In silence, they draw on their cigarettes at the same time. They’d like to sit down, but the wood of the only available bench is saturated with water. Its forest-green paint has been cracking for a long time, chips scratched off by the teenagers who sometimes loiter outside the school while waiting to pick up a sibling. There are words carved in the wood, and sentences written with a marker. Porn to be alive, for instance, the loop of the first B having been deliberately erased. Below that, Love me Lili – probably with the point of a compass – must have been long and hard to engrave, a true labour of love. Valérie sighs. She stamps on the spot and crosses her arms over her large chest.

“Things have been complicated with me and Patrick for a long time, and since the last building site it’s become unbearable. So I guess it was time.”

“Where’s he going? Do you know?”

“Apparently he wants to leave here. He mentioned a public building firm in Marseilles.”

“Marseilles? So he wouldn’t be working with Manuel any more?” This separation seems to her more outrageous than the other one.

Her phone rings again. “Shit, can’t she leave me alone?”

“Maybe you should answer.”

It’s the weakness in Valérie’s voice, this compliance before an order, that prompts Séverine to switch off her phone completely. She stuffs it angrily to the bottom of her pocket. “Does Manuel know?”

“Not sure. I imagine he would have told you, wouldn’t he?”

“No. We don’t talk much at the moment.”