Paris sits at a heart-shaped table, her lamplight eyes dimming for the morning. She pumps a tube of mascara, yawning.

“Oi!”

Paris jumps, troubled by the noise. “Oh no. Not you.” She says, blusher brush poised.

London doffs his rooftops like ten million battered bowlers.

“Nice to see you too. Not a morning girl, eh?”

Paris shakes her lovely head in a flurry of churchbells. “For you mon cher, there’s no right time of day.”

(The Channel chuckles, unsettling ships, as Dover reclines in her cloud of talc and giggles like a tickled bluebird.)

London utters a swearword. “You don’t like me, do you?”

“You’re not fit to lick my shoe.” Paris scowls, adjusting the Eiffel Tower until it sits slap-bang in the middle of her head like a crown.

“What hard work you are!” London howls, slamming a fist into the Serpentine.

Calais shrugs his trees, bored. “Mon dieu – get a room.”