Ridiculous, he feels ridiculous. Tiny, a liar, not worthy. He hasn’t spoken to her for months. He summons the memory of her laugh, of her bottom on white sheets, but it’s no use: the child asleep next to her and the post-natal shadows under her eyes elevate her to a higher level. She looks through him. Patrick finally dares, his voice a little shaky: “Is she mine?”

She doesn’t answer. He blinks and grits his teeth. He wants to pick the child up in his arms, what he’s feeling is new, it’s idiotic, but he still finds it moving.

“Can I hold her?”

An almost imperceptible movement, his hands to the sleeping child, wrapped up so warmly she’s vanished under the blankets.

“No.”

So he stuffs his hands deep into his pockets and keeps them still. He walks to the swings, then comes back to her, breathing heavily, afraid – the moron’s almost happy.

Maybe, if she said Stay, he’d stay. Maybe he’d face his friend. Maybe he’d finally talk. Maybe he’d be able to explain his silence the night when. Patrick likes lying to himself.

“I’ll send you some money.”

She shakes her head.

Céline doesn’t take her eyes off him. He thinks she’s magnificent despite the tiredness, the pregnancy spots on her face without make-up, her clamped-together lips, the adolescent hooded top under her anorak, with its little silver stars. And yet there’s nothing childlike about her. She has earned her status as woman. At a high price.

After a while, his unease grows so strong that he feels like hitting something. “Shall I walk back with you for a bit?”