There was only one other woman in there, squinting at the smoky glass and trying to reapply her mascara. On the washstand, beside her handbag, lay something slightly odd – a pair of handles like the ones usually found attached to expensive carrier bags, the type of handles that are made of hard plastic and clip together along their length. They weren’t odd in themselves, what was odd was that there was no bag attached. But I only noticed all this on the edge of my consciousness, until the woman threw her mascara back in her handbag, tucked it under her arm, then – I thought I was seeing things – picked up the handles and swung them as if there was an invisible carrier attached. The Emperor’s New Bag.

In silence, we all turned to watch her leave, and as soon as the door had shut behind her, Emily, Connie and Debbie erupted into excited talk.

‘It was, wasn’t it?’

‘Got to be!’

‘Who? What?’ I asked, realizing that the woman wasn’t, as I’d thought, a poor lost soul and mad as a bike.

‘Doctor Hawk’s handles!’ From their shining eyes it was clear I was meant to know what they were talking about. Slowly I shook my head and Emily explained.

‘You know how we all carry baggage from our past?’

I had to admit I did – in fact, I was beginning to realize just how much stuff I was carrying.

‘So Doctor Lydia Hawk is a shrink who’s got this, like, pioneering approach. She translates emotional baggage into physical baggage. For the first month you see her you’ve to carry a proper suitcase.’

‘And it can’t be one of the ones with wheels,’ Debbie elaborated. ‘And it’s got to be full of stuff – Doctor Hawk packs it so it’s way heavy and you’ve really got to carry it. Ev-err-y-where. To the drugstore, to work, out on dates…’

‘And as you get better, the bags get smaller. Until you’re shrunk enough to get given Doctor Hawk’s handles. You’ve got to carry them for a whole year as a reminder.’

‘And they cost a thousand dollars.’

‘Ten thousand,’ Connie corrected.

‘That’s insane!’ I said. ‘They’re only plastic handles. You could just tear them off any carrier bag that you get for free.’

They all disagreed, three heads of big hair swishing emphatically from side to side. ‘Nuh-uh. Got to be the special Doctor Hawk ones, else they don’t work.’

‘There are only twenty pairs in the whole world,’ Connie marvelled. ‘They are totally the coolest things.’

Sometimes I thought I was getting the hang of how they do things in Fantasy Land. Other times, like right then, I felt as clueless as the day I’d arrived.

But never mind – back out for more dancing! The music was unreconstructed seventies disco – ‘Mighty Real’ and ‘Disco Inferno’ and other wonderful stuff that I remembered from my childhood – and the high spot was when Emily had a word with the DJ and next thing ‘I Will Survive’ was bouncing off the mirrored walls. One of the braver blokes tried to break into our circle just when the song got to the ‘Go on now, Go!’ bit, so we shouted it at him until he withdrew again, then we danced like there was no tomorrow.

34

I found myself certainly wishing there hadn’t been one the following day, when Emily announced, Lara’s on her way over.’

‘To see you?’ I asked hopefully.

She gave me a funny look. ‘No, to see you.’ She spelt the words out like I was a moron. ‘Her. Girl. Friend.’

Oh Lord.

The day had begun very nicely, starting with Lou taking us both out for breakfast. Lou had arrived last night when Emily – loosened by several free Complicated Martinis – rang him at two a.m. and invited him over. He’d arrived within twenty minutes and claimed that he’d spent the evening watching a ball game on TV and praying she’d ring.

‘Sheesh,’ Emily had exhaled, making a meal of being disgusted by his insincerity.

Then in the morning he’d taken us to Swingers, a cool, crowded diner where the ambience was vibey and flirty, even at ten o’clock in the morning – long, hot looks being exchanged over blueberry pancakes, and that was just the waiters – where he was fun, entertaining and as nice to me as he was to Emily without in any way coming across as sleazy. He insisted on paying for us both, and on the drive home stopped at a drugstore and bought cigarettes and sweets for Emily, gave her three good suggestions for Chip the Dog and told her to call him if she needed anything. ‘And I mean anything,’ he stressed, with unmistakeable meaning.

As he drove away, I had to say to Emily, ‘I think he’s really nice.’

‘Only because you’ve been out of the game for too long,’ she said, booting up her laptop and arranging herself at the kitchen table with an ashtray, coffee cup and packet of Mintos. ‘But he’s actually evil.’

‘Evil! That’s a terrible thing to say.’

And it’s not terrible to cold-bloodedly set out to make a woman fall for you, then do a disappearing act?’

‘But are you sure that’s what he’s doing?’

‘’Course I am.’ She scrolled down her screen and muttered, ‘Now where did I get to? Oh here we go. Chip the dog has just bitten the property developer.’ She flung her face into her hands and whimpered, ‘I can’t believe I’m writing this stuff. I hate myself!’

‘Think of the money,’ I replied, just like she’d told me to. ‘Think of all those lovely things, like being able to eat, and pay rent, and put gas in your car.’

‘Thank you, thank you.’ She began to type and everything was grand until Lara rang to say she was coming over.

Half an hour later, Lara burst into the room, as golden and gorgeous as always, except instead of filling me with admiration it now terrified me. She stopped at Emily and looked over her shoulder at the screen. ‘Hi, sweetheart, how’s it going?’

‘I’ve gone beyond shame, Lara. I’m a Hollywood whore.’

‘Hey, who isn’t? Emily, would you mind if I spent a little time with Maggie in private?’

Emily winced but managed, ‘Work away.’

‘I know this is a little weird,’ Lara said softly.

Emily just shrugged and, feeling wretched, I took Lara into my bedroom, closed the door and braced myself for passionate snogging.