I could see that I’d thrown Marcia with my argument and she was considering what I’d said. ‘Hmm. Maybe that’s true, but what if you can’t move forward because you’re stuck in a pattern of thinking so sabotaging your relationships? I think this is exciting and I still think we should look into finding Billy Jackson. Who’s next on your list of past lovers? And don’t give me any more pets.’

I knew I’d have to humour her. When Marcia got the bit between her teeth, there was no letting go. ‘OK. First love, er … that would have been Andrew Murphy.’

‘And where was this? In case I need to track him down.’

‘Manchester. I was ten. He was in my class in junior school, just before I met you.’

‘Hold on,’ said Pete, and he cocked his ear to listen to an announcement. ‘Come on, looks like our flight is on time after all. We’d better go to the departure gate.’

Saved by the bell, I thought as we gathered our hand luggage and made our way to our plane.

*

Soon we were winging our way above the clouds back to London and Mumbai was receding in a haze of dust beneath us. Luckily Marcia and Pete’s seats were across from me on the aisle so Marcia couldn’t question me further. I did a few puzzles for a while then my eyelids grew heavy and, as I began to doze, my thoughts turned back to my early years.

Andrew Murphy. I hadn’t thought about him in years, decades.

He’d lived round the corner from us in Manchester, in a Victorian house on the main road near the Golden Lion pub. I liked it because it had a wooden porch at the front and looked more interesting than the 1930s semi-detached house that I lived in with my parents and two brothers. Andrew and I were in our last year at the same primary school and the first time I really noticed him was in RE. Before that, apart from my brothers, boys hadn’t been on my radar, I only saw them as annoying creatures who were too boisterous and smelt of stale biscuits.

Mother Christina had been talking to the class about God being omnipresent.

Andrew stuck his hand up. ‘In that case, why do we only pray in church? If he’s omnipresent, isn’t it OK to pray anywhere, even in the loo?’

I’d turned to look more closely at who had asked what I thought was a brilliant question, and saw a good-looking lad with an open friendly face and shock of brown hair that wouldn’t be combed down.

He got detention for being disrespectful and I was sent with him for laughing.

‘So God is omnipresent apart from bathrooms and toilets,’ he said later as we wrote out lines from the catechism.