?

It was that holiday in France. The first with the new girlfriend. The first since you and mum split up.

I imagine it was horrendous. I imagine I was angry and rude and difficult.

But I only have good memories from that trip. The view of the village church from my bedroom window, you trying to teach me to paint with watercolours, eating brioche and nutella for breakfast everyday, the open air swimming pool and you persuading me to jump from the top diving board.

And then there were the long, warm evenings. We ate outdoors and chatted and played with the English family staying in the cottage next door. I don’t remember how it came about, but all of us, children and grown ups, ended up playing hide & seek. Our playground was limitless, we had the whole of the village square to hide in, as well as each others cottages.

I don’t even remember hiding. I don’t even remember finding Nicola. But I remember all of us searching and searching for you. It was getting dark and we had walked the length and breadth of that village twice over, looking in every potential hiding place. We’d been over and over all the rooms in both of the cottages but we simply couldn’t find you. You had vanished.

We were beaten. We shouted, wanting you to know the game was over. You’d won.

‘Daaaad, we give up, come out. We can’t find you Daaaad’.

I was stood beside the back door to our cottage when you leaped from inside that bin. I don’t think I’ve ever jumped so much in my life, my feet actually left the floor and I let out a little squeal.

You’d spent the whole evening, crouched in that stinking bin, only coming up for air when you were sure no one was around. You reeked of refuse and your legs were cramping up but you’d won.

I remember laughing so hard.

Hey Dad, do you remember the hornet? OK, well maybe it wasn’t a hornet. The wasp then. It could have been a hornet though.

I was in that flat in Wembley. What was I, maybe 17?

I was just peeling my work clothes off when I heard a definite buzzing sound. There was this HUGE hornet (lets just say it was a hornet) frantically flying round my tiny attic room. I started flapping, panicking, my arms flailing, trying to open the stupid skylight.

I was half naked and terrified. The hornet flew into my cheap paper lampshade from Ikea, which only served to amplify the buzzing sound and paint an enormous shadow of the creature on every wall of my room.

That was it, I was hyperventilating, genuinely fearing for my life.

‘That’s it,’ I thought, ‘this is my fate. Death by hornet.’

I managed to slam my bedroom door shut, leaving the killer bee on the inside. I sat at the top of the stairs and shakily keyed your number into my mobile and listened to it ring.

As soon as you picked up I burst into tears, blurting out that I was being held hostage by a hornet, that I had no way to go to bed and that I was having trouble breathing. I’d venture that I was probably having a full on panic attack by this point and, although I’m sure you recognised the absurdity of the situation, you knew I needed you there in person to calm me down. A phobia is a phobia, however ridiculous it might seem to everyone else.

So you got in your car and drove to my flat in Wembley. With your can of bug spray. You drove for nearly an hour, at 10.45pm, to come and kill a wasp for me.

You climbed the stairs, like a knight in shining armour, and swiftly entered my room, letting the door close behind you. All I heard from my position on the landing was the quick ‘whoosh’ of the aerosol and then your voice telling me it was OK now.

‘You can come in now, it’s safe now’ you said.

Hey Dad, do you remember my 18th?

You missed my party. You were in UCH in London. They told you those flu like symptoms were actually leukemia. I don’t know how you reacted, I wasn’t there. I was dressed up as Audrey Hepburn, dancing to Madonna and drinking peach Schnapps and lemonade.

Mum told us the next morning. I’d figured it was serious. Somebody let slip that you weren’t at your local hospital, that you’d been transported to somewhere more specialist. She sat us on the sofa, the sofa where we always sat for bad news, and told us. I don’t remember crying much but I must of.

We took the tube up to Euston Square. Hammersmith and City line I think. The pink one. We bought birthday cake and ornaments from the party. A clapper board and a cheap plastic ‘Oscar’. We changed into our costumes in the toilet. It was supposed to be like you never missed the party.

So I walked down that hospital corridor and entered your room wearing a black, floor length cocktail dress, long satin gloves and a tiara.

You had cancer.

I don’t remember which one seemed more ridiculous.

Hey Dad, remember when I phoned you to tell you I was pregnant? You thought I was going to say that I’d booked a driving lesson.

Hey Dad, do you remember when you drove to the hospital when Izzy was born. You weren’t even supposed to be behind a wheel, you were that dosed up on morphine. But you came and you held your granddaughter anyway.

You were cross when you had to go. You needed to take your meds but you had left them in the car. You wouldn’t let Carl go and get them for you. You said he shouldn’t leave his daughter.

Hey Dad, remember when I got my Alevel results? 3 As. I don’t remember what you said, I don’t think I can even remember telling you.

But I can summon up a prefect image of your handwriting on the back of that post card you gave me. ‘I’m very proud of you’ it said. ‘Love Dad’.

Hey Dad, do you remember the last time we spoke? I told you Izzy had cut another tooth. You said that was great because teeth were very important.

Wise words from your death bed. Look after your teeth.

Hey dad, I miss you. Happy Father’s Day.

Loveaudrey xxx