The change at Waterloo was a brief glimpse of another world, a past life full of people walking fast, staring at phones, smoking in the cold breeze. The taxi driver to the hospital was chatty, to my irritation. Back in London, I’d prided myself on having good conversations with cab or Uber drivers, usually a bottle of wine in on my way home. I’d even boast about it: Had such a great chat with my cabby, all about his family in Morocco. So much virtue-signalling, as you’d once called it.

‘Off to antenatal, is it? My missus, she had all three of ours there.’

I rubbed the bump, growing more solid by the day. He’d reminded me that life was going on, despite the quagmire I was stuck in at home. I had scans booked, midwife appointments. The baby was growing, no matter how much I tried to hold back time. ‘I just want to check it out. I hear they have a good birth centre.’

‘You don’t want to be bothering with those paddling pools, love. Nice epidural, that’ll sort you out. My missus . . .’ And on he went for the whole drive, giving me the low-down not just on his missus’s labours, but also on those of his two daughters and his daughter-in-law. I was trying to remember if you’d ever told me where you worked. I’d assumed Tunbridge Wells, where I thought you lived, and which I knew had a big hospital. Why would you work in Surrey if you lived in Kent? It shamed me, how little I knew about you, the man I claimed to love. I paid the driver, now one of my most intimate acquaintances, and waddled inside to the reception desk.

‘Antenatal?’ The woman behind the desk wore a long grey cardigan and that same look of all NHS receptionists, which I imagined was similar to that of a wartime general staring out at an invading horde. None shall pass. ‘Third floor.’

‘No, it’s not that. Sorry. I’m looking for a doctor called Andrew Holt.’

‘What’s it in relation to?’ She was already reaching for the desk phone and a thrill of shock ran through me. Was it going to be as easy as that?

‘But . . .’ I panicked suddenly, imagining that you might be there, working alongside this doctor. Or, if what I suspected was true, that he might be you. That maybe you’d lied to me.

‘What?’

I said nothing. I didn’t know how to explain you might not want to see me. She spoke into the receiver. ‘Dr Holt’s office? I have someone here wanting to speak to him. Private patient, I think. Name?’ She turned to me, and I couldn’t decide what to say.

‘Er . . . Nora Halscombe.’ The lie just popped out, and immediately I was frightened I’d be found out. But what harm could it do?