‘Hi!’

‘Come in, come in, wow, aren’t I rude?’ She’s got Noah’s eyes, his lovely easy smile, his gentle manner and I instantly like her. ‘You’ll have to excuse the mess, been putting a dog back together all morning.’

‘Back together?’ We follow her in; the place looks fine to me. Tidier than mine anyway.

‘Hit by a car.’ She winces. ‘A bit smashed up, but who needs legs that all point in the same direction anyway?’

‘Ignore her,’ says Noah. It’s pretty hard to ignore his hand in the small of my back as he steers me towards the kitchen. ‘She’s ace at straightening them up, all the right bits in all the right places.’ He kisses her on the cheek.

‘Okay, okay, enough of the being nice big bro, what have you done now?’

‘I haven’t done anything.’ The hurt tone of his voice makes us both laugh. Then I remember why we’re here and stop laughing, and fish my phone out. ‘It’s Gavin.’

‘Gavin?’ She frowns.

‘Gavin,’ I say, scrolling through until I find the profile pic of him. I hold the phone up; Gemma nods. ‘Gabe,’ I say, pointing to the name.

‘Gabe?’ Gemma looks from me to Noah. ‘Am I supposed to be following this?’

‘He’s been on Tinder.’ He pauses, Gemma still looks confused. ‘It’s a dating—’

‘I know what Tinder is, you idiot. What do you mean, he’s been on Tinder? Of course, he has!’ She frowns. ‘Though the Gabe bit is wrong.’

‘What do you mean, Gem? Of course, he has.’

‘That’s where Linda met him.’

Noah looks at me, as though he’s asking permission, so I nod. ‘That’s where Rosie met him. Recently.’

Gemma narrows her eyes. ‘What do you mean recently?’

‘As in around the time Linda was about to give birth.’

‘Let me just check I’ve got this straight. You,’ she inclines her head my way, ‘are on Tinder and chatted to Gavin, who called himself Gabe.’

‘More than chatted,’ I add glumly, ‘we arranged to meet. But he didn’t show!’ I add this as though it’s a positive.

‘Linda probably went into labour,’ Gemma says, surprisingly calmly.

‘Wife in labour’ wasn’t one of the excuse scenarios that had run through my mind when I’d been running through possible reasons for his no-show. No wonder he ghosted me, he’d been too bloody busy shouting push and mopping her brow. I’d been thinking more along the lines of ‘my cat got stuck up a tree’, or ‘flat tyre’. Similar I suppose.

‘What are you going to do?’ Noah asks Gemma.

‘Do? Me?’ She frowns at him. ‘Why do I have to do anything? Why is it my problem and not yours, brother, darling? Honestly, talk about shifting responsibility.’

‘She’s your friend.’

‘He’s Dan’s friend. I’m going to tell Dan. He’s my husband,’ she explains to me.

I’m starting to feel a bit awkward. Soon everybody in the town will know about my disastrous non-dating experience. Well, everybody that Noah knows will. Still, this isn’t the time to worry about my huge embarrassment, this is about Linda, and Gavin-the-Gabe. And their children.