‘You know, people who talk about spritzing themselves with perfume. I get so irritated I feel my head’s going to come off – it makes me think of these glitzy women in sheer stockings and sexy black suits who are always rushing around from gym to conference room to kitchen, being all sexy and domestic.’ She knew, as she said it, that she was talking about Frankie – the chic solicitor in her expensive leather shoes and dark suits, the tousled woman draped in Adrian’s rumpled shirt and smelling of wine and sex. ‘Then there’s those people who talk about the au pair problem and the nanny problem. They’re even worse. Oh dear, the nanny doesn’t iron the clothes properly blah fucking blah …’

‘Um, Irene – I probably do that, actually. Talk about the nanny.’

‘Oh well.’ Irene giggled. ‘You probably do and I probably would if I could. I don’t hate you, of course. But you know what I mean – women who go on about the difficulty of being – what is it? – time-poor. Yuck!’

‘We are time-poor though. Money-rich and time-poor.’

‘Bah! You may be; you’re a successful business woman. I’m just a bit poor. Or poorer than you, at any rate. I keep hearing these phrases. Ahead of the curve. It makes me feel ill.’

‘You seem to feel very strongly about this,’ Karen said primly.

‘I want us to make the world a better place; I don’t want to be ahead of the fucking curve. Which is just as well, considering how I’m miles behind it. Or the other day on the tube I heard someone say that everyone needed at least £12,000 a year for holidays. They didn’t say “want”, they said “need”. Twelve thousand pounds! How much do they think teachers earn? What about the people dying of Aids in Botswana? Or the two women I followed up the escalators in some department store and they were going on about the wedding present list. I wanted to punch them. Am I talking too loudly? I am, aren’t I?’

The pasta arrived and she pushed her fork into its tangle and twisted it round. ‘Then there’s sex.’

She said it emphatically enough for other people to turn their heads.

‘What about sex?’ said Karen, giggling nervously.

‘Well, it’s all so complicated, isn’t it?’

‘That’s true.’

‘Do you and Mac have a good sex life?’

‘God, Irene. You go for months treating me like a distant acquaintance and now you’re asking me about my sex life.’

‘Yeah, but that’s the point. We’ve never talked about sex, have we?’

‘Haven’t we? I guess not.’