‘I’d never have thought it would suit her.’

‘No, me neither. Not with her colouring.’

‘No, not with her colouring.’

‘But she looks great.’

‘She really does.’

‘And if she’d told me what she was planning to do, I’d have tried to talk her out of it.’

‘Me too. I would never have thought it would suit her.’

‘No, me neither. I have to say I really didn’t think it would.’

‘But it’s fantastic. Really natural looking.’

‘Very natural looking…’ And so on. Lovely, no-brainer stuff, where I didn’t have to be clever, or even coherent. Extremely comforting.

But when we got back from the beach, our sleepy, lazy mood changed and we were suddenly encapsulated in a ball of anxiety. The first thing Emily did after she’d opened the door was to skid towards the answering machine, hoping for a message from David Crowe.

‘Well?’ I asked.

‘Nada.’

‘Oh, poor Emily.’

‘It’s too late,’ she said the following morning, as she made us our smoothies. ‘If it was going to happen it would have happened by now.’

‘But your script is brilliant.’

‘It makes no difference.’

Despite having perfectly valid problems of my own, I couldn’t help but be affected by Emily’s hopelessness.

‘Isn’t life very unfair?’

‘Too right. I’m so sorry that all this stuff is going on with me,’ Emily said. ‘I’m sure you could do without it.’

‘Ah, you’re ΟΚ,’ I shrugged.

The thing was – though I’d never have admitted it – that it was almost a relief to be around a big drama that wasn’t mine. Now and again Emily made another half-hearted effort to quiz me up and down about Garv, but I was resistant and she hadn’t the energy to persist.

‘So what would you like to do today?’ Emily asked.

‘Duh!’ I gestured at the window and the dazzling day beyond it. ‘Go to the beach, of course.’

‘I’ll get my bikini,’ she offered, gallantly.

I shook my head. ‘There’s no need. Stay and do some work, you’ll feel better.’

Emily had always been a grafter, and though she claimed she wasn’t making any progress on her new script, I knew how guilty she felt if she didn’t put in the hours. She’d even done some work the previous evening.

Mind you, as well as writing, Emily spent half her life on the phone, hopping from call waiting to call waiting, like a juggler keeping several balls in the air. There was no such thing as a short conversation.

Connie – whom I still hadn’t met – seemed to take up a lot of her time, on account of having drama after drama with flowers, caterers, hairdressers, bridesmaid dresses… It made me queasy to overhear. I didn’t want anyone ever to get married, I wanted the whole world to get divorced – even single people – so that my life wouldn’t feel like such a rare and conspicuous fiasco.

Connie’s most recent wedding disaster related to her honeymoon. In a strange version of life imitating art, the resort she’d picked for her honeymoon had been invaded by disgruntled local militiamen, who’d kidnapped seven of the guests. Connie’s travel agent was refusing to return her deposit, and though Emily hadn’t an ounce of legal knowledge, she was urging Connie to sue. ‘You’ve got rights. Who cares if it wasn’t in the contract? Oh hang on, there’s my call waiting…’

‘I’ll be back later,’ I said, flinging a book into my beach bag.

‘Are you sure you’re OK?’ Emily asked.

‘Yes.’

Well, I wasn’t too bad – I’d been in Los Angeles for three days and not once had I rung Garv. I’d had two really compulsive urges, but luckily they’d both happened when it was the middle of the night in Ireland, so I’d convinced myself not to act on them.

‘You’re getting a great tan,’ Emily said, sitting cross-legged on the couch and switching on her laptop. ‘Drive safely.’

On the way to my car I saw the New-Agey next-door neighbours, obviously on their way out to work. An incongruous pair: she was African-American, haughty and graceful, with a swan-like neck and elbow-length extensions, whereas he looked like Bill Bryson – bearded, balding, bespectacled and kind of jolly. I gave them a nod. Smiling, they approached and introduced themselves: Charmaine and Mike. They seemed very pleasant and didn’t mention my aura.

As I said goodbye and turned away, I saw one of the neighbours from the other side, returning from buying coffee for himself and his house-mates, if the Starbucks tray he was carrying was any clue.

‘Yο,’ he yelled at me, as he marched along in knee-length cut-offs and a torn vest. Even if Emily hadn’t already told me the lads were all students, I think I could have figured out that this one wasn’t exactly an insurance salesman, judging from his shaved head, many facial piercings and elaborate facial hair. In my few short days in Los Angeles I’d decided that next door could well be a halfway house for Goatees Anonymous. There appeared to be dozens of blokes – although Emily said there were only three – and they all seemed to be afflicted. Some just had wispy, bum-fluff efforts; others, obviously the more hardcore cases like this guy, wore cultivated Fu Manchu mini-beards.

Outside their house sat a long, low, orange car. It looked so clapped out I thought it had been abandoned, but Emily told me it belonged to the boys. It had only cost them two hundred dollars on account of none of the doors opening, so entry and exit was by means of the windows. They called it their Dukes of Hazzardmobile.

‘Hey,’ I replied, climbing into my car.

I drove the shamefully short distance to the beach and parked. The vista ahead of me was as picture-perfect as it always was. The sand, the sun, the waves, the clear, golden light. Pity I was so wretchedly lonely. Worse still – and I was ashamed to admit this – I was unsettled without the routine and structure of a job and, really, I can’t tell you how annoying this was, because I felt like I’d spent most of my working life fantasizing about winning the lotto, jacking in the job and having endless free time to loll around in the sun. Now that I had it, I was afraid of it. Of course, over the years, I’d taken holidays, but this strange, uncharted hiatus wasn’t a holiday. I wasn’t sure what it was, but I knew what it wasn’t.