For the rest of the day Si and I avoid eye contact. At just after 5 p.m., he gets up and shuffles some papers before swinging on his coat.

Addressing Ben, though it is clearly for my benefit, he says, ‘I’m off now. Won’t be in tomorrow, I’m in court all day. I’ll let you know how it goes.’

Ben grunts without looking up, ‘Don’t let us keep you.’

I watch him cross the room from the corner of my eye.

‘Lovers’ tiff?’ Ben asks as the door slams shut.

My fingers tense over the keyboard. ‘Fuck off.’

Scraping back my chair, I pick up the packet of cigarettes.

At the other end of the office from where we sit is a cheap latex boxroom within which is the Editor’s office, his desk crammed in with a wood-effect table and a filing cabinet. Just past his office is an external door leading onto a metal fire escape covered in black peeling paint.

Outside, I smoke two cigarettes in a row at the top of the stairs, looking out over the garden, which consists of a few bald flower beds and a series of badly laid slabs of stone shaded by ancient oak and cedar trees.

In the basement Giovanni, the Art Director, is shouting at the work experience girl. For a moment I remember how, when I first started working here, I’d been quietly impressed by the ‘art department’ with its dark room and photo studio. Now it just looks like a dank cellar with strip lighting and a few rusting Bisleys.

Breathing deeply through my nose, the cigarette smoke pirouetting up my arm, I lean back against the wall, listening to the music drift across the gardens from an open window somewhere in the distance.

By 7 p.m., all but Elaine, who is sorting through paperwork at her desk in reception, have headed home or more likely to the pub. Minutes later, she pokes her head around the door. ‘I’m going home now. Don’t forget to lock up, will you?’

Once alone, I sit back at my desk. Through the slats in the blinds I see the light outside is fading, Camden Town enveloped in a haze of pinks and pale blues as dusk settles.

Working in silence, I stay another couple of hours until the room grows cold, finishing off a piece I’ve been working on, trying to put a positive spin on a knife amnesty which has produced a total of about three weapons over the course of a month.

Swigging at a warm can of gin and tonic, I type my final words. Just as I am pressing Shut down on my computer, the phone on my desk rings.

My fingers hesitate as they reach the receiver, before snatching it and drawing it to my ear.

‘Isobel? Thank God.’ The voice is Giovanni’s, behind him the telltale roar of the pub.