‘When are you due?’

Ruth held up crossed fingers. ‘In six weeks, hopefully, if we make full term. We’ve had a long road to get here. We tried IVF, which didn’t work out, and it’s taken us a lot of poking and prodding to get this far. Sorry – too much information?’

Hopefully, this Ruth wasn’t going to spend their entire conversation apologising. ‘No, not at all. No such thing as too much information as far as I’m concerned.’

Ruth looked relieved. ‘Oh, did you do IVF, too?’

‘No,’ said Jenny. ‘But I’m always interested in a good story. I’m a writer.’ Time to steer the conversation in a different direction. ‘What do you do?’

‘Oh. I work for a bank. I did wonder, seeing the people here, whether there might be others who are IVF?’

Jenny raised an eyebrow. ‘Because most of us are so old, you mean?’

‘No! Well, maybe.’ Ruth tucked her hair behind her ears. ‘Sorry. I’m so nervous. David and I never thought we’d actually make it this far. Sorry, I’m talking about myself again. Tell me about your pregnancy.’

Jenny was here to gain information, not give it out. ‘No, no. Carry on. Please.’

Ruth didn’t need much persuading. ‘Well, after we’d failed IVF at the third go, we gave up and went on holiday. About three weeks after we got back, I was in the toiletries aisle at Sainsbury’s, saw a packet of tampons and realised that I hadn’t bought any since before our holiday. At first I thought my ovaries had given up altogether – sorry for the gory details – but I also had a tiny flicker of hope. So, I decided to do a test straight away, before the hope got out of control.’

‘In the toilet at Sainsbury’s?’ Jenny’s own experience of pregnancy testing was of holding Dan’s hand as they waited – for the longest three minutes of their life – for the second blue line to appear.

‘Classy, huh? Trying to hover over the toilet and urinate on that thin little stick without weeing all over my shoes was pretty tricky.’ Ruth stroked her bump as she spoke. ‘I couldn’t believe it when I saw the result. I assumed the test must be faulty so I did the second one straight away. I even went and bought more tests. When David got home from work, there was a row of six positive pregnancy tests on the back of the toilet waiting for him.