The empties sat on her coffee table, but on coasters. That proved she wasn’t some kind of slob, not letting things go. She had a bag of weed in her bedside cabinet so she could seriously mellow out later. Her coke days were in the past, had to be.

She turned on the telly and swore: the ending credits were rolling on EastEnders. She channel-surfed until she hit MTV and there was Christina Aguilera strutting her stuff, with a song titled ‘Dirty’. Falls had to look twice to make sure that, yes, she was wearing what seemed to be cowboy chaps or whatever the hell they called those leather things that went on over jeans. Lest you be in any doubt as to what the song was, the word ‘Dirty’ was emblazoned on Christina’s knickers. Falls got into the beat of it and had to admit that the energy made you want to party.

No way was it the Bud doing the business. You’d need another ten before you could start to like Aguilera on any serious sort of level. Then a black guy called Redman joined Christina and he did that whole bad boy, gangsta rap gig. In truth it was a mess but got your motor churning.

Then Coldplay were up with ‘Scientist’: earnest white boys doing the Dire Straits/Travis rock-cred act. She liked this too and knew about this group as Gwyneth Paltrow was said to be pursuing an intense romance with the lead singer. Falls took a long look at the guy. He was unshaven, very pale and never smiled. Yeah, Gwynnie would love that gig.

The name of the group worked for Falls, she felt it had that nice ring of Brixton. If you had to describe how to survive the streets, you could do worse than say… ‘Coldplay’… and if that didn’t make sense, then you belonged in Hampstead.