I worked all day Saturday. He spent Sunday fixing up a gig somewhere, I forget exactly where, I’m not sure he even told me. Rationally, I know that he’d already confirmed this work before we had our row; irrationally I feel he’s avoiding me. To be accurate, we’re avoiding each other. Even when we finally fall into bed at the end of our gruelling days we do little more than exchange monosyllabic polite questions and answers, designed to learn precisely nothing about one another’s state of mind.

Since Friday night the flat has been full of stress and silences, so I’m happy to rush to work and let the fragrances which perpetually float in the air soothe me. Ben’s Bunches and Bouquets is my sanctuary. My haven. Flowers can be calming, reassuring, joyful and sexy. Currently, they provide me with everything Adam isn’t.

I never wanted to do anything other than be a florist. I started working at Ben’s B&B four years ago, just before I met Adam. I love my job. The shop is just a ten-minute walk from our flat and Ben is just a few years older than me and a fun boss who gives me plenty of creative scope and independence; he’s become more of a friend than a boss over the years. Even as a tiny tot I used to love to bury my nose in the bright roses blooming in my gran’s garden. I’d inhale the silky, sensuous scent the way some starlets inhale cocaine in the loos at China White; I couldn’t get enough. My gran had a keen creative and romantic streak. She lived before web design or adultery became acceptable conduits for these character traits and so, as she had always been especially green-fingered, she found a more genteel outlet – she arranged flowers.

Gran grew lots and lots of flowers in her garden. Mostly I remember roses and sweet peas but I know that she grew delphiniums, lavender, marigolds and nasturtiums too, to name but a few. It was my habit to trail her as she mooched around the garden. Clippers in one hand, wooden trug in the other, she’d set off in search of the most beautiful stems available.