I rolled my eyes. ‘OK, then you can add Idris Elba, George Clooney and Colin Farrell to that list. I think I’ve always known I belonged with one of them. Be great if one of them turned out to be my soulmate.’

‘Start at the beginning, Bea. First love ever,’ said Marcia.

‘Jack.’

‘Jack? I don’t remember him. How old were you when you met him?’ She seemed peeved that there was some part of my life that she didn’t know about.

‘Five.’

‘And Jack?’

‘He was a puppy when we got him, so he was probably about six weeks old.’

Marcia sighed. ‘Oh that Jack, course I remember him. He was a dear old thing. I suppose it’s vaguely possible your soulmate might have returned as a dog.’

I laughed again. ‘You really are mad as a hatter, Marcia. But I did love Jack. I truly did. He was my best friend and constant companion. I was heartbroken when he died.’

‘I remember. We buried him in your parents’ back garden.’

‘And I was heartbroken again when old Boris died, and Caspar.’

‘Ah, we all loved those dogs,’ said Pete. ‘There’s nothing as sad as losing a beloved pet.’

‘I’ll look into whether animals reincarnate as animals or if ever they cross over to being a human,’ said Marcia.

‘What planet are you on, Marcia? I’m not even entertaining this, not for a second.’ I gave Pete an exasperated look. He grinned back at me and went back to his screen. ‘I’m not sure if I even believe in reincarnation, animals or human. There’s no real proof is there?’

‘Oh yes there is,’ said Marcia. ‘I’ve read loads of accounts of people who have recall of past lives; people who have recollection of places that they’ve never been to in their current life and they remember specific details of the people that they used to be, who they used to know and where they lived. You should look it up. There’s loads on the Net.’

‘Think rationally for a moment, Marcia, that is if you’re capable of doing that. These places that people remember – but have never been to – are probably from movies they’ve seen, or the Internet, or travel programmes. We’re exposed to so much these days, these reincarnation-believers probably trot out something that they saw online but don’t remember having taken in. Our brains are stuffed full of information.’

‘You can believe what you want, Bea, and I can be rational, but I want to remain open-minded too. There are many things we don’t understand with our limited brains.’