“Ermmm,” the nice-sounding woman says. “That’s not…”

Of course she wouldn’t have used the real one. I chastise myself. I didn’t use Mum’s real maiden name myself. It would be far too easy for someone to guess it. “Sorry,” I reply, “complicated family, you know.” The woman titters. “It’s Maris.” Maris was the name of our first and only pet, a hamster who had died from a shock-induced heart attack when one of Dad’s friends had drunkenly slammed into his cage one evening. We had named him after a potato.

“Yep. Got it. I’ll send you a new phone by courier. It’ll be with you within the hour, Ms. Patterson.”

Damn, some things in life were a lot easier if you were rich and influential. It had taken me three hours on the phone to even navigate to the right department to request a replacement when I’d lost mine at a conference last year. Then forty-eight hours before the new phone was delivered. Chris had gone ballistic when I’d rung him from the hotel’s little desk phone. “Is there someone there with you?” he had demanded when I tried to explain why I couldn’t FaceTime. He had asked over and over. A conversation repeated in person when I arrived home the following afternoon.

But for Leah, life was easy. The nice lady even promised a replacement custom phone cover so it would be as good as new.

The phone now ordered, I make some coffee, swearing in exasperation at the fancy coffee machine, which seemed to require an engineering degree to operate. Eventually, I give up. I need to check in with Chris anyway—it’ll be better for me to call him first than risk him FaceTiming me and seeing Leah’s house in the background—and so I decide to find a coffee shop to call him from. Google Maps shows me there are four “boutique coffee houses” in the vicinity and one chain place on the next street. I doubt Leah has ever set foot in a chain coffee shop, it doesn’t exactly scream “influencer,” so it’s unlikely anyone will recognize me—her, I mean. Just in case, I dig out a Sweaty Betty cap from her wardrobe.

Squashed into the corner, with a macchiato and pain au chocolat, I take out my own phone and take a few pictures. Not pretty, well-framed and overly filtered concoctions to post on Instagram, but simple and functional records of my purchases, little reminders in case I forget. My only concession is cutting off the address of the cafe when I take a photo of the receipt; even though I don’t personally care which branch of Starbucks I’m in, I don’t want Chris to spot it if he checks my photos. Once satisfied, I remove the cap and shake out my hair. I could be in any coffee shop, in any suburb.

Chris answers my FaceTime on the second ring.

“Nice of you to call,” he says gruffly.

“Work is slammed,” I reply, “first break all day. We’ve got a new client and he wants me to look at ways to improve the productivity of his team…” I can see he’s not actually listening; his eyes are focusing on something behind his phone screen. After all, he only wants to know what I’m not doing, that I’m alone and busy with work and not off having fun.