She sighed. He was right, of course, but that didn’t make the prospect of it any easier. And after two full on days in London, she really couldn’t face seeing him tonight. Should she reply, or just ignore the text? With some messaging apps, it was possible to see if someone had opened a message, but, thankfully, Charlie had sent her an old-fashioned text message so he had no way of knowing if she’d read it or not. That, at least, gave her a few minutes to think about how best to respond.

But what was the point? It wasn’t as if they were going to go on record and respond to what was, essentially a Fake News story, fed to a scurrilous news website to discredit them both. Getting together to talk and agonise about that wouldn’t make a scrap of difference. And, actually, seeing Charlie would be far too painful.

Before she could think twice about it, and to make sure that he didn’t just rock up at her door, she sent him back a swift response.

Not much to say, really. Better to just ignore it and get on with things. Nothing we can do.

As she sent it, she knew she was avoiding another confrontation, but she also knew it was far better for her own mental health to put some distance between herself and Charlie. And it was definitely better for them both not to be seen together.

‘Hey, gorgeous,’ she called as Arthur came strolling through his cat flap and jumped onto her lap. ‘I hope Isabella remembered to feed you before she shut up shop tonight.’ Since he didn’t seem to be complaining for his dinner, Holly assumed that was the case.

Leaning back in the armchair, she soon found herself becoming drowsy. As she drifted off, she was assailed by dreams of herself as a medieval maiden in a long, flowing yellow dress, and Charlie as some kind of Black Knight, flinging her over the rump of his horse and absconding with her. If the AllFeed news story hadn’t been so offensive, the dream would almost have been funny.

The next morning, it was a relief to open the door to her shop and get back to being the retailer she was by trade. So much of her attention had been distracted by Charlie, and the CF campaign lately, that she was losing sight of the passion that had driven her to open ComIncense in the first place. This place, and her family, were all that mattered. It was about time she focused on them. Harry seemed to be doing fine and she was looking forward to catching up with him one evening this week.