Talking to Tilly cheered me up. I was trying hard not to feel sorry for myself. I couldn’t help, though, thinking it was desperately unfair that I’d suffered two medical dramas within a year. My ‘eye thing,’ as Tilly called it, hadn’t kept me confined to the flat – though walking round with a gas bubble in my eye was not much fun – but it had been more worrying. I knew my leg would heal. I just had to be patient. Like Charlie urged, I tried to enjoy the downtime, and after a few days of going slightly crazy, I got a grip and spent more time being constructive, taking on a new mini-project for Victor.

I remembered that I hadn’t received any feedback from Karen about the second version of her site, so emailed her asking if she was happy with it. She didn’t reply straight away and I decided to give it a couple of days before chasing her. I felt anxious about it, and told Charlie so in an email. She asked if I wanted her to go round and ‘sort her out.’

You don’t have any boys to send round, she wrote, so I’ll do it.

I replied with a LOL.

Sasha called and texted and arranged to come round. She was finally going to get to meet Charlie, who was still adamant that Sasha wouldn’t like her but agreed it was crazy they hadn’t met yet.

‘Why are all your friends girls?’ Charlie asked after I’d set up the ‘date’ with Sasha.

‘I’ve got male friends.’ I tried not to sound indignant. ‘But most of my friends are scattered around the country or still in Eastbourne.’

‘I suppose you don’t meet that many new people, being freelance.’

‘Exactly. And what about you? You never talk about your friends at all, apart from people at work.’

She walked over to the fridge, poured herself more wine. ‘I’ve got plenty of friends . . . But I haven’t lived in London very long, have I? They’re all back home in Leeds.’

‘Do you miss them?’

She shrugged. ‘Yeah, a bit.’

‘We should go up there, when I’m walking again. You can show me where you grew up, introduce me to your mates.’

‘Maybe.’

I remembered something. ‘That night we first went out, you stayed with someone in central London. Who was that?’

‘Huh?’

‘I just assumed you have a friend who lives in central London.’

‘Oh. Actually, I lied to you that night.’

I looked at her.

‘I wanted to go home with you, but knew that you’d think I was a total slut or that it was just a one-night stand. And I didn’t want the awkwardness of getting a cab to drop us off separately. So I lied.’

‘Oh.’