‘You should be calling me Mrs Safran,’ she said, her tone crushing. There was a flat quality to her eyes, a glassiness, as if she wasn’t really seeing me. ‘Give me my baby.’

For a moment I imagined taking Carson, who I had changed and fed every day for months now, and running with him, down the street to the dusty, scorching highway and out of the city. It was madness. It was a felony – kidnapping. So I passed him over, and as she took him in her arms he began to cry again. As I followed her back into the house, I saw David had arrived home, slamming the front door. Abby swept past him, howling child gripped in her arms. From upstairs came the sound of Madison, also crying. David looked at me. ‘What now?’

I just rolled my eyes. ‘Don’t ask.’

He ran a hand over his face and I wondered what he was doing home at this hour. ‘I can’t take much more of this. Christ, will it ever get easier?’

I didn’t have an answer for him.

That wasn’t even the strangest moment that day. Later that evening, after hiding in my room all through dinner, eating some very stale peanuts left over from the plane, I crept downstairs in the hope of some real food. Abby was sitting in the kitchen, at the island, staring into space.

‘Oh!’ I said. ‘Sorry, I . . .’

She shook herself, as if coming back to consciousness. ‘I didn’t get that role. The nurse.’ Her voice was flat.

I had already guessed as much. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘The odds are stacked against me,’ she said, carefully stirring her black coffee. ‘I’m thirty-five, a mom. They don’t want that. I tried to shed the mom bod, but they could tell. They can always tell.’

‘Couldn’t David help – he must know producers casting for films? Or his new film?’

‘What new film?’

God, she was really out of touch with his life. ‘His company have the rights to that YA series, you know, the one with the witches. Maybe there’s a role in that for you? I, er, I read about it somewhere.’ I didn’t want her to think David and I were talking behind her back, although, of course, we were.

Abby laughed. It was strange, because her face didn’t move above the mouth. ‘David has the rights? Yeah, David. The big-shot producer.’ She heaved herself off the stool, moving as if her body hurt. ‘Don’t believe everything you read, Casey. This town runs on hype. Once you stop believing in yourself, you’re toast. People can smell it on you. Desperation.’ She moved towards the stairs. ‘There’s noodles in the fridge, you can have them.’ This was one of the odd little kindnesses among her rages and mood swings. It was so strange.