The restaurant was a basement, really, with a damp smell of impending disaster and a neglected feeling. Inside, the waiters kept their jackets on over their uniforms, expecting to be called away at a moment’s notice. There were only two waiters left from the previous staff of six. They hugged the menus to their chests, as if in possession of ancient secrets. The windows were fully covered. Angela and her date (forty-seven, artist, no visible scars) had just been to the theatre. Theatre wasn’t something she normally did – and the imminent end of the world wasn’t the time for trying new things – but, regardless, they attended the theatre. They had sat on a long, hard bench, their knees touching, then not-touching, then occasionally touching again at moments of dramatic seriousness. The touching was electrifying to Angela. It gave her a powerful rush to the head. The play didn’t do much for her at all, at all.

‘I’m not sure,’ Angela said. ‘I didn’t get it.’

‘What didn’t you get?’

‘All of it, it has to be said.’

There was one other couple in the restaurant, young and disturbingly beautiful, their smiles wide and postures primed as if in constant pose for a photo. They glanced over as Angela and her date began to raise their voices.

‘That’s a very ignorant point of view,’ her date said.

‘It is, I agree. My own ignorance is my business though, and I don’t feel the need to explain or justify it to anyone.’

‘Didn’t you like the way their naked bodies symbolised their vulnerability in the face of the end of the world?’

‘No.’

‘And the dancing as the earth opened up below them? Their bravery? Their joy? Didn’t you like that?’

‘No.’

‘Angela, I don’t want to put pressure on you but if you didn’t enjoy and appreciate that play, you’re not going to understand me, fundamentally, as a human being.’

‘That’s okay,’ she said.

The surlier of the two waiters approached them and set down their near-empty plates. Angela’s date suddenly began grabbing at the dinner items as if to speed up the process.

‘Don’t do that,’ she instructed, ‘that’s his paid employment.’

The artist whipped out his napkin and produced a pen. ‘Angela, what is your ex-husband’s address?’

‘Why?’

‘I would like to send him a card in the post, just a small token, to show him his hard work didn’t go unnoticed. I believe people should be thanked for the duties they have performed in this life and you must have been a handful.’

‘I was,’ she agreed. ‘I was like a long day’s labour in the sun. You would emerge disorientated and physically exhausted, but stronger for it.’

His hand hovered excitedly over the napkin, as if planning exactly what to write inside his card.