It was my nephew's christening on Sunday, and I was godmother, which was a lovely thing, and I was really moved by the service.

Afterwards we went back to the in-laws for a party, all the family were there. Surprisingly Steve came with me and my son - given that he knew my family wouldn't be thinking too highly of him since the last time we were all together was in summer for a family BBQ just after he'd got with Lauren. I'd dropped him at his flat that morning because he'd spent the night before with me, taking tons of heroin and god-knows-whatever-else, then spent the day and night texting me rubbish from the Lakes!

But they're a forgiving lot (given my brother, they've had to be), and things appeared to be going fine. My little sister (he's never met her) said, 'so you must be the Boy' and gave him a kiss (as did her mum-in-law, who must have been very wary, given that she's not family), and everyone was being very welcoming. He went off to the loo, then had a fag, then - disappeared!

I wasn't worried at all - I guessed he'd done a runner, and was annoyed he hadn't told me. But I wasn't going to let on at the time.

Everyone eventually noticed he'd gone. They all wondered why I was so calm about it, until I said 'would you worry if Steven (that's also my dead bruv's name, conmfusingly) disappeared?' It was like a light had gone on. 'Aaaaah' went all my family, immediately (to the confusion of everyone else).

'Funny, isn't it, how life turns out?' said my older sister.

The mum-in-law was worried he might come back when I'd gone. I reassured her: 'it's ok, the dark's coming on, his homing instinct will kick in now.'

When I got back (I'd ignored all his calls and texts cos I was annoyed), Steve was crying and a mess, and said he'd had a panic attack, 'but you won't believe me.'

'Too right I won't. You buggered off to a pub so you could get legless with no one seeing you. You can't kid the sister of a confirmed wanderer.' I gave him a bit of a hard time for a couple of hours then relented, cause I wasn't really that bothered, I'd had a great time at the party.

The only real consequence is that we have a sweepstake going on how long he'll last on Xmas day (don't anyone tell him, it might affect the result).