Tully avoided his gaze. ‘This one? Sure you have.’

‘Michelle has a lot of clothes that aren’t new but which I haven’t seen before,’ Rob said, sipping the froth off the premium beer that Sonny must have bought without receiving the third degree from her about its cost. ‘The next thing I know, there’s an eye-watering charge on the credit card from Zimmerman or Scanlan Theodore.’

‘And Rob has so many golf clubs that aren’t new but which I haven’t seen before,’ Michelle replied. ‘If I looked at the credit card statement, I’m sure I’d find some eye-watering charges from House of Golf.’

They both laughed with the airiness of people without money problems. This was how it happened, Tully realised, opening a new bottle of sauvignon blanc. You married a kind, generous progressive man, and within a decade he became George Banks from Mary Poppins. (The boys had been watching Mary Poppins lately and Tully had been shocked by what poor Winifred had had to put up with. No wonder she joined the suffragette movement.)

‘You won’t find any eye-watering amounts on the credit card from me,’ Tully said, holding up her hand to imply scout’s honour. ‘You have my word.’

She wasn’t sure if it was the scout’s honour or giving her word that did it, but Sonny seemed to relax. It had the effect of relaxing Tully too. Until her phone started ringing and she saw Heather’s name on the screen.

‘It’s Heather,’ she said, her eyes widening.

‘Answer it,’ Michelle demanded.

‘Should I?’ Tully said. The group nodded unanimously so she raised the phone to her ear. ‘Heather?’

There was a longer than normal pause.

‘Tully, hi . . . I hope I’m not catching you at a bad time.’

‘It’s not a great time,’ Tully said. ‘I have some friends here at the moment.’

She looked up. Rob, Michelle, and Sonny were all watching her eagerly.

‘In that case, I won’t keep you. But I was just talking to your dad, and he suggested it might be fun for us to get together again. Another lunch, just the girls this time. I wondered if you would be interested?’

Tully had a vision of herself sitting at a table with Rachel and Heather, no Dad. It made her stomach lurch. It was one thing meeting up with Heather and Dad at his request, but . . . socialising with her? It felt like the ultimate betrayal of Mum.

‘It might sound a little too much,’ Heather continued, ‘but I just thought it would be nice if we got to know each other better as women . . . without your dad around.’

Rob and Michelle were sitting forward in their chairs, absolutely thrilled, mouthing things to each other and beaming. The new girlfriend. Calling!

‘I’m sorry, Heather – like I said, this isn’t a great time. I have guests here.’

‘Oh.’ A pause. ‘Of course. So sorry.’

Tully knew she should say, I’ll be in touch about lunch, or, I’ll call you later and we can make a plan. But her brain seemed to have temporarily cut off access to such social graces, so instead she said, ‘Bye,’ and hung up the phone.