‘Hello love!’ she says, acknowledging my arrival and then continuing to hastily cross things off her to-do list. ‘Right. Decorations, tick. Colour scheme is nailed. Just need to follow up with the caterers – the woman there is being very vague about the canapé sizes – and then I need the addresses written out in my special gold pen and then stuck onto these envelopes.’

I am genuinely taken aback by the scene in front of me. Cec was never this manic an organizer before – we used to laugh together about how seriously people take these sorts of things. She was my laid-back friend who rolled her eyes with me at the endless Instagram posts of cheesy engagement shots and baby reveal parties. Where has her cynicism gone?

‘OK, Amelia and I can help with that bit, can’t we?’ Bea says, as Amelia licks a sugar-free Chupa Chups and nods along.

‘Great, thank you – here are the envelopes.’ She hands a stack of paper to Bea. ‘The list of names is on my laptop, over there,’ she says, pointing to a shelf next to the TV.

‘Cec, give Olive something to do,’ Bea says, gesturing at me while I stand there aghast at Cec, who has turned into a micro-manager overnight.

While Bea and her kids are writing out invitations, I start ringing up a catering company about a vegan option for the charcuterie boards. I suddenly notice that Isla is nowhere to be seen.

‘Where’s Isla?’

‘She’s in the kitchen making decorations,’ Cec says, frowning at her clipboard.

I find Isla sitting at the large kitchen island, crying quietly, with a Pritt stick in hand. She sobs gently as she pulls the glue stick across the paper decorations.

‘Isla! What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing. Cec just asked me to glue these decorations together,’ she continues, pulling the stubborn stick against the grain of the paper, sniffing. I yank it from her.

‘It’s fine,’ she says, picking up another baby-shaped blue paper cutting and gluing its bottom, wiping her snot with her sleeve.

‘It’s clearly not – look at you, you’re crying.’

‘Ugh, I am surrounded by all this baby stuff and it’s so bloody hard.’

‘Oh babe. It’s not fair for you to be doing this. I’m booking you an Uber home right now. Stay in here. I’ll deal with Cecily.’

‘Please don’t make a fuss, Ol,’ Isla calls after me.

I march back into the living room. My cheeks feel hot and red.

‘Cec. I’m booking Isla a car home. It’s really not OK to ask her to do all this baby-shower stuff with what she’s going through. It was a bad idea.’

Cec looks up from her baby-shower folder and stands up. ‘Well, that’s fine, obviously. Why didn’t you say anything before? I don’t want to upset anyone,’ Cec says, tucking her bob behind her ears awkwardly, and then putting her hands in her back pockets.

‘Yeah, well. I’ll get Isla home, and you can give me another task to do.’