Outside, I find myself face to face with the woman from the kebab shop. This time she is pushing a toddler in a pushchair and staring into the shop window. The little boy’s hair is so long that the fringe is almost covering his eyes. She must have left him outside the kebab shop, I realize. He must have been all alone on the pavement all the time she and Marouf were having their fight! The baby sits up straight, clutching his foot with one hand and a packet of crisps in the other. Some of it falls to the ground.

It is because of him that I speak to her. ‘I saw you back at the kebab shop. Are you alright now?’ I bend to smile at her son. He looks at me and makes a lovely ga sound, his own distinctive voice, his few teeth sitting lonely in their gums. I want to lift him up, to bathe him, to feed him, to teach him. I am yearning for my own baby and my silent invisible swell of a stomach is a solemn promise, the secret I am waiting to share. Beyond the fog of lethargy and nausea, after the heaviness and the pain, I will look down at an infant in my arms. She will be the centre of my life, she will be in focus, in colour and everything around her will be blurred, in black and white. I reach out to touch the toddler’s hair. It is so pale that it is almost white. Surely he is too fair to be Marouf’s. Surely. I am judging his mother now and as if she can read my mind, she withdraws, her face grim. Without a word, she yanks the pushchair so that the poor child is jerked back into his seat.

‘Wait,’ I say, but she just walks faster. I catch up with her and she is forced to stop. My words come out in a rush, ‘You should give him a rusk or a piece of fruit, not this snack that is not even potatoes! Get him something good. He needs proper food to grow. And cut his fringe, he can barely see through it …’

‘I don’t need you interfering! Mind your own bloody business.’ She pushes down on the handlebars so that the pushchair jerks up and comes down on my toes. I stand rooted to the pain as she flounces off. And because I haven’t spoken to anyone for days, I feel sorry for myself. I wipe my tears and hobble to the car. I used to have a gaggle of friends and invitations to parties. At work others listened when I made presentations – I even had an assistant in my last few months before I resigned. In that other past life, I never craved tomatoes and I must have passed one hard-done-by mother after the other without turning a hair.