‘They aren’t dates, that’s the whole point; we’re just friends,’ Minnie explained. ‘And no, nothing as weird as the banana scenario.’

After that first Sunday on Hampstead Heath, a new routine had evolved between Minnie and Quinn. Every Sunday they would meet at the ponds at seven thirty. They didn’t arrange it, they just both started going when they knew the other would be there. They swam for half an hour, sometimes longer, they got breakfast and coffee at the van, they walked, talked, and then circled back to the train and said goodbye.

Minnie didn’t want to question what they were doing. She never wanted to leave when they reached the station, but she couldn’t bring herself to ask him to go on somewhere with her. Outdoor swimming was a hobby they both shared; having a coffee afterwards was casual, friendly. Anything more and it might verge into ‘date’ territory. If he suggested it, fine, but he never did.

She looked forward to Sunday mornings every minute of the week. She dreaded Sunday afternoons when it would be a whole week until she could see him again. She turned down invitations from other people to do anything on a Sunday morning: swimming was an immovable fixture in her calendar, just as it had been when she was a child.

When it rained she worried he wouldn’t come. Who went swimming in the rain? She went anyway and he was there; they were the only ones. She didn’t ask him about his love life again, and he didn’t ask about hers. Minnie purposely avoided the subject. Perhaps he was still seeing whoever she was, perhaps he was still dating pneumonic blondes from Tinder – she didn’t need to know. Talk of other people would taint the nature of their meet-ups. These Sunday mornings were bell jars full of precious conversation. Minnie didn’t want too much of the outside world getting in; she thought that he understood and felt the same.

‘And you talk about what?’ Leila asked.

‘Life, work, parents, books – everything. We joke around a lot, he’s quite philosophical; he’s so smart, such easy company. I feel like we could keep talking for hours and then the morning is suddenly over and it feels like no time at all.’

‘Uh-oh,’ said Leila, fanning herself with her programme.

‘Uh-oh what?’

‘Sounds like you in lurrve.’

‘No.’

Minnie shook her head, scrunching up her face as though squinting to see. On the catwalk a group of models wearing pink and beige army fatigues came hopping onto the stage.

‘What are they doing?’ asked Minnie.

‘They’re supposed to be flamingos, in military camo gear,’ said Leila, as if she was explaining the most obvious thing in the world. ‘’Cause we’re all fighting for survival, right, it’s just a different kind of war.’