It had been a laugh at first – a naughty fling. Something serious between them was never going to be on the cards. Outgoing Lotte, with her huge personality, surely couldn’t possibly be right for Tor, but somehow, against all the odds, something between them just clicked. She owes it to Lotte to tell her family, so they can potentially move on to the next stage of their relationship, but she doesn’t quite have the nerve.

‘Well, merry Christmas,’ Arek says.

‘You too.’

‘Hey, Tor. Smile,’ he adds. ‘We did good today.’

4

New Friendship Turf

‘We haven’t had anyone in for a while,’ the Airbnb owner tells Maddy, as she unlocks the door to the flat in the dilapidated red-brick apartment block, ‘because of … well, you know … it’s been tough.’ Her cheeks are ruddy, her eyebrows unkempt.

If any hotels here in Brighton had been open for business, Maddy might have booked a suite, but instead she’d turned to Airbnb in desperation. Sitting in the car park in Pease Pottage services, on the way down from Cobham, she’d sent over twenty messages to various hosts and had almost given up hope, when a message for this place had pinged up. Even so, the owner had been wary of a short-term let. Maddy had persuaded her by paying up front for a fortnight. A central flat with a sea view and private parking is gold dust, after all.

She hadn’t been expecting a palace, but the flat, purposely done up in neutral colours, is bleaker than she’d been expecting. It occurs to her now that maybe she’s made a mistake by being so dramatic and leaving home so emphatically. Perhaps she should have gone straight round to Lisa’s. Her best friend would undoubtedly have taken her in with open arms. But she knows Lisa has a houseful and Maddy’s troubles are too huge to dump – even on her best friend – on Christmas afternoon.

In the kitchenette she opens the fridge and is assaulted by a blast of mouldy air.

‘TV works,’ the owner says, aiming the remote at the flat screen on the wall. The fairy glitter tinkle of a Christmas advert fills the room, followed by canned applause as Michael McIntyre’s Christmas Wheel comes on. Maddy thinks of all the families around the country slumped on their sofas watching it.

She can tell the owner is itching to ask more questions. After all, there’s obviously a juicy backstory to a single woman turning up on Christmas Day out of the blue, but Maddy manoeuvres her to the door, taking the keys from her.

When she’s gone, Maddy sits on the thin arm of the cheap sofa bed and turns the TV off. In the flat next door, she can hear muffled classical music.

She puts her hands between her knees, her chunky diamond rings cutting into her toned thighs, and lets out a low groan. Her steely resolve has deflated on her journey here into a baggy, saggy airbag of defeat. She’s being ridiculous, right? She’s gone too far. What the hell is she doing here in this awful flat, in a place where she doesn’t know a soul? She’s fifty-two, for God’s sake. She should just quit now and drive back to her nice warm home.