Leonie glances towards Tanya, which is a mistake, because she’s breastfeeding, exuberantly, indiscreetly, shirt open to her waist, and of course, why shouldn’t she? But it makes Leonie’s guts squirm. She focuses on her old friend’s face, or tries to, but Tanya is gazing down at the child now, like it’s the new fucking Jesus. Leonie hates how babies do this to women. It’s not necessary. She’s proved it. She makes a non-committal noise, in her throat, and Tanya looks up then, and laughs. ‘We need the uncompromising too,’ she says, ‘to keep us true.’

That might be so, but Jacqui still looks pissed off. Maybe it was her husband who brought the tea, or it could be that she’s just the pissed-off sort. Well, Leonie has nothing against that. ‘How old’s the kid?’ she asks Tanya. Not that she cares, but she really hasn’t the energy to put Jacqui right – she looks a lot less likely to listen than Vee – and anyway her leg has gone to sleep under her and she couldn’t get up and walk away. She stretches both legs straight out in front of her.

‘Three months,’ Tanya says. She’s unattached it now and is holding it over her shoulder: it burps, she smiles. Then, with a movement Leonie didn’t see coming or she’d have deflected it, her friend is on her feet and the baby is being dangled at her, so she can do nothing but take it. ‘Hold him, will you? I just need to check how Saffron’s doing.’

The others have gathered into another conversation, so Leonie sits with the baby lying along her legs, contained in the valley made where her thighs are pressed together. She pulls her knees up a fraction and puts the soles of her feet flat on the ground, leaning the weight of her upper body back on her hands, so that the baby is contained and secure but she doesn’t need to actually touch it. It’s a fist-faced thing, still, doesn’t look like anything much.

She looks away, and spots Vee, who is circling with her camera. When she sees Leonie, she raises it to her eye. Leonie sends her a look that says, I will actually kill you if you take this shot. Vee doesn’t. Well, it doesn’t look as though she does. She lowers her camera and turns away.