‘Don’t even go there,’ Lauren warns. ‘This was going to be our year to get what we wanted, Annie. Change our lives for the better. For me, that involves being with Jude.’

Pulling the travel guide to Peru from beneath my desk, I gaze lovingly at its cover and the image of Machu Picchu peeping out of the wisps of swirling cloud. And for me it involves having an adventure. One that’s a little more life-affirming than taking off your togs on a blustery Norfolk beach.

Chapter 26

Chapter 26

I hang up just as my colleague Minny totters through the doors. ‘We’re having a planning meeting tonight for our trip to Peru at All Bar One,’ she tells me. ‘Sure you can’t come?’

‘I can’t,’ I say. My heart flutters. ‘It’s just not me.’

‘It’ll be a blast. Everyone’s going,’ she wheedles. ‘Sarah’s going to shut the offices for two weeks. There’ll be nothing for you to do here anyway.’

Someone has to hold the fort, I think.

‘We’ll be there from seven o’clock,’ she tells me. ‘Hope to see you later. It won’t be the same without you.’

And then she’s gone.

That’s me unsettled for the day.

I have some figures to input into the computer but I can’t concentrate. I take messages on the phone, then before I put the calls through, I forget who I was talking to and about what. My mind is a churned-up mess. It drifts from the azure waters of Lake Titicaca, up to the towering peaks of the Andes, beneath the marshmallow clouds of the endless Peruvian sky.

I don’t know how I get through the rest of the day. I have to fight the urge to get my travel guide out every five minutes and I swing between desperately wanting to go with the rest of my colleagues and being too terrified to admit that I do.

When it’s time to go home, I feel exhausted – though I’ve done nothing more demanding than wrestle with my own conscience.

I swing my car into the drive and then sit there with the engine turned off. This is the first time that I’ve ever felt like this, but I can hardly bring myself to go into my own home.

Everything that is familiar, the things I’ve always loved now seem to be a source of discontentment. I look at the garden and think that it’s in serious need of a revamp. At the weekend, I might pull everything up and start again.

When I eventually haul my reluctant arse indoors, Greg’s in the kitchen.

He doesn’t look up when I walk in, but says, ‘Dinner’s nearly ready. I got home a bit early, so I thought I’d start it. There were some lamb chops in the fridge. I’ve done them with some carrots and new potatoes.’