‘It’s a shoo-in now, surely. It’s got to be,’ Johnny said, sprawled in his chair and puffing on his vape. ‘Everyone knows the BAFTAs presage the Oscar wins.’

‘Did you really just say “presage”?’ Matty quipped, checking her caramel-tinted hair for split ends.

‘Hey! Being a cameraman doesn’t mean I’m illiterate, you know.’

‘Well, why should anyone assume you’re not, when you insist upon dressing like a vagrant?’ Matty shrugged, eyeing the grubby wash of his torn jeans with particular disdain. Admittedly they didn’t look like they’d been washed since . . . well, ever. ‘If you want to be taken seriously—’

‘Children,’ Clover warned, sitting on the worktop beside the kettle. ‘Play nice.’

Condensation was dripping down the inside of the windows of her first-floor mansion flat, misting the view onto the mirroring red-brick block opposite. The mornings were still chilly and they relied on the oil-fired heater to send out a rosy heat. It ticked quietly on the floor, the closest thing they had to an office pet. In the minutes of their last meeting, a motion had been put to save up for a fish tank.

‘All I’m saying is, everyone knows that what wins in London goes on to win in LA.’ Johnny shrugged.

‘Not necessarily,’ Matty argued. ‘Best actors, yes. But best picture, no. And as for Best Documentary Feature—’

‘But both academies share five hundred voting members.’ He shrugged again, as though that clinched the argument.

‘Guys!’ Clover said, raising her voice to bring their attention off each other and onto her. She looked at Matty warming her hands around her mug of tea, Johnny dragging on his vape; neither of them looked particularly like they made up two-thirds of an international award-winning documentary filmmaking team. ‘It’s pointless you bickering over this. It’ll be what it is.’ The truth was, she could hardly bear to think about it. Her stomach was pickled with nerves, yes, but after her conversation with Mia last night . . . ‘Far more pressing is what comes next. How exactly do we follow up on all this?’

She spread her arms wide to indicate the flowers that were on every surface. Florists had been knocking at her door all morning, bringing extravagant displays of white roses, striped buckets of yellow roses, sprays of lilies and freesia, monumental orchids – not to mention a basket of muffins sent over by way of congratulations from Louis Theroux. A clutch of giant, helium-inflated balloons bobbed in one corner of the ceiling, looking like it had escaped a child’s hand, or a thank-you card, or the set of Up. Johnny had ‘taken responsibility’ for the case of Bollinger Liam had sent over, and was using it as a footstool.