Graham White. The years after Joe and I had split up had been bleak when it came to men. I’d moved back in with Heather and we’d watched our flatmate Katie get married then move to a rustic idyll in Wiltshire.

And so there were two of us.

Heather and I went all out to meet The One. Heather particularly; she was ready to settle. I was less enthusiastic about committing again but was happy to accompany Heather to places supposedly good for meeting new people. We did the wine bars, which I grew to hate – the noise, the crowded pubs, men just wanting a one-night stand. I did date a man called Keith for a short while, but he was the grumpiest man on the planet once you got to know him, a glass half-empty type of person. I’d counted his complaints on one outing to see friends in Bristol, and by the time we’d got to Paddington Station from north London, there had been eighteen – about bin men who hadn’t made their collections, people who chucked chewing gum on the pavement, tourists who gathered at the bottom of escalators, the government, taxes, the weather, politics; all legitimate complaints, perhaps, but it was oh so wearying to listen to. I felt any joy I’d found in the day seep out of me like air out of a balloon, until I was as flat as he was and had a sudden urge to leap under the nearest train, or push him under one. We didn’t last long, and I hadn’t mentioned him for ‘the list’ because I knew there was no point. He most definitely wasn’t The One. Plus the few times we had had sex, it had been awful, soulless; I wasn’t that desperate. It was around the Keith time that Heather met Anita, love of her life, swing-dance partner and all-round fabster. I watched them fall in love, move in together then get married, and I was genuinely happy for her.

Then there was one. Me.

‘There’s someone out there for you,’ both Heather and Marcia had told me. ‘You’ll find him.’

I wondered if I was too picky, if I was difficult, unattractive, demanding, too independent, too needy. In the end, I gave up looking, and filled my time with classes – yoga, Italian, art, film study. I’d be fine on my own. I dug up my mantra from my teens and my twenties. I didn’t need anyone. I was fine, just fine.