‘And I’ve booked it for the end of October. I know that’s still a few weeks away, but you’ll be back at LSE next month and I want to get it in the diary.’

There was a momentary silence. How could Judith tell her she wasn’t going back to uni?

‘You think it’s a terrible idea, don’t you?’ said Catrin, misinterpreting her friend’s lack of response.

‘What? No! Don’t be daft!’

‘Good. Well I’ve told Lana, and she’s up for it. Saturday the twenty-fourth, OK?’

‘Brilliant!’ said Judith, swallowing before she asked, ‘How is Lana, by the way?’

Catrin glanced awkwardly at Gareth. ‘She’s fine. You know Lana, throws herself into everything. Always on the go.’

Gareth looked at the floor and Judith nodded, smiling, trying her hardest to act normal.

‘Anyway,’ said Catrin, full of forced jollity, ‘you’ll see her at the hen, won’t you? And we can all have a proper catch-up. It’s been too long.’

‘Yes, it has,’ said Judith.

There was a beat and then Catrin was on her feet. ‘Right, can I just use the loo before I go?’

‘’Course!’

Catrin headed out of the kitchen, chatting back to them as she went, telling them about how her father had already written his father-of-the-bride speech and kept laughing at his own jokes whilst rehearsing it in the garden shed. Judith and Gareth stared at each other, fearful, hysterical, saying nothing.

And then Catrin’s jolly chatter suddenly stopped. And they were struck with a simultaneous realization.

Judith closed her eyes and sighed.

‘Fuck,’ whispered Gareth.

And as they held their breath, Catrin came back and stood in the doorway. ‘Your bedroom, Jude …’

Judith could only look at her.

‘It doesn’t seem to be a bedroom any more.’

‘No,’ said Judith, struggling to find her voice. ‘It’s a study … kinda thing.’

‘So in that case,’ asked Catrin, already knowing the answer, ‘where do you sleep?’

Later that evening, Judith and Gareth cwtched up on the sofa, dealing with the after-effects of Catrin discovering their secret. Earlier they’d watched her weigh up the situation, absorb the information and calculate the fallout. She’d been torn between thinking Judith and Gareth were being hugely disloyal to Lana, and thinking the two of them made a lovely couple who were really well suited to each other. The one thing she was certain of, though, was that she wouldn’t breathe a word to Lana.

‘It’s up to you to do that, Jude,’ was her parting shot. ‘But please do it soon. Otherwise the whole thing’s gonna just drag on and the hen night, let alone the wedding, will be unbearable. ’Cos we’ve never had secrets from each other, have we?’

Catrin was right, of course. They couldn’t just pretend Lana didn’t exist. ‘She’s still one of my best friends,’ she said to Gareth as he massaged her feet. ‘And for as long as I’m in your life, she’s gonna be in your life. We can’t get around that.’

‘I know,’ he said quietly. ‘So, d’you want me to tell her?’