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help but smile at the memory. As soon as she offered to throw open her room for a bash (well, hers and Kate’s room, technically), then it was all hands on deck. Kate was always in charge of catering, which in those days amounted to little more than a speedy trip to Tesco’s to buy a trolleyful of crisps and garlic bread. Jase and Rich would run around campus spreading the word and inviting all and sundry. Ted and Lloyd would move furniture, dragging the beds out of the way to create room for a makeshift dance floor, and Mia would buy the booze. She always bought crates of beer and a vast number of bottles of wine. Obviously some people would bring litre bottles of screw-top wine, but Mia liked to provide her guests with something that cost at least a few quid a bottle. She’d insist that she wouldn’t clean her toilet with most of the cheap plonk proffered, but in fact she was simply generous, something she didn’t feel needed talking about.
    She must have thrown a dozen or more similar parties in the four years she was at university. Every one of them was a monumental success. Friendship and fun and difficult-to-define comfortable familiarity had drifted through each event. Everyone had oozed such uncomplicated optimism and unfettered enthusiasm for life. They had a real belief in the brilliance of their futures.
    Mia closed her eyes, telling herself it was because she was tired and not because she was trying to blink back tears. She acknowledged with a profound irritation that she had found parts of this evening a strain. She was aware that she no longer found it easy to be entirely relaxed with the old gang. She no longer thought it was a natural state of affairs if they all knew everything there was to know about one another, which was at once a disappointment to her and also a direct result of her own actions. She had not confided her longing for a baby to anyone. At uni the gang had forged their way through well-mannered small talk, progressed to intimate revelations, moved on to huge debate and finally completed the circle so that their conversations relaxed into an almost continuous discussion on the story line of Neighbours . Now, they seemed to have regressed back to the small talk, only it was no longer always well mannered.
    Mia gave up the line of thought. It was too depressing. Instead she started to run through the list of names she liked for babies. It was her favourite game.

7. Clearing Up
    Tash reminded herself that these people meant a lot to Rich, and Rich meant everything to her. Yet she couldn’t help breathing a sigh of relief when they finally left her to the washing up at 1 a.m.
    ‘They really liked you,’ said Rich, as he slipped his arms around Tash’s waist and breathed in the smell of her hair. She was concentrating on the washing up, so didn’t turn to face him.
    ‘You think so, hey?’ she asked, not absolutely convinced. Yes, Jason liked her. That was clear. She had legs, breasts and a vagina; he wasn’t going to dislike her. He borderline fancied her, which was ideal. They could gently flirt, knowing it would never go anywhere, and he could ask her for advice on women. Not that he seemed to need it, if the anecdotes that he relayed tonight were anything to go by. And he clearly adored Rich. She could trust him not to tie a naked Rich to a lamppost the night before their wedding.
    Ted and Kate were quite unlike any of Tash’s friends. They seemed genuinely excited that they had managed to book tickets for the Khachaturian Centenary Concert with the Philharmonic Orchestra and George Pehlivanian conducting. Apparently it was mid October’s must-see. But they were not interested when Tash generously offered her spare tickets for the Robbie Williams concert at Knebworth, which was probably just as well because her old mates would sell their grandmother’s souls to secure tickets and would not appreciate her giving them away to her new friends. Their conversation had been fiercely