Since Hannah was still reluctant to retrieve the phone for fear that Rob would know she’d read his latest missive and was still ruminating over how to respond, she typed out a quick text to her friend via the messaging app instead.

Can you talk?

With iMessage, there was no way to know if Zoe was available, which of course was exactly why Hannah was using it. But when she didn’t respond or call back immediately, she figured that her friend had to be in a meeting, in the car, or maybe even on a flight.

Which meant Hannah was stuck. OK, she thought, taking a deep breath and another gulp of wine. Maybe she needed to just put this whole thing to bed here and now by sending her ex a quick, easy-breezy reply, instead of obsessing over it like a teenager.

The obvious was something non-committal like; Sure, check back in with me when you’re in town or some such, but that didn’t feel right.

As if nothing had happened. As if everything she’d been through in the interim meant nothing, and the lengths to which she’d gone to put the necessary distance between them by moving her entire life out of LA were entirely trivialised.

Those older hard-done-by feelings flooded right back, and miffed that she had to deal with all of this again, just when she was feeling that she’d successfully put it behind her, Hannah threw back the last of her wine and began typing a response that didn’t let Rob so easily off the hook.

But while intending to compose a short response of a few choice words that left him equally confused as to her true meaning, before she knew it, she’d started pouring it all out; how much she had sacrificed, how his actions had humiliated her and how hurt she’d been, relieved to be able to unburden it all on someone right then since Zoe wasn’t available. And of course, safe in the knowledge that she was never going to send it.

Because while she’d so often been tempted, she would never dream of revealing any of her true feelings to Rob, unwilling to give him the satisfaction of knowing just how much he’d hurt her. Better to let him continue to believe that she was above any such dramatics and that the conclusion of their relationship was a matter of course and a mutual decision.

Make it so.

Hannah harrumphed. Aware that her glass was now empty and, definitely in the mood for another, she stood up and headed for the fridge for a refill, satisfied to have safely got it all off her chest at least.

Despite that, sleep still hadn’t come easily.