But that smell is just strong enough to drown out the will to fly and instead light the touchpaper to fight, anger in her veins bolstered with the knowledge that confrontation is, and always has been the only true way to get him out of her system.

‘Sorry!’ he says, not yet seeing her, not properly. ‘Having a mental morning already! Anyway …’

Becky stands and they shake hands, and Scott recognizes her while his hand is still in hers.

‘Becky?’

‘Hi, Scott.’

A long silence. She wonders if he will run, or call someone to drag her out. But instead he frowns, then laughs. There are no dark circles or creases under his eyes. Underneath the duck-egg blue of his jacket, this well-tailored jacket, is a white T-shirt – cellophane packaging removed only that morning, she bets, crumpled and discarded on the floor of his luxury apartment for someone else to collect and throw away. God she hates him.

‘I was expecting someone called Karin. You haven’t changed your name, have you?’

‘No,’ says Becky.

‘OK. Well … this is unexpected! Um … Did you want to discuss investment stuff or …?’ He leaves the question trailing for her to fill in.

Where does she begin?

‘How long’s it even been?’ he says.

‘A bit over sixteen years since I last saw you.’

‘Wow. You haven’t changed.’

‘I think I have.’

‘Well … you look good.’ He is being bright and sparky, the Scott of a named house plant and pretty coffees and hangin’ with his big sister Gemma. Still, she can see that he is unnerved. Well, good.

‘Do you remember that party we were both at in Hampstead?’

He squints, remembers. ‘At that girl Amy’s house? Do you want to sit down?’

‘No I don’t want to sit down. I don’t know whose house it was.’

‘OK,’ he says cautiously. ‘The same party we did a pill in her parents’ amazing wardrobe room kind of thing?’ He has dropped his voice, like he might be overheard.

‘Yes. I wanted to talk about what happened between you and me.’ Her voice wobbles a little and she digs her fingernails into her palm.

‘Like what?’ says Scott. He has dropped all the peppiness. Now he is nothing but anxious. She can’t quite bring herself to say it though.

‘After Spin the Bottle.’

‘Yeah, but what?’

‘I mean what happened. Sexually.’ There. That’s as close as she can get.

Scott looks down, embarrassed. ‘Christ,’ he says softly. ‘Did that really upset you?’ Then, ‘Is that what you want to talk about? Now? Look, I don’t remember everything. We were pretty fucked up.’