How could someone so young be so completely at ease in a home like this? Chloe still got up an hour early on the day their cleaner came and wiped down all the surfaces, hid her vibrator under a nest of tights in her underwear drawer and gave the bathroom a quick bleach. She had to be at school by eight, so it usually meant getting up before six. Rav couldn’t understand why she did it. To him, having a cleaner meant that a person who didn’t really exist would arrive at their house while they weren’t there and they would return to a neat and tidy living space. To Chloe, the cleaner was completely and utterly real, having a painfully unvarnished view into their life, seeing what they ate and how much they drank, whether Rav had slept on the sofa after a row or if she had bothered cooking something elaborate. She still pretended to her mother that she didn’t have a cleaner. The prospect of explaining why – that they were both so busy – was too much. She couldn’t face the inevitable ‘But, darling, you’ve got lots of time, you’re only a teacher.’

‘So, how long have you lived together?’ Chloe asked as Verity took vegetables from the fridge and set about making a salad.

Verity shook her head. ‘We don’t.’ The little gold diamond hoops which punctured her ear lobes caught the light as they moved. She had only one hole in each ear. Zadie had had loads. Her first had been done at Selfridges in London, something which Chloe had been blown away by. The rest of them had been done by friends at school, copying The Parent Trap, people on beaches in Bali or hostels in Berlin. Zadie had done Chloe’s second set, drunk at Archer Crescent one night. She’d flicked a lighter over a needle while Chloe lay on the bed hoping she was drunk enough not to feel it and pretending she wasn’t worried about her mother’s reaction. She hadn’t wanted the piercing, really. Just something permanent on her body which came from Zadie.

‘My family are very traditional. I have a little place in Notting Hill. Of course, I stay here often, but I won’t live here until we’re married.’

‘My mum was horrified when I moved in with Rav. Said something about men not buying the cow if you give out the milk for free.’

Verity laughed. It was the first time Chloe had seen her do so in an unguarded fashion. She looked even younger. ‘I think my grandmother had a similar expression. Though, clearly, it’s not true. How long have you been married?’

‘Six years. We’d been together for nearly a decade before that, though. When I told my mother he’d proposed she said “Finally” so much she forgot to say “Congratulations”.’