it in their stride along with you. ‘I’m not a woman,’ I go on, in as laid-back a way as I can possibly manage. ‘I mean, I’m not just any old woman! It’s me, Libby Lomax. Um, Adam’s girlfriend? The jewellery designer?’
‘Libby?’ Lottie gasps.
‘That’s right. Hello!’ I add. ‘Nice to see you again!’
Posh James’s shoes arrive, now, and I hear an appalled, ‘For fuck’s sake,’ before he grabs Fritz’s collar and – helpfully – puts an end to the water torture by manhandling him back towards the kitchen door and putting him out in the hallway.
‘Thanks!’ I say, still trying to sound relaxed about all this, in the hope that it convinces them there’s really nothing so very extraordinary about finding a virtual stranger with their head wedged between a set of iron bars at the neighbour’s house, with only some strands of ribbon and elastic to protect her modesty. ‘Much appreciated.’
‘But, Libby …’ Lottie isn’t sounding remotely relaxed. ‘You have to tell me. Are you … in this position … voluntarily?’
‘Adam hasn’t fucking imprisoned her in a sex dungeon, or anything,’ Posh James says, cuttingly. ‘He’s not even home. I saw her letting herself in about an hour ago. At least, I think it’s her …’ There’s a pause. I don’t know why, but I get the impression of a neck being craned. ‘She looks a bit different from this angle.’
‘Then stop looking from that angle!’ Lottie snaps. ‘Let the poor girl have a shred of dignity, will you?’
What I’d quite like, right now, is for the floor beneath Fritz’s den to open up like a large sinkhole, drag me down deep into the earth’s crust, and finish me off in a pit of molten lava.
‘Anyway, if he’s not imprisoned her, what the hell is she doing in here?’ Lottie demands, before crouching down to meet me at eye level. Her pretty face is creased with genuine concern. ‘What are you doing in here?’ she repeats the question to me. ‘If you’re too scared to say anything aloud, just … I don’t know … blink three times … or do you have a safe word, or something …?’
‘No, there’s no safe word!’ I really, really want my very nice new client to stop thinking I’m heavily into sadomasochism. ‘This is all just a silly accident. I put my head through the bars, you see,’ I go on, cleverly avoiding any mention of why I put on slutty lingerie to do this in the first place. ‘I think the problem is my earrings, actually, so perhaps …’ I reach one hand up to start undoing one of the chandelier earrings on one side and then, the moment it’s fallen free, do the same to the other. ‘I’m sure I’ll be able to get my head out, now.’
Wrong again.
My head, even without the earrings, still won’t slide back out through the bars of the safety gate.
‘My head hasn’t grown, has it?’ I’m sounding panicked again. ‘Could that have happened? Do heads just spontaneously grow?’
‘I don’t know about that.’ Lottie puts her own head on one side. ‘I suppose it could have expanded a teeny bit, or something … From the friction of you trying to pull it out, maybe?’
‘For fuck’s sake, the two of you. It isn’t amateur physicist week.’ Posh James doesn’t sound the least bit impressed. ‘Obviously what we need is some sort of lubricant.’
‘James!’ Lottie gasps.
‘To rub on the bars,’ he explains. ‘To help her slide out. Olive oil, butter …’
‘Oh. Well, yes, that might be a good idea, actually. I’ll go and look in the fridge,’ Lottie says, getting to her feet and heading across to the other end of the kitchen. ‘Keep talking to her, James!’ she calls over one shoulder. ‘In case she goes into shock, or something.’
‘She’s not going to go into bloody shock,’ Posh James replies, irritably, before thinking slightly better of this and turning back to ask me, ‘are you?’
‘No,’ I mumble.
‘Good. I might, though.’
Which I think is just him being rude – extremely rude – about the nightmare-inducing sight of my bum, on the other side of the bars from him, until he goes on: ‘I mean, I honestly didn’t know Adam had it in him. I was pretty sure – a hundred per cent sure, in fact – that Adam batted for the other team.’
‘Sorry?’
‘Drove on the right-hand side of the road.’
‘Um, are you pointing out that he’s American, because I did already realize—’
‘I thought he was gay.’
I blink at Posh James. To be more precise, I blink at his battered Converse.
‘Adam’s not gay.’
‘If you say so.’
‘I am saying so.’
‘Well, you’d know better than me, obviously. It must just be a very, very good male friend of his I see leaving here early in the mornings, when I’m heading home from my run … what the hell, Lottie?’ he adds, as Lottie’s ballet pumps return our way again. ‘I suggested olive oil or butter, not half the contents of the store cupboard!’
‘Well, I don’t know what’s going to work, do I?’ Lottie is crouching back down to my level again, clutching an entire armful of assorted packets and bottles. ‘So, which do you think is most slippery? Groundnut oil? Grapeseed oil? Sesame oil? Argan oil … oooh, I’ve never heard of that one before.’
‘It’s often used in North African cooking,’ Posh James says. ‘You can use it to make fresh dips, drizzle it on couscous—’
‘Oh, was that the thing that made the couscous taste so amazing in Marrakech?’ Lottie asks.
‘I think it was the cinnamon, actually,’ her husband tells her. ‘I’ve started adding it when I make couscous at home, you know, but I don’t think the quality of the cinnamon here is as good as it was over there, because—’
‘I honestly think any of the oils will be fine,’ I say, starting to feel more desperate than ever now that – somehow – we all just seem to be sitting around here swapping recipe tips and reminiscing about couscous. ‘Can we just try one?’
‘Of course. Let’s start with the sesame oil!’
So we do. And when that has no effect whatsoever, we try groundnut oil. And when that has no effect whatsoever, we try sunflower oil. And when that has no effect whatsoever (apart from making me smell like some sort of giant Chinese takeaway, that is), Posh James announces, ‘Fuck this for a game of soldiers. I’d better call the fire brigade.’
‘No!’ I moan, gently, because if it’s mortifying enough being semi-naked and wedged between two iron bars on my hands and knees in front of Lottie and James Cadwalladr, I can’t even begin to imagine the horror of importing half a dozen firemen into this kitchen, too. ‘Please …’
‘Well, I don’t see that we have any other option,’ he says, irritably. ‘I don’t own a hacksaw. I suppose I could always go and see if any of the neighbours has a hacksaw—’
‘Bogdan!’ I suddenly gasp.
I can’t believe I didn’t think of this before.
‘My friend Bogdan – he’s a handyman … well, and a hairdresser, too, but …’ Not relevant, Libby! Stick to the important facts! ‘He’ll have a hacksaw, I’m absolutely sure of it. Look, can you just grab my phone from my bag,’ I say, feeling weak with relief, ‘and bring it over so I can call him?’
‘Absolutely!’ Lottie sounds pretty relieved as well, because although this might be the worst