She’s browned off with all my teasing

I watched her run out with a face like a Cheesy Wotsit

This is my 300th Single Mum’s Diary – and it may also be one of my last.

It’s not that I’ve stopped being a single mum (that’s a life sentence), but when I tried to take a photo of my daughter Jesse for this week’s column, she flatly refused.

I’d been making her packed lunch for summer camp yesterday morning, when she finally came down for breakfast. Backwards.

“Why won’t you turn around, Jesse?” I asked in my what-the-hell-have-youdone-now? voice.

“I can’t. You’ll laugh,” she cried tearfully, and ran back upstairs.

But I had already caught a glimpse of her glowing face. “Oh no – you’ve used my fake tan,” I gasped. “But it needs to be diluted with moisturiser, you silly moo.”

Silly Moo sat at the top of the stairs, put her head in her hands and cried hot tears of shame. Frankly it could have been tears of bleach – nothing was going to remove her streaky face mask of iodine-orange fake tan before a car bulging with noisy girls arrived to give her a lift.

“What am I going to do?” she wailed. And I realised this was it – this was the very reason I was put on this planet.

“You know what you’re going to do?” I announced. “You’re going to get in that car, point at your orange face and say, ‘Surprise! I know it’s early for Halloween, but I’ve come as a pumpkin’.” Which just made Jesse wail even louder.

“OK, OK… how about you just tell them you used my face cream last night but didn’t read the label which said ‘fake tan’,” I tried again. “It’s an easy mistake to make and you can laugh it off.”

Looking at me with total trust in her eyes, Jesse wiped her nose on my sleeve and hiccuped: “Yeah that would be funny – I think I can do that.”

“Excellent!” I said brightly. “And, erm, can I take a quick photo before you go?”

“Nooooo way,” she shouted. “It’s enough that I’m embarrassed in front of my friends – I don’t want to be laughed at by the whole world.”

And in that moment, I guiltily realised that I was putting a column deadline before her feelings.

It made me think back to Jesse’s last day of summer term when we said goodbye to her retiring headmistress, who put her hand on my arm and said kindly: “You’ve done a wonderful job with Jesse, but try not to tease her so much.”

But as I watched Jesse grab her lunch box and happily run out to her shrieking friends, despite having a face like a Cheesy Wotsit, I couldn’t help thinking my daughter is the bravest person I know.