‘Yes, but more to the point, are you having fun?’ Eve replied, looking at her pointedly.

‘What are you on about?’

‘Just saying that Jack’s looking Brokeback Mountain hot tonight.’

‘Don’t be daft, we’re neighbours. His wife is a good friend of mine if you remember?’

‘Oh, calm down, I’m only messing,’ Eve said, giving her a nudge. ‘I’m just saying, he’s not looking too shabby, is he? Lucky Angie.’

Sophie had to agree, although she couldn’t imagine ever being married to someone as good-looking and charming as Jack. After he returned with their beers, Eve whisked him off for a dance and she stood by the side and watched them. Eve was much better at dancing than Sophie and did a good job of following the dance moves and helping Jack to keep up too.

As she sipped her beer, Sophie thought about Alan. How long had it been since they had been out together, just the two of them, without the kids? She couldn’t even remember. Most evenings they just watched TV and went to bed. Perhaps she should suggest a night out. It was just what they needed after the last few months, a bit of fun. She knew that she’d become a bit fixated on having another baby even after she promised Alan that she wouldn’t. And they were in danger of turning into a boring old married couple, if they hadn’t done already. She’d book something as soon as he got back from his parents, she decided. Stifling a yawn, she looked at her empty beer bottle and decided to call it a night. She grabbed her coat and bag and went to tell Jack she was leaving.

‘Wait, I’ll come with you,’ he said.

‘No, you stay a little longer, have fun,’ she urged him.

‘Will you be okay, walking home on your own?’

‘I’ll be fine, Jack, honestly.’

He doffed his hat at her and then turned away to continue dancing with one of the Year Three mums who had commandeered him. With a final glance at the dance floor, Sophie put her coat on and made her way out of the school hall into the cold night air.

Angie sat in bed, playing absent-mindedly with her phone before throwing it onto the duvet with a sigh. She thought of Jack at the barn dance and felt guilty that she’d feigned illness to get out of going with him, but the truth was that she just wasn’t in the mood. She couldn’t be bothered to make polite conversation with people she didn’t know or care about, or to pretend that she and Jack were the perfect couple. Recently she had found that she had little energy for anything anymore and she wondered what had happened to her.

Angie had never wallowed in bed in her life. She was a fighter – she got up, put her warpaint on and took on the world. But at the moment all she wanted to do was crawl under the duvet and hide away. Which was tricky when there was a six-year-old trying to sail a remote-control boat in the bath and a nine-year-old arguing with her sister over a hairband. Angie tried to block out the noise. She blinked a few times, willing tears to come so that they might provide her with some emotional release. But, unfortunately, Angie didn’t cry either.