Almost forty minutes later Yvonne is switching off her computer and reapplying her make-up. She looks fine for after-work drinks, but not really for dinner, especially to the kind of place Jaden likes to go.

She walks across to The Endurance. It’s busy outside, packed with crowds enjoying one of the first bright evenings of the year and pretending the cold isn’t bothering them. She hopes they’re not standing outside, as she’s underdressed for the weather and her feet are already cold in their sandals.

‘Excuse me,’ she pushes her way through the entrance and towards the back of the pub where the work lot usually congregate and then she sees him.

Him.

Right there, in her pub. It can’t be. But when she looks again she sees it’s undeniably Lewis. He stands at the bar, nodding at the person in front of him. In his hand there’s a glass which he raises to his mouth then stops and laughs at something the other person says.

Yvonne gasps and turns the other way. It’s weird because he had been on her mind ever since her mum made that comment about him not helping Emma out and she hadn’t known how to respond to it. It’s been easy to push him from her mind and in the last eight years she’s rarely thought of him, except in those moments when Kiama has made a certain expression or showed a touch of arrogance. But Lewis and that whole messy situation was such a long time ago.

‘Yvonne,’ Hannah shouts, ‘I’ve been calling you. It’s lovely outside, come on.’ Her colleague takes her by the arm and leads her back outside to the group, who have lined up their wine glasses along the window ledge. Someone hands her a glass and Jaden makes a point of checking the time on his phone. ‘That was a long ten minutes,’ he says.

‘Yeah, Yvonne,’ another colleague says, ‘Jaden was looking like a little lost puppy without you.’

Jaden turns down his bottom lip and she allows him to pull her close. She looks through the pub window, but from this point can’t see all the way to the bar and Lewis.

She tries to enjoy her drink and small talk about everyone’s weekend plans but it’s impossible to concentrate. What would she say to Lewis again? Would she introduce him to everyone if he walked over right now? It would be awkward. She was a mess the last time they saw each other, crying and shouting, but she was also young, so young.

Her colleagues are getting louder, laughing enthusiastically about something she missed. Jaden tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear and says, ‘Can’t believe she did that?’

Yvonne smiles and pretends to know what he’s talking about, to have been listening all along.