She changed her route, took another turning, went to the gym for an hour.

When she let herself into the flat she found Banjo lying on the sofa in front of the telly smoking a joint. But he’d found her shopping. From the kitchen came the tantalising sweet smell of a vegetable curry, cooking slowly on the top of the stove: garlic, coriander, turmeric, cloves. He smiled up at her with unfocused eyes, still lying on the sofa, held open his arms, and Molly went into them: enclosed, surrounded, safe.

8

On the Tuesday morning after the reunion Frances Kitson put her padded bra into the bottom of her handbag. She liked to be prepared. She had been called in to an office in Greek Street for an interview for a television commercial for an insurance company. She found a room full of actresses of about her age, including Emmy Lou Brown. Some were plump, like Frances. Some were thin, like Emmy Lou. The actresses sighed, called to each other across the room, rolled their eyes, pretended it wasn’t important: it was money of course, but it wasn’t art. But Frances had done several adverts, had learnt something. When Emmy Lou began to whisper about Terence Blue she said firmly, ‘We’ll have coffee at Pritzi’s afterwards,’ sat in a corner of the chattering room with the three lines of the script marked Plump Woman and looked at them carefully.

A THIN MIDDLE-AGED WOMAN AND A PLUMP MIDDLE-AGED WOMAN ARE EATING ICE-CREAM SUNDAES IN A RESTAURANT.

THEY ARE NEXT SEEN OUTSIDE A TALL IMPOSING EDIFICE VIEWED FROM BELOW. IT TOWERS UPWARDS AND HAS ‘WISE INSURANCE’ ON THE FRONT.