Perhaps they should have a weekend in Paris together? Although they would need to bring the children, there was no one they could leave Charlotte alone with for an afternoon, let alone overnight.

*

Time crept on and Alice felt a squirm of embarrassment. She kept the waitress at bay for as long as she could, insisted her friends would be there shortly and they would order together. Her French wavered with the combination of a hangover and mortification and the waitress mistook her linguistic abilities, slowly repeating her question in English as to whether it was just a table for one, and not three, as had been booked? The restaurant was busy and heads craned in her direction.

When the table became at risk – ‘You must order or you must leave,’ the waitress said bluntly – Alice ordered: Eggs Benedict sur English muffin, sauce hollandaise. It was a set menu: coffee, juice, an assortment of ‘house breads’.

‘Les pains sont pour une ou trois personnes?’ the waitress enquired. One or three?

‘Trois,’ Alice responded firmly. They might be late but they would definitely come. They wouldn’t leave her here alone at brunch, she thought irritably. She shot desperate glances at the door while trying to look aloof. She no longer felt free without her phone, she felt disorientated. No distractions were forthcoming, she had no book, no phone, no friends. Where were Alice and Jules?

By the time the breads arrived – cinnamon and cardamom rolls, scones, banana cake – she was starving. She scoffed her share, and then continued to eat. She felt guilty but they could hardly complain, could they? They were fifty minutes late. Surely one of them could have called the restaurant to let her know?

When her eggs followed, and there was still no sign of her friends, tears pricked her eyes, but she blinked them away. That would be the final indignity. She ate without tasting. After three people’s worth of cake, she wanted only to finish so she could leave.

She signalled for the bill. When it arrived, she had been charged for ‘trois personnes’. A hundred euros for a humiliating brunch alone, she seethed, but then it hit her. Something bad must have happened.

‘Il y a eu un accident,’ she declared. There has been an accident. She gestured vaguely at her bag as though she had received a call. Perhaps it’s true, she thought, hailing a taxi back to the apartment. She was an explosive mix of anxious, nauseous and angry, but as her taxi wound over the river and along boulevard Saint-Germain, angst took precedence. Would she find one of her friends unwell? Hurt? Sick? On fire? She almost hoped the apartment were on fire because it needed to be something good to have stood her up like that!

She slipped a key out of the key safe and took the stairs two at a time, charging into the apartment, calling their names. It was as silent as when she left it. Her phone and note were still on the table. For goodness’ sake, she muttered, no one had even bothered to charge it. She marched into Jules’s room. Empty. Nina’s room. Empty. She checked the kitchen, the bathroom, the balcony. Empty, empty, empty. Her friends had gone. And they’d left her alone in Paris.