All of which tied in rather nicely with my preference for letting our relationship fizzle, rather than nuking it with a dramatic confrontation. After all, I told myself, lots of friendships faded and to seek out conflict when my life was so nicely back on track, would be a pointless backward step. The power station project was going well and, more importantly, my relationship with Cameron had continued to steadily improve, to the extent that a chat over lunch or a drink with Roger and Luke after work no longer felt forced or uncomfortable. In fact, my conversations with him were now something I very much enjoyed.

For Jason too, Ruby’s departure appeared to kick-start a period of sustained improvement. True, he suffered the occasional worry that he might one day return home to find a bunny boiling on the hob, but on the whole his texted updates revealed an increasing optimism for a future in which he did not need to sleep with every willing woman in order to achieve emotional and sexual fulfilment. An additional point of happiness for him was that he and Giles had now managed to have a beer together. Their conversation had admittedly been entirely cricket-based – but it was at least a start.

As for Giles himself, my fears that he was about to enter a period of introspective gloom and self-doubt following Bill’s gig proved unfounded. He had awoken the next morning displaying his usual bonhomie and, with no apparent hesitation, had texted Melissa to arrange to meet for lunch the following week; a lunch which had since been followed by multiple dog-walks, an evening at the theatre and dinner at a Clifton restaurant.

Thus, it seemed, for the time being at least, that all was well. And it was with this significantly improved sense of well-being, coupled with a weekend spring in my step, that I turned the corner into the lamp-lit avenue one Friday evening to see June making her way slowly towards me from the opposite end of the road.

She raised a hand, I waved back, and a minute later we met at Giles’s gate.

‘Oh it is her. She looks so wide in that coat,’ she murmured, before continuing more loudly, ‘and how are you, Edith, and how is your Giles?’

‘We’re both really well, June,’ I said, looking down uncertainly and wondering if double-breasted might not be working for me after all. ‘How are you?’

‘Good, good.’ She smiled, putting a hand to her head and adjusting the blonde, Margaret Thatcheresque wig which was perched there. ‘We were in Eastbourne with friends last week. There’s a hotel there which puts on dinner dances. We visit every year at this time. It’s quite lovely.’

‘Sounds it,’ I said. ‘I’d love to see pictures of that, if you have any.’