‘Oh, I’m a massive fan of yours, Patricia,’ my mum says; the words I was dreading she’d say, told myself she’d never dream of saying, and yet, there you go, she’s said them. ‘You know, I don’t work full-time anymore, not since I turned sixty, so Monday, Tuesday, Friday I never miss you on the telly. And you know what? I always agree with everything you say. I do, you know. I get on the phone to me mum – she’s eighty-seven but mind as sharp as a knife – and I say that Patricia Carmichael’s hit the nail on the head again. And I have to be honest with meself, Trish, I don’t usually agree with a Tory.’

‘I’d never have guessed,’ Trish says, now poised.

‘What’s the model like in real life, the one who keeps getting the surgery?’ my mum goes on. ‘Because I worry for that poor girl, you know, I do. One of these days her face’s gonna pop and she’ll never get another husband again. And the fella, the washed-up pop star from when our Chloe was little, he’s clever isn’t he? You wouldn’t have guessed it. But he’s very bright, always says the right thing when you’re all debating the headlines. A good family man, too.’

Trish nods slowly.

‘Look at me,’ my mum says, slapping her cheeks, her sweaty, heavily made-up face now melting into her palms. ‘Gabbing away to none other than Patricia Carmichael. Anyone’d think we were mates. Ignore me, just pretend I’m not here, ignore everything I said.’

‘I’ll try,’ Trish says.

‘Oh, bloody hell,’ my dad pipes up and snaps his fingers. ‘I’ve just cottoned on to who you are. The pleasure’s all mine, Patricia, all mine, my love. Weren’t you in the jungle last year?’

Trish sighs. ‘No.’

I jump in.

‘Trish,’ I say. ‘This is Sue, and this is Bernie; me mum and me dad.’

‘Again,’ Trish says, reaching for her Michael Kors handbag. ‘I’d never have guessed.’

I laugh, because that was a joke, right? She was being funny, yeah?

My mum laughs with me, my dad joining in a slow moment later.

‘She’d never’ve guessed,’ he jokes.

‘Do you live around here, Trish?’ my mum asks. ‘Is that how you know our Chloe? ’Cause I don’t know how you do it, how anyone does it. Them tubes. All the people. Some bloody big fella was effing and blinding at me and Bernie ’cause we were minding our own business, weren’t we, love? Just standing still on them escalators.’

‘“Keep right! Keep right!” he was yelling,’ my dad calls out, his hand cupping the side of his mouth. ‘Like he had this almighty power over us. Bloody Londoners.’

‘We stood our ground, didn’t we, Bernie love?’

‘Mum,’ I stop her. ‘Trish is Jack’s mum.’