As Izzy’s cold has worsened, I’ve taken the day off work. To give Rose her due, she’s always been fine whenever I have needed to do this. Izzy spends most of the day dozing, or blearily watching cartoons. I catch up on housework, trying not to think about my proposal, and focus on the positive aspects of my life instead.

For instance: my bedroom is much improved since Andy took that dowdy old standard lamp with the olive-green tasselled shade that he was so fond of, and which I hated. The worrying fan heater has gone too. Small joys, I realise – in fact, they could be construed as straw-clutchy – but I am trying to derive glimmers of pleasure wherever I can.

Saturday, September 21

Penny drops by with Nick, plus Bobby, which cheers up the still cold-ridden Izzy. I’ve noticed that Penny has started a new thing, where she prompts me to tell Nick one of my supposedly ‘hilarious’ anecdotes. ‘Tell Nick about that thing when you …’ she keeps saying. I’m not quite sure why she’s doing this, as if I’m incapable of interacting with other adults without her help. I just hope to God she’s not trying to show me off in my ‘best light’ – i.e. pimping me out – in the hope that some kind of romantic spark might develop between Nick and me (admittedly, he’s lovely, handsome, clever, all the right things – for someone who might be looking for That Kind of Thing).

As I pour their coffees in my kitchen, she starts asking about Andy, and whether I’ve found out why he took the flat above the cheese shop yet; she seems to be trying to signal: ‘My Friend Viv Is Single, Nick. Pay Heed.’

‘I’m trying to keep communications with him to a minimum,’ I say with a smile.

She tries again. ‘The things that man moaned about. Like the scones in the hospital canteen! Tell Nick about the scone thing,’ she prompts me.

‘What scone thing?’ I ask, genuinely confused.

‘You know – the thing with the hard pat of butter.’ Oh, God. This is worryingly reminiscent of when Spence was learning guitar. Whenever Andy’s parents visited, Andy would say, ‘Go get your guitar, Spence! Play “Whisky in the Jar” for Grandma and Grandpa.’ And he’d skulk off to fetch it and play it dutifully, emitting gusts of resentment, until he reached thirteen and point-blank refused.

‘You mean at the hospital?’ I ask, and Penny nods. So I launch into the background info, about Andy’s perpetual moans about the hospital car park, the low-grade loo roll and the hard pats of butter, and how he was driven one day to sitting on one (still in its foil wrapper) in the canteen, in order to soften it for spreading, and it oozed out and made an oily stain on his trousers.