‘It was Devon, not the Bahamas,’ I said, swivelling around to switch on my computer. ‘And it was pretty small and intimate. I’m seeing someone, so…’

Why did I keep doing this? Was I willing it to be true – for my phone to give that reassuring chirrup that would restore my self-esteem at a stroke? Julia clapped her hands like it was her third birthday and it was time to blow out the candles.

‘Oh, Rachel, that’s so exciting! What’s his name? Who is he?’

I gave a garbled response – Arthur was a doctor this time, a devoted father with an impressively civilized divorce – already regretting my haphazard lie. Julia was rapt.

‘I’ve got news, too!’ she said, when I’d run out of imaginary heroics. ‘Hobo’s going to have a sibling!’

‘What, you’re adopting another dog?’

‘No,’ said Julia, with a twee little giggle. ‘I’m only ten weeks in, so I’m not really meant to tell anyone, but considering how much I’ve been throwing up, there’s no point hiding it from my desk buddy.’

‘Oh wow, congratulations!’ I said, struggling to make my voice match up with the sentiment.

It was stupid how crushed I felt. Maybe Mum was right about me; maybe she was being cruel to be kind. I would be forty before I knew it, with nothing but a debt mountain and an imaginary boyfriend to show for it. I had to call Amber. I had to see her and get back some of that pioneer spirit that had surged through me when I’d been with the others, all of us brave outliers. Now I was stranded in the fish tank of my normal life, comparison sending me insane. Perhaps she’d let me pay by credit card?

As I stood up, phone stuck in my sleeve, I spotted Duncan striding towards our bank of desks.

‘Rachel, can we talk in my office?’

This didn’t feel like a promotion.

The picture of Hayley and the twins on Duncan’s desk wasn’t angled outwards – he wasn’t the kind of person to use his family as a status symbol, a reminder of how much he was winning at life. Instead it was turned towards him, next to his ancient, standard-issue computer – something that he glanced at almost unconsciously for comfort, to remind himself of who he was, outside of being a cog in the wheel of government. His soft brown eyes were darting towards it now: it made it inconveniently hard to hate him.