“Sorry, what were you saying? I was… Wait — a photo. Oooh, I was just… Oh, that’s just lovely. Is that a British… Measure? Beers, eh? I do so enjoy this… Pint. Of beer. That I always have.”

Maybe it’s really hard being David Cameron. Maybe it’s not. Maybe being groomed for the second most important job in the world — I don’t know, maybe third: that Man United gig gets a lot of press —despite having a face made of white pudding brings around its own pressures. It probably does.

Sometimes, I’m sure, David Cameron, fresh with blood, his power-lust sated, looks out the window of his bullet-proof sedan and longs to be out there. “You know, with the proles...” he sighs. An aide whispers that you probably shouldn’t call them that but he’s not listening. He’s wishing. Wishing to be out there with the people and their sausage rolls and their television licenses, their Take Me Out and their Tinder, fantasy football and five-a-side, their shopping on Sundays for screws and new light-bulbs, with their beer. Their beer! He’s seen members of Parliament going through tons of the stuff — good old British metric tons of beer — and they look like they have a great time.

Sometimes, when he’s allowed, he sneaks down to one of the three-dozen bars in the Palace Of Westminster. He’s all soft-footed and sheepish, hugging the wall, the polar opposite from Dinner With The Dignitaries David, with his big chest and performative laugh, his hands red from joshing, from red wine; his big, wide, red face beaming. Here he sinks inwards, like a loaf with too little baking soda. Or baking powder. He musters the courage to quietly order a beer — “A pint, please. Which? Oh, I… Pint. Yes. Thank you. A good British measure.” — and averts his gaze as others try to avoid his. The most powerful man in the country — maybe second, I don’t remember — and they’re all forced to play a merry little dance.

He sidles up to one MP — possibly Kwasi Kwarteng, Member of Parliament for Spelthorne — who is telling a joke to another MP. He laughs along.

“I also…” David butts in, but his bottle has immediately gone. The other two are silent now, looking at him. The silence is thick like butter. They stare into their pints, and words start forming on David’s lips. He’s doing a run-up. “I, too, love to imbibe the amber nectar… When the football is on,” he says.

He’s quietly confident that this exchange has gone well, quietly marks a little tick in the Exchanges That Have Gone Well Today column in his large head. Kwasi laughs politely, makes his excuses and leaves. The other one too, leaves. Gone. David’s on his own now with a pint of beer that he clearly hates. He active resents this pint now, its shape. He doesn’t even like the taste of beer, not like the proles, who were forced into liking it so as to protect them from the barreling death-fog coming out of the mines or whatever.

He makes a quiet promise to practice at home. “Next time I’ll get it right”, he thinks. “Next time I’ll be one of the boys”.