She reaches to hold my hand. ‘I do love you, darling.’

‘I love you, too, Mum. I do. Even though we’ll never be friends in the normal way.’

‘Inmates,’ she says. ‘That’s what we are.’

I nod. ‘And Kelly’s moving in so you can’t just come back here as and when you please. I won’t be your candle in the window.’

‘Understood.’

She moves to hug me, and I let her. Our clavicles clash like antlers. I pull her in tight and try not to think about every single contact point between our bodies and how long this embrace might last. I do pull back first and that feels empowering but also potentially insulting and oh god I just need to stop analysing every single fucking thing all the time brain PLEASE.

‘Oh, my darling,’ she says, into my hair. ‘At least I only had to try and look like Twiggy. You’ve got to sing and dance and fuck and work and mother and sparkle and equalise and not complain and be beautiful and love your imperfections and stay strong and show your vulnerability and bake and box and pull fucking pork. It’s much too much.’

I say, ‘Alexa, play “Age Ain’t Nothing but a Number”.’

‘You don’t even have an Alexa.’

‘Hahahahahah.’

INT. JENNY’S ROOM. NIGHT

A lamp on. Jenny in a double bed, reading a book. Her phone is face down on the bedside table, next to a pint of orange squash.

The phone beeps and lights up. Jenny looks at it, hesitates, looks back to her book, and then puts her book down and picks up the phone. She reads the name on the phone, hesitates again, makes a decision, nods and answers.

ART: Jenny! How ARE you?

JENNY: I’m okay, Art. Yes, I think I am.

ART: Thanks for picking up. I wasn’t sure you would. You’ve always been such a textual being.

JENNY: How are you, Art? It’s been months.

ART: Oh, okay. You know. Suzanne is doing my head in slightly. She’s pretty crazy.

JENNY: Wait – either I’ve heard this before or there’s been a glitch in the Matrix. You don’t need to slag Suzanne off to me, Art, you know? You don’t have to be the big man protecting my puny feelings.

ART: And Clem got sick last week and it’s taking over EVERYTHING. I’m behind on my shoots. I feel like saying, hey – I am a person too! I am a human, with needs! Suzanne seems to forget this when her kid is around, and as for the kid – well, the kid has no concept of it at all. She does not give a shit about my work, this kid!

JENNY: Extraordinary.

ART: Isn’t it. You know, Jenny, you sound different. You sound good. Like … I dunno, the old you.