She got up to turn on the kettle.

She could hear people moving about in the flat above her. It used to be quiet most of the year, but she realised that the owners, who lived in Paris except during holiday times were letting it out as an Airbnb, whenever they weren’t here themselves.

She sighed.

Life was changing in so many ways.

Maybe she really would have to give up her dream of living here and go back to live in London.

But now she wouldn’t have a hope of buying anywhere, and where would she get money to pay rent? Would she end up loading shelves at B&Q, along with the other silver stackers? All told, it would be cheaper and easier to stay here and beg in the streets.

She called and left a message at the old solicitor’s office in Hampstead, where she was once secretary, just to see if there was any work going. No doubt she would hear nothing. She’d been laid off. Why would they want her back now that she was even older?

As Theresa poured her tea, she decided to phone home. Perhaps talking to her daughter would help.

Imogen picked up.

‘Hello?’ She sounded stressed. Instantly Theresa realised it was not great timing. With the hour difference, Imogen would have only just got home from work.

‘Hi, darling. Just phoning to say hello.’

‘Oh, Mum. Hi.’ Theresa picked up her lack of interest. ‘Look . . . I’m a bit pressed at the moment. Only just walked through the door. Here. Speak to Chloe.’

Chloe was Theresa’s eldest grandchild.

‘Hi, Gran. How’s sunny France?’

Theresa waffled on for a while. She could hardly ask a fifteen-year-old for career and life-choice advice!

‘Gran, I was wondering . . . ?’ Chloe left the phrase dangling.

‘Yes?’

‘Is Bellevue-sur-Mer near the French Riviera?’

‘Bellevue-sur-Mer is the French Riviera.’ Theresa laughed. ‘The Riviera is just an English phrase which means the coast of south-eastern France, the whole coast along here, around Bellevue-sur-Mer.’

‘So you live in the French Riviera?’

‘Well, yes. But over here it’s called the Côte d’Azur – the blue coast. Is this for a geography class or something?’

‘Something like that. Here’s Lola. Talk some sense into her.’

Theresa was amused that Chloe was picking up her mother’s way of talking.

Lola wanted Theresa to look out and send her a copy of the photo she had taken of her and her two sisters by the wall plaque of Catherine Ségurane, the sixteenth-century Niçoise heroine who had saved the city by baring her backside to the fleeing hordes. ‘I’m writing a project about women soldiers,’ she said. ‘And I’m going to say that she won the war by showing the enemy her bottom.’

Theresa looked across the room at the bookshelf. She could see the orange spine of her photo album at the end of the row of art books. She promised she would do it right away, laughing at how fixated children always were with bottoms.