Emily’s essay for the New Yorker would never be published, nor filed nor finished. Three months from now, Emily would be working on the piece, with some difficulty, in her Kensal Green flat, when the call came from Liam. The flat was furnished much the same as before the separation. Michael subtracted his clothes and books and a few bookshelf trinkets, such as the little bell he’d used as a boy, whenever ill, to summon his parents, and the ice hockey puck he’d bought on a childhood holiday to Canada, an object that he considered to be a lucky charm. Liam would call to say he had some news. He’d taken a job as a staff writer on a well-resourced technology magazine, a role he thought was ‘the right move at the right time’. Unfortunately, and Liam paused after he announced the word ‘unfortunately’, his replacement had scrutinised the commissions for the food issue and made a difficult decision about certain articles in the pipeline. Liam tried to make it sound as if Emily’s wasn’t the only piece spiked. Liam sounded half in the bag; he slurred and repeated himself. He suggested she pitch the piece elsewhere, said it was a story he’d like to read one day. The magazine would pay expenses: the managing editor had signed off on all receipts and a kill fee of seven hundred dollars. When he’d run out of things to say, Emily thanked him for calling and said goodbye.

5.

The school had yielded up its restless population, aged between five and twelve years, and most had been collected by parents or babysitters or otherwise dispersed via bus. The wail of kids leaving school had scattered; a few children waited in the shade—their voices moderate, the riot gone out of them—they leaped to their feet when a parent approached. Among these pupils: Jamie, sitting on his bag, reading a large-format book about the Battle of Waterloo. Before his Napoleonic phase, Sophia explained, Jamie was mad about medieval Japan; before that, he’d loved Greek myths.

An adult stood behind him, a lanyard around her neck, arms crossed.

‘Not again,’ said Sophia.

‘What again?’ said Emily.

‘That’s Hannah, the vice-principal. She’s taken a special interest in Jamie. She thinks I’m a loser.’

‘I don’t think you’re a loser,’ said Emily.

‘Come with me,’ Sophia said. ‘Pretend you’re my friend. You’re supportive.’

Hannah moved towards them with the quick strides of the highly productive, Jamie trailing behind. To begin, she praised his reading habits, and they all looked at the boy in what appeared to be a consensus: this was a nice, smart kid.

Hannah said: ‘But we have other topics to discuss.’

‘Other topics?’ Sophia said warily. ‘Keeping in mind he’s eleven years old.’

‘Jamie has brought his pet snake onto the school grounds.’

Sophia turned to her son. ‘You have a pet snake?’