Ali held up her glass and they clinked. ‘Here’s mud in yer eye,’ she said; then she sighed contentedly, and looked around at all the other people milling about in the bar, all the strangers who’d chosen to do as she and Cass had done, and come and listen to Tahnee Jackson tonight, and she felt a great warmth towards everyone; whoever they all were, she belonged among them, these disciples of live music.

‘Y’know,’ she said, ‘it might be the wine talking, but I have a really good feeling about the future.’

Cass scrutinised her for a moment and then said, ‘I can tell you do.’

Ali laughed. ‘Oh yeah?’

‘Yeah, you look different. Why do you look different?’

‘Different how?’

‘You look really happy.’

She drew back and looked at Cass, askance. ‘Well, that’s because I am, by and large.’

‘Happier, I mean. Brighter, lighter. You’ve been a bit of a misery guts.’

‘Well, there’s been Stella and—’

‘No, before that, way before. You were flat, but now you’ve got your bounce back.’

Ali picked up the bottle for something to do, and topped up their glasses. Cass stared.

‘What’re you looking at?’ Ali said.

‘You have a kind of … a kind of glow.’

‘Well, it’s hot in here.’

‘A loved-up glow.’

Ali was startled now, and felt a kind of thudding anxiety that her body, her face, might so easily give away the secrets of her heart and mind.

‘And you said you might write a love story.’

‘So what if I do?’ Ali said. ‘I’m a novelist; I make stuff up.’

‘Hey,’ Cass said. ‘Are you having an affair?’

Ali managed an incredulous laugh, but she couldn’t help the blush that bloomed in her cheeks and on her throat. ‘No, Cass,’ she said. ‘I’m not.’

‘You wouldn’t have an affair and not tell me, would you?’

‘I’m not having an affair.’

‘Oh, c’mon, spill. We tell each other everything, remember? You’ve got all the dirt on me, every crumb.’

Ali managed to hold her friend’s gaze, and it crossed her mind to tell her: tell her that it wasn’t an affair, but it was certainly something, something absorbing and enveloping, between her and Dan Lawrence. But she didn’t. She kept him hidden, kept their connection to herself; it was too precious to expose to scrutiny, even here, with Cass, her best friend, who might be able to read her mind, Ali couldn’t be sure.

‘You can’t kid a kidder,’ Cass said. ‘I’ve been where you’re at now. What’s going down? Who is he?’

Ali was resolute. ‘Absolutely nothing,’ she said. ‘Absolutely no one.’

‘Right, well, you tell me when you’re ready.’ Cass had searching eyes, but still Ali said nothing, only looked at her watch.

‘Nearly ten past,’ Ali said. ‘Come on, let’s go upstairs.’