Mel Ashton - hardworking and responsible - is tired of her image. Bored with her flat and exasperated by her job, Mel is thinking about making a few changes to her life. The only thing she's not planning to quit is her relationship with David. The trouble is that David - a talented artist - likes Mel just the way she is. He likes her rational approach to life. He is impressed by her ambition, and her calm presence provides the perfect antidote to his unstable intensity. With Mel, David is finally growing up - and he's even growing out of his adolescent obsession with women called Laura. Ten years ago David met an artists' model called Laura. But, intimidated by her beauty, he never approached her...and an obsession was born. A whole string of Lauras followed, and his perfect women was always a Laura until he met Mel. But Mel is changing. And when Edmund, David's elder brother, recommends David to his friend Joss, who wants a portrait painted of his new wife, David's relationship with Mel becomes more precarious than either of them could have imagined. For Joss's wife is the original Laura...