‘It’s such a shame about the job thing,’ Sheila muses, shaking her head a little regretfully. ‘I would have loved to have you both back here.’

Lauren is quick to jump on this news. ‘What job thing?’

‘Drew got offered a position at the school until the end of the year,’ Sheila eagerly shares. ‘He was all keen to take it up, but Darcy thinks it’ll be too hard on them.’

And Darcy knows that’s exactly what Sheila will be telling everyone. They all could have had their beloved Drew Roberts back in Gloucester if Darcy wasn’t such a selfish cow. She wouldn’t say it directly, but reading between the lines, the message would be completely clear.

Lauren takes one look at Darcy and clearly feels a little awkward. ‘Long distance would be hard,’ she says, trying to offer Darcy some support. ‘Especially with Darcy’s kind of work.’

But this doesn’t provide Sheila any comfort. ‘You won’t be able to work like that for good, you know,’ she tells Darcy. ‘When you’re a mother you’re not going to be able to work those long hours.’

‘We might not have any kids.’ Darcy shrugs, knowing there’s no need to be purposely mean, but she can’t help herself.

Sheila’s face falls.

Darcy feels too bad to let it continue so adds, ‘Not for a while, anyway.’

Sheila is visibly relieved but is quick to tell her, ‘It’s best to have kids young, isn’t it, Lauren?’

Lauren is wide-eyed, clearly not wanting to get involved in this conversation. She stammers, unable to find suitable words to satisfy both parties.

Darcy sees her mum across the room and is just about to excuse herself to go talk to her when she hears, ‘Darcy!’ She turns to see Ellie and Tara, two of her closest friends from uni, charging towards her.

‘What are you doing here?’ They both live in Sydney. They’ve never been to Gloucester before.

‘We got lost and didn’t make it in time to surprise you!’

‘You travelled all the way up here?’ She caught up with them only a few days ago after work for a wine and neither of them breathed a word. Darcy hugs them to her.

‘It’s your birthday!’ Ellie smiles.

‘But it’s only my twenty-sixth.’ Darcy wishes Drew hadn’t made such a big fuss.

‘Still,’ Ellie says, ‘we didn’t want to miss it.’

‘And we thought there might be some cute country boys here,’ Tara adds.

Darcy laughs. ‘Oh, good luck,’ she says and casts her eyes around the room to see if there are any potential suitors for her city friends, quite confident they’re going to be disappointed.

‘Do you know if Ed and Sienna are coming?’ Darcy asks. It seems like Drew has made a point of inviting every other important person in her life. It feels weird not having Ed there.