It had been a long, long, Thursday evening at the European council summit for Theresa May. First she had had to listen to loads of boring speeches about things she wasn’t very interested in and then she had got stuck next to a French bloke who’d insisted on talking to her in French. What was wrong with the EU these days? Back in David Cameron’s time, everyone used to speak in English.

Eventually her frustration had got the better of her and she had turned to the Frenchman to ask why her speech was only number 15 on the agenda.

“Parce qu’il n’y a pas 16 items sur the agenda,” the Frenchman had said, while swigging another tumbler of merlot.

The time passed slowly. Ten o’clock came and went. Eleven o’clock came and went. Midnight came and went. Just after 1am, a steward tapped her on the shoulder to let her know there was a spare five minutes if she had anything she wanted to get off her chest while the few remaining people still awake finished their coffee.

“I’d like to talk to you all about Brexit,” Theresa had begun.

“Parlez à la main,” shouted a lone Belgian, before falling off his chair.

Theresa continued, determined not to be distracted. “I’m here to tell you that Brexit means Brexit and that the UK remains committed to getting whatever deal with the EU we can manage to negotiate once we’ve got some sort of a clue what it is we really want. Merci, danke.”

Silence. Two people staggered off to bed without saying a word; the rest remained asleep in their chairs. The épaule had never seemed so froide.

“I think that went quite well on the whole,” Theresa said later to one of her advisers.

“Er, yes ...” the adviser replied, guardedly. “I suppose you were at least invited to this summit. We only got to hear about the last one in Bratislava after it had finished.”

Things didn’t really pick up that much the following morning. On her way into the meeting, she had heard the European commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, whisper he wasn’t interested in doing Britain any favours and the frosty reception she had got in the room suggested that was a sentiment shared by other EU leaders.

“Can we talk about Brexit?” she begged.

“Non.”

“But I need to be able to tell people back home something. Can I just say we’ve agreed to start preliminary trade deals?”

“Nous will say rien until you invoke article 50.”

“But I won’t know what I want unless we have some discussions before I trigger article 50.”

“Parlez en français,” sniggered Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator.

“Mon français n’est pas très bon.”

“C’est meilleur que votre position de négociation!”

“He is right,” said Juncker. “Besides, nous want to talk about Russia, not vous.”



The meeting ended with Theresa sulking and saying nothing as the Lithuanian president sent her email links to YouTube footage of Russian warships sailing up the English channel.

“It’s time for your press conference,” her adviser reminded her, shortly after 1.30am. “Don’t forget to sound really upbeat and tell everyone this summit has been a huge personal success.”

“This summit has been a huge personal success, and Britain remains a confident, outward-looking and enthusiastic member of Europe,” said a hollow-eyed, flatlining Theresa, sounding diffident and introverted. “We talked a bit about Russia and immigration and I am sure we can make a success of Brexit so long as people stop making it difficult for me. Now, does anyone have any questions?”

Theresa looked up, hoping that just this once no one did. No such luck. Did she really expect 27 countries to listen to us when we’re leaving? Wasn’t the EU out to embarrass us and make things difficult for us? How come she had made such a complete balls-up over the appointment of Dame Lowell Goddard to the child sex abuse inquiry?

“Um ... er ... people really are listening to us,” she said. “They’ve just a funny way of showing it. Now is there anyone from the overseas media here?”

A hand shot up. Theresa fell on it gratefully, relieved to be able to show the whole world that at least one other country was listening to her. The hand turned out to belong to another UK journalist who was usually ignored and was trying to blag a question. There really was no one else out there listening to her after all. Theresa had never felt quite so alone.