I refused to be impressed that you were a doctor. ‘Is that hormones?’ I wanted to show I knew the word endocrinology, despite my cheap print dress and the tattoo on my wrist. You lowered your eyes.

‘Some women say everything is hormones.’

I smiled reluctantly. ‘Some men say it’s just cold in here.’ There, I’d made an erection joke, we were definitely flirting. You looked again at my badge, lying over my chest, moving as I breathed.

‘Suzanne.’

‘Suzi.’ We linked eyes. Yours were so blue, cold and pure as glacial lakes. I couldn’t breathe, a sudden warmth spreading through my veins. It was all that clichéd and that fast. I can’t do this, I thought. Not again. But, you know, it’s so much easier the second time. Even the guilt felt familiar, worn-out, as if I only had so much capacity for it.

‘Suzi?’ said Nora, as we tramped along the country lane.

‘Oh, sorry, I was miles away.’ I had to stop drifting off like this. I had to act like a normal person, an expectant mother. I had intended at first to tell her about the trip to the doctor, but realised I didn’t know how to explain it. Whatever way I spun it, Nick came out like a concerned partner, and me like an unstable madwoman. ‘The house is just over the hill.’ I’d promised to show it to Nora, the ruins of the old country home our cottages had once been tied to. It had been bought by a hotel chain before the last recession, but never developed.

Within minutes of walking, the space and silence had done their work, and I could feel myself relax. It was so hard, trying to be normal around Nick. It was hard even when you were still around, waiting for the phone to ring with some revelation, waking at night poleaxed by guilt and panic. Worrying every time Nick got an email or text message, asking myself was I sure I’d wiped my iMac history and changed my password after he saw me keying it in that one time. Now, since you’d gone, I worried about other things. The baby coming, what would happen then. Who it would look like.

Remember when you surprised me on my walk that time? It was so risky. What if Nick had been with me? That was when the dog jumped up and ruined your trousers. Sorry. I almost didn’t mind the idea of getting found out by then. It would mean she might let you go. I was braced for the fight with Nick. I’d even worked out what I might say: You moved me here without asking, you made me quit work, you kept me a virtual prisoner . . .