I bring in the tea, trying not to make a face. ‘I wouldn’t really call it a business.’

‘Well, it keeps you in toffee, evidently.’

Toffee? Ducks? I try to catch O’s eye but she’s avoiding me. She knows what I’m thinking: Jez is a lunatic. O must have been desperate to have rung her, which makes me feel all the more guilty that I didn’t stay.

‘Well, I’ve got this thing going with the great masters of modern art printed on wellies. For the gardening set. And as novelty gifts. So I’m just putting it out there, this is my baby. Nobody better steal my idea. O said you were working with a patent lawyer, Charlotte. Make sure you don’t plant it in his subconscious while he’s dreaming.’

‘No worries,’ I say, sniffing the milk doubtfully. ‘The patent lawyer is no longer a client.’

Jez purses her lips, which gives her fishface. ‘Sorry, darling. Have a toffee.’

While they are drinking tea, I escape to the shower and then my room, where I run a search. I play with a lot of terms – Dream City BigSky collective unconscious greyscale people Sweet Dreams committing suicide dreams more than one version of self dream canals dreams scaffolding – just free-associate and let it run. I make a mental note to ask Shandy if she knows anything. She’s only a junior virtual-furniture designer, but BigSky is one of those post-geek companies that’s low on hierarchy and big on collaboration. If the Dream City has something to do with the planned addition to BigSky’s Sweet Dreams platform, Shandy might have got wind of it.

My searches yield nothing useful, but they distract me from Jez’s inane chatter and pretty soon I’m asleep. When I finally drag myself out of bed, the afternoon is spent and Jez is gone. O is sat at her display with Edgar on her knees and a cup of tea in her good hand.

‘O, I’m not as flaky as Jez, am I?’

O whuffles a laugh into her cup. ‘Sure you can handle the truth?’

‘But seriously. When she lived here. Were you two . . . were you tight?’

‘Did we have an affair, do you mean?’

‘Pffft, what? Oh wow – did you?’

‘Even coming from you, that is absurd. Please get a grip.’

‘I just meant, were you mates, did you hang out like we hang out, you and Jez and Edgar?’

Hearing his name, Edgar flexes his claws against O’s knees and blinks his green eyes in feline acknowledgement of my existence.

‘I do believe you’re jealous.’

‘I’m not! Honestly, I know it sounds like that but I’m not. Anyway, it was before my time so why should I be jealous?’ I’m digging myself in deeper and deeper. ‘I guess my question is, do you think Jez is all there?’

‘Mentally? She’s not the sharpest pin in the pincushion. Is that what you mean?’

‘Only I wondered . . . you know, if she’s the sort of person you tend to have in as a flatmate, then on some level would it imply that I’m . . . how can I put this . . . ?’