Hi. I’m Delores. And I have a dream. Well - a fantasy really.

It’s September. There is a room. In it are people. They are handsome, tanned, pretty and slim.

They are chatting, drinking, and occasionally touching each other.

This goes on for hours, and I can feel myself getting very warm under the velour lining of my new frock.

As each course passes, I find myself eating with new, ever more willing partners.

Then a young man, called Jon (people rarely use their real name at these things) points to the handsome man to my right. ‘That’s Phil’, he whispers in my ear, ‘and he started it all’. I could feel myself flushing. Here was a man who had brought together the best looking, best dressed people I’d ever met. And apparently, he does it three or four times a year. Phil remained enigmatic. I could tell that for him, bringing people together was at the heart of everything he did.

Here he was – my fantasy was real.

And as the plates disappeared, so did my inhibitions.