IT WAS IN the hurly burl of someone else’s wedding that Lauren (played by Nicole Schaeffer) had her ‘aha!’ moment about the idea of not having children. This is the central core to Lauren, the ninth episode in the Ink Jockey podcast series The End of the Line, directed by Mark Heywood.

It’s a cynical piece which trots out the hackneyed feminist values about a guy wanting a woman to raise their children for them, and a dad keenly anticipating buying a wedding suit for his daughter’s big day, but one which also takes a rather bitter and vulnerable stab at convention.

Would the wedding guest with her alarming confession really want to trade lives with Lauren, as she says, honeying her words smarmily? Is electing not to breed selfish? Lauren says she’s never dated someone who makes her think she would be a good mom, which oddly plays into the platitude she is kicking and pricking at. She’s also deeply affected by the pity parties of the married and the child-ridden who tell her to ‘hang in there’.

“Lauren” is deeply defensive and contradictory in many ways. It’s a tale of f*ck you money that enables a married woman to hold onto her sense of self. Lauren wants to hold onto being Lauren, whatever it takes. But if a convincing “Dick” comes along, well then

• Lauren is a story conceived by Nicole Schaeffer and Mark Heywood. Written and directed by Mark Heywood and features technical input by Hetty Hodgson. With music by Daisy Chute and Cerian of the Heard Collective, it is performed by Nicole Schaeffer and it is the ninth in a series of podcasts produced by Ink Jockey collectively called The End of the Line.