Caroline and I were on our way to Windsor for a meeting with the senior management team. She was supposed to be talking about budgets, and I was there to present the recruitment plans for the new warehouse that was opening in the new year. Caroline was driving and chattering on about work as we sped along the M4. I was exhausted, my throat sore.

Going out of the office is never a good thing for me. It upsets my routine. Already I was planning the checks for when I got home, telling myself that I would have to do it right, do it properly, so that I didn’t end up doing it all sodding night again, making a racket that Stuart could hear through the floorboards.

‘You look worn out, love,’ she said then.

‘Do I?’

‘Late night, was it?’

‘Not really. I think I’m getting a cold or something.’

I went back to gazing out of the window. If only I could sleep, just for a few minutes, I would feel better.

‘How’s things going with that lovely man upstairs?’

‘Oh. Well, he’s still talking to me after all, it seems. He took me out for the day.’

‘That sounds promising.’

‘It was nice.’

‘You don’t sound sure.’

‘We’re just friends, Caroline,’ I said.

‘Bollocks you are,’ she replied.

I laughed, in spite of myself. ‘He’s not up for anything else, I’m telling you.’

‘I wish you’d stop bloody pacing around each other and just get on with it,’ she said.

‘Look,’ I said, ‘nothing is going to happen. If it was going to happen, it would have done by now. I do like him, at least I think I do. But I prefer being on my own.’

‘Don’t you get lonely sometimes?’

‘No.’

‘Oh, I do. Since Ian left – it’s miserable really. I try to hold it all together for the kids, but you know, when they go to their dad’s at the weekends, the house is so quiet. I was thinking of joining a club, or something. What do you reckon?’

‘You mean like a singles thing? A dating agency?’

Her cheeks were pink. ‘Well, why not? It’s not easy meeting nice blokes, is it? I was kind of hoping – maybe…’

‘Maybe what?’

‘Maybe you’d come with me?’

I stared at the side of her head while she kept her eyes on the road, her fingers gripping the steering wheel. I tried to think of something to say.

‘We’re here,’ she said, pulling into the car park. ‘Are you ready to face the lions?’