They lay facing one another on the bed, she in her unzipped dress, her make-up halfway down her face, with one shoe on and one shoe off, and Davey in his shorts and socks. The night had taken a turn, they both knew it, but lying there face to face, and for the first time stripped bare, was refreshing, comforting and real. They talked about old times, the band, the boys, Rabbit, Johnny and that epic love story that no ordinary mortal could compete with.

‘They were star-crossed, and I ended up marrying a banker called Neil who lifted the cheek of his arse to fart and said “beggin’ your pardon”.’

He smiled at her and played with one of her blonde curls. ‘I didn’t even try.’

‘Why?’ she asked.

‘Lots of reasons – I was scared, and I’m odd . . . so there’s that.’

‘There is that,’ she agreed.

‘Also, I loved Johnny, too, and what we had. I lost him to his illness and the lads in the band to their other lives. It seemed so easy for them to just pick up and move on, find a life outside of music, discard the dream, but not for me.’

‘You were heartbroken,’ she said.

‘Just like you are now.’

‘I am,’ she said, ‘and I’m lonely.’

‘Me too.’

‘You have Juliet,’ she said.

‘And she’s opened the door to a life I didn’t think was for me.’

‘So now you want a wife and kids?’ Her query came with an arched eyebrow.

‘Now I want a real life with real love. I think Juliet deserves that, too.’

Marjorie was tired and emotional; her thoughts drifted to another time in her life, one when she and Neil were trying for the baby they hoped would fix them. It didn’t work out; they had tests and they were inconclusive and their problem conceiving was described as unexplained infertility. It was after that diagnosis and two failed rounds of IVF that Marjorie had slept with Davey and got caught.

‘What about you, Marj, do you want a husband and kids?’

‘No,’ she said.

‘Why not?’

‘Because I had a husband and I can’t have kids.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean we did it all and couldn’t conceive – then Neil meets the lovely Debbie and now they have a baby girl.’

‘That doesn’t mean anything.’

‘It does, and it’s OK. I’d probably be a shit mother anyway.’

Davey wasn’t buying that. ‘Bullshit, you’d be the best mother in the world.’

‘Stop, Davey. I’m not one of your girls who’ll believe anything to stay in the bubble with you, as nice as the bubble is.’