That was all it had ever been – a job. Not a career, not a vocation, not a calling. Hers was one desk among many in an office with strip lighting that buzzed. It paid the bills. Of course, those bills would still need to be paid, even if she left that desk …

Unhinged, that’s how she felt. It was as if the car accident had snapped a vital part of her and it was now flapping wildly in the wind, loose from its fixings, hanging in there by not very much at all.

Vivian stopped eating and reached across the table, laying her hand over Thea’s. She stared intensely into her daughter’s eyes and, when she spoke, it was with a deliberate solemnity. ‘That, my love, is the best news I’ve heard this year. I’m delighted! You’re wasted in … whatever it is that you do in that little office. Come help us out at HQ. We always need someone to paint the placards.’

HQ was a living room. The Menopausal Army (‘Probably best to call us Post-Menopausal now, darling!’) had had many names over the years but always the same goal: change. Vivian Mackenzie had spent nearly thirty fervent, bright-eyed years protesting, marching, arguing and educating on anything and everything that needed it. A lot of things needed it. They still did, but Vivian had, over the last few years, taken a step back from leading it all. Thea was banned from calling this retirement.

‘You are a creative soul, anyway – I’ve always thought it,’ Vivian continued. ‘We can find you another job.’ She gripped Thea’s hand tighter. ‘I blame myself, you know, for this inability of yours to sleep properly. We moved around so much when you were little, there was no routine, no stability. You were so well behaved, but it’s left its mark. I see that now.’ She emphasized the next words. ‘I own it.’

There it was. There was the pause, which Thea was meant to fill with the reassurance that Vivian’s chaotic lifestyle when she was little had not irrevocably scarred her in any way. Old age was making her mother sentimental.

‘Mum, it’s not your fault—’

‘Is it dangerous? How does it work? You hear such stories these days. These big companies, they have no morals, no sense of responsibility …’

‘I don’t know. I’m being sent an introductory pack. I can back out if it doesn’t sound right. There are loads of these kinds of sleep apps around. It’ll probably turn out to be crap and I’ll be back at square one.’