‘Cat?’ Django called softly. Cat blinked, yawned and smiled, hoping it would deflect attention from the obvious effort of pulling on a brave face at that time of night.

‘Mario Cipollini’s thighs have a circumference of 80 centimetres,’ she told them.

I could hear them, my sisters. And they’re right – I am in France, sort of. And I wonder if I shouldn’t go. I mean, if I stay, maybe He will pop round some time over the next three weeks. Say he wants to change his mind but I’m not here? Might he come back? And say sorry?

As if.

No no.

That’s over. Move on, Cat.

But he might.

No, I don’t think he will.

How can he love me and then not? And in the same day too?

‘I love you,’ he said in a rare phone call from work that morning. ‘I’m leaving,’ he said, as so often he did, later that night. ‘So go then,’ I said, thinking if I stood up to him it would give him the reality check he needed. ‘Go then,’ I said, presuming he’d stand stock still in horror, sweep me off my feet and cry, ‘Never never never.’

Instead?

He went. He ran.

Three months since.

And I cannot bring him back. Yet I left the door metaphorically wide open, hoping he’d come back and bang on it, proclaiming, ‘I want to be here with you. Always. What can I do, sweet love?’

So now I think I regret what I did. But they all tell me not to.

The door’s still ajar. Soon I’m going to have to shut it. For my safety and my sanity. Let go.

I don’t want to. Won’t letting go be just that – letting go?

Giving up? Admitting failure? Admitting that it is really, truly over?

And if I let go, am I not saying that I relinquish my hope? Because who am I, Cat McCabe, without my hope?

France. Le Tour de France. La Grande Boucle. A dream I’ve had for five years. He was a dream I had for five years – at least this is one I can make come true, all the way to the Paris finale. I will follow the Tour de France, become a part of this fantastic travelling family. From start to finish. All the way, over the flat lands, over the Pyrenees and Alps, through the vineyards and home to the Champs-Elysées. Me and my heroes. Fabian Ducasse. Vasily Jawlensky. Luca Jones.

You can keep your Brad Pitts and Tom Cruises. You can even keep your George Clooneys. If you want a hero, choose anyone from the Système Vipère or Zucca MV teams. Brad and Tom couldn’t do a fraction of the twenty-one hairpin bends on L’Alpe D’Huez. Mr Clooney wouldn’t dare descend a mountain with the grace and speed of a peregrine falcon in full plummet.

Bollocks! What on earth has got into me? I mean, I know I have to move on now – but fantasizing about professional cyclists is not only unrealistic, it’s daft and it could be detrimental. Exactly. I’m a professional journalist about to infiltrate a male-dominated world. Not a groupie. Even if I was a groupie, why would they look at me? Put me next to a podium girl with their lips and their legs and their kisses and mini skirts, and I rest my case.