Louisa inched forwards but stopped short of the end of the wall. What if Tiff saw her now? She’d be caught sneaking, and she’d know Louisa had heard her bad-mouthing her. As much as that should make Tiff look bad, Louisa had the feeling she’d be the one who’d come off worse. It was an awkward, embarrassing situation that she’d rather avoid.

But she desperately wanted to know who Tiff was talking to.

Sod it, she should purposely stride around the back, the way she always went into Tiff’s so it wouldn’t look out of place. I want to see the look on her face when she sees me. Wriggle out of that one, Tiffany.

Before Louisa could take a step in that direction, a whiny, nasal cry erupted to her right. Shit. Noah. Taking a few side steps, then turning and dashing to the front of the house, Louisa snatched him quickly from his pram and cuddled him, muffling the cries in her shirt.

‘Sshh-sshh,’ she soothed. Holding him tightly in one arm, she dragged the pram away from Tiff’s front door and pulled it behind her out of the driveway. She waited until she was out of earshot, then popped Noah back into his pram and began walking. Her mind went over what she’d just heard. She wondered who Tiff could’ve been talking to. There were the usual suspects: Oliver and Brian. But it could well have been anyone. Louisa may not even know them, or they her.

In the last two weeks, Louisa had gone from having a great best friend, to having a friend she suspected of having an affair with her husband, to then having a fling with her ex-boyfriend. Was she going mad? Louisa had to admit, even if only to herself, she had been chaotic lately. The issues surrounding no sleep – the hallucinations, the forgetfulness – were bad, but if she was now becoming paranoid too, well that would add a whole new level of worry. And if it was paranoia, Tiff saying that her baby brain had reached a new level wasn’t necessarily wrong. It was hurtful – but actually, Tiff was right.

But that didn’t explain why Tiff herself was acting strangely – she didn’t have baby brain. Louisa continued to pore over these thoughts as she pushed the pram towards home on automatic pilot.

A dull headache filled her skull, and it wasn’t until she stumbled through her own front door that she realised she hadn’t eaten all day. Something else she was forgetting lately – she either seemed to miss meals without even realising, or was craving chocolate biscuits and stuffing her face with them at odd hours.