‘But what if it suited you and not him? How did you know when he’d be in the right mood? What happened if he turned up and you were like, “No thanks, I’m wearing a face mask and watching reruns of Gilmore Girls”?’

‘Jess, you are illustrating precisely why you have never been, and probably never will be, the sort of person who has a friend with any sort of benefits.’

‘I could,’ I said, feeling a bit injured. ‘If I wanted to. Which I don’t.’

‘Sure, Jess,’ said Gen, laughing, but not unkindly. ‘You’re a total hearts and flowers romantic. And that’s okay.’

After we’d ended the call, I looked at myself in the mirror. I tried a sexy sort of pout, and held my hair up off my face to try to imagine what it’d be like to be the sort of person – someone like Emma – who can just have sex with whoever she feels like and then get up the next morning and ask them to pass the cornflakes without feeling even the slightest bit awkward. I pulled a face at the thought, and let my hair drop back down to my shoulders. You know what, I said to myself, maybe it’s okay if I’m just not that sort of person.

‘And here we have the lesser-spotted tourist,’ Alex says in a David Attenborough voice, turning around on his heel and walking backwards, facing me.

It’s a Sunday afternoon and miraculously he’s not working. A week has gone by and I’ve hardly seen Alex because he’s been working nights and sleeping in the daytime. He’s not just doing his placement, but he’s doing some bank work as a healthcare assistant as well to earn a bit of extra money. He looks hollow-eyed with exhaustion.

Right on cue, he yawns widely. ‘God, I’m sorry.’

‘You should probably be asleep,’ I point out, reasonably. ‘Not wandering around showing me slightly interesting parts of London.’

‘Yeah but I can’t just work all day and sleep all night,’ he says, then bursts out laughing realising his mistake.

‘You could. Like the rest of the sane world. Only you’ve decided on a noble vocation where you get precisely no sleep and work ridiculous hours instead.’

He laughs, his bright eyes twinkling in a way that is disturbingly sexy, and I look down at the squashed, end-of-winter grass and scuff it with the toe of my boot. I know how it feels.

I look sideways at Alex as we’re walking. He’s checking his email on his phone and not really paying attention, so he doesn’t notice. I’m trying to size him up and decide if he’s that sort of person, or if he’s just going along with it and half-hoping Emma might want to make something more permanent out of their arrangement. I can’t tell.