The Cows: The bold, brilliant and hilarious Sunday Times Top Ten bestseller. Dawn O’Porter

about death, it’s wrecking my head.’

      ‘Sorry,’ I say, even though I’m not. I creep behind him and put my arms around his waist. We stand like this for a minute or two, Phil’s body stiff and uninviting. I undo his belt.

      ‘I want you,’ I say gently as I take his flaccid penis into my hand and try to work it into something functional. I don’t remember ever having to do this at the beginning of our relationship. It’s standard now.

      After a long silence, it’s finally hard. ‘Come to bed,’ I say, taking him by the hand and leading him into the bedroom.

      As I take off my jeans and knickers, Phil lies down. He pulls his trousers down a little but leaves his underwear on. I crawl on top of him. ‘I might need a little help,’ I say, seductively putting my fingers into his mouth. He sucks them and turns his head to the side. I run my wet fingers around the opening of my vagina, a move he taught me, that he used to like to watch. I position myself above him and lower until he’s inside me. He keeps his head to the side. I move slowly up and down, not taking my eyes off his face. I try harder, making the noises that used to turn him on. I lean forward and kiss his neck, then his cheek. I kiss the side of his mouth as I groan and move faster, but he refuses to look at my face. He’s managing to retain an erection but he’s not moving, he’s not offering anything. I keep going, ramping up my speed a little but getting nothing back from him.

      ‘Phil, come on,’ I bark, frustrated. ‘Just fuck me, will you!’

      Phil pushes me off and onto the bed. I roll and face the other way, covering my face with my hands. It’s too embarrassing to bear.

      ‘I’m sorry, Stell,’ he says, sincerely. ‘I’m just really full.’ A lie.

      He gets off the bed, does up his jeans as he goes into the living room. I hear the TV go on.

       Tara

      Sophie and I used to work for an agency that supplied waiting staff for posh people’s parties. We’d serve miniature Yorkshire puddings with horseradish cream, or other such pretentious tiny things, to London’s society crowd. We dealt with a lot of pretentious arseholes, but we also got to snoop around their houses. Huge Notting Hill townhouses and massive Sloane Square apartments. They were another world from what we were used to in Walthamstow. Our families did well by our local standards, we were the upper end of the scale for where we were from, but nothing in comparison to the people who had these parties. They seemed like something out of the movies, and they lived in a London that we didn’t recognise as ours. We used to laugh about how we would be if we lived that way. We fantasised about wearing wild dressing gowns, marabou slippers, wafting around our mansions with glass after glass of champagne. It was a ridiculous dream, but every time I arrive at Sophie and Carl’s house, I realise she is living it.

      I pick Annie up so she can ring the doorbell. It’s Victorian, so quite stiff. Her little fingers struggle to push it, so I put mine on top of hers and say, ‘One two, three.’ We hear the perfectly tuned, beautiful bells of Big Ben that their £400 doorbell bellows out whenever anyone pops round. Sophie’s voice booms out of a speaker, ‘Hang on, just upstairs,’ but as she says it, we hear heavy footsteps walking towards the door. Annie holds onto me a little tighter, which makes me feel so good. She’s been angry with me all day. But in that way that kids do, when a shred of fear from the outside world creeps in, she knows her mummy is the one to make her safe. I squeeze her back, happy to be a team again, as the door slowly opens.

      And there is Carl. All six foot two of him. His dark hair neatly cut and parted at the side. His fifty-one-year-old, well-looked-after body hidden underneath a cream V-neck jumper, with a checked shirt poking out from underneath. I’m not sure what you’d call the trousers he has on, a casual chino? This is him when he’s relaxing at home, but he still looks smarter than most of the men I know when they’re at work.

      ‘Hey Carl, so nice to see you,’ I say, stepping inside and kissing him on each cheek. I feel under surveillance, like I could say something incriminating to piss him off. I remind myself I am a parent, that he is not my husband, and it actually doesn’t matter if he likes me or not. But still, I feel judged.

      ‘Hello Tara, Annie; welcome. Sophie is somewhere, come in,’ he says, warmly, reminding me that most of my opinion of Carl comes from Sophie’s paranoia.

      ‘Hiiiiiii,’ says Sophie, coming down the large staircase. She looks fully the part and as beautiful as ever. All casual in black, but impeccably styled.

      ‘Aunty Sophie!’ says Annie, letting go of my hand and running over to her. They’ve always got on great. Sophie is childlike by nature, so connects well with kids. I am pretty certain this would not be the case if the kids were her own. It’s another reason why marrying Carl suited her. He has three boys by his first marriage, and no interest in having any more.

      ‘Hello sweetheart,’ she says, picking Annie up and giving her a huge kiss. I see her shoot a look to Carl, to make sure he is watching. She thinks him seeing her with children makes her seem responsible in some way, I think. ‘Shall we go into the kitchen?’ she says.

      In the kitchen, a huge white three-sided cube that opens up to a sprawling and perfectly preened garden, Carl goes over to a wine fridge that is four times the size of my actual fridge and says to Sophie, ‘Maybe a 2008?’

      ‘Lovely,’ she replies.

      As he opens it, Sophie opens the back doors so that Annie can burst into the open air and run around the flower beds. She gets to do no such thing at home, because my garden is basically a shed with no roof on it. I do love seeing her play happily, a gentle reminder that maybe I am doing OK at being a mum.

      ‘So, did he text?’ Sophie asks me, as Carl puts three enormous bulbous wine glasses in front of us. He puts three fingers’ worth of wine in mine, three fingers’ worth in his, but as he’s pouring Sophie’s, she puts her hand up as if to stop him putting so much in hers. That is the first time in the history of my existence I have ever seen her do that. Carl looks impressed. Sophie looks at me and winks.

      ‘No, not yet,’ I say, tasting the wine. It’s unbelievably delicious, like the smoothest, creamiest, most perfectly chilled drink I have ever consumed. I bet it cost £50 a bottle. I drink it slowly, despite wanting to neck it. ‘I obviously gauged that completely wrong. He hasn’t contacted me all weekend, I’m gutted,’ I continue.

      ‘I presume you’re talking about a young man?’ says Carl, like an old dad.