One hot water bottle in a drawer later. R has visited, zebra striped and cocktail drunk. At the ball J and I watched her sing with one hand on her hip and her red hair fantastically massive and glowing under the stage light. He said as I stood with my shoes in my hand and my false eyelashes drooping, the reason why R is single is because she is so sexually overpowering.

In the middle of R visiting, the boy comes along dragging his feet. At 2pm he still lay with his head under his covers, and he said as I came in NO, very firmly, so I went away.

R says, you’d better not be throwing me out to have sex. She scowls and winks at the same time.

You understand, don’t you? he says, meaning me to understand that he has, after all, been working all day. The prospect is always worse, and today it swallowed up his day whole. I’ll be back, he says, at 2am.

So very quickly he leaves and I tell R, who is downstairs drinking coffee and staring at the pineapple sitting on her chair, not to fall for the guy playing (fittingly) Valentine in the play she is in, but to run away with me. Aww you know I’d like nothing more. Je t’aime, she kisses my shoulder with a flourish as I leave.