Fear swells in my chest and I fix my eyes on the reflections in the water until it dissipates. It’s only my first day on the job and yet I’m already thinking about what’s ahead, about what I might find out if I let myself. I exhale a long, shaky breath. I don’t need to do anything straight away. I don’t need to do anything about it at all, if that’s what I want. It’s entirely possible that, when it comes down to it, I simply won’t have the guts.

‘Where do you live?’ Léa says. She’s finished her sandwich and is munching on a packet of paprika crisps.

‘London. The capital of England.’

‘Where the Queen lives?’

‘Yes. Well, it’s a big city, but yes.’ I wonder if the Queen has ever been to Peckham.

‘It is nice?’

I nod. ‘It’s busy. Exciting. Wonderful.’ How else to describe the city that’s been so much a part of my life to a seven-year-old Swiss who has never been?

‘How old are you?’

‘Thirty-nine.’

‘You have children?’

I shake my head. It’s not a loaded question coming from her, so I don’t mind. Unlike the countless people who have asked me that, or a version of that, in recent years. A harmless enough question on the face of it, but one that’s usually dripping with subtext: Why not? What’s wrong with you? Don’t you want them?

Sometimes I’m tempted just to tell them the truth. Yes, I want to say. I want children so much it’s like a physical pain, but after five years of trying and several failed rounds of IVF, my husband and I have separated, so my chances are slim, don’t you think?

But it’s against social etiquette to say things like that, to make people feel awkward even though they were the one probing for gossip, so I just smile and brush it off. Oh you know, perhaps one day…

‘You have a husband?’ Léa asks.

‘Nope.’ An easier response than ‘sort of’.

‘Why?’

I look out into the lake. There’s a question. ‘Because life doesn’t always turn out the way you want it to,’ I say.

Léa continues eating her crisps and I think she’s got bored of questioning me. She kicks her feet against the wall. ‘Maman says you can do whatever you want if you work hard,’ she says after a minute, and I’m impressed by her sentence structure.

I finish my Rivella and look at her. ‘If I had a daughter, I would say exactly the same to her.’ Even if it’s not true.

A wail turns both our heads to Luca. He’s dropped his sandwich in the lake. A duck makes a beeline and starts pecking at it. A gherkin slice detaches and bobs about on the surface.