In a husky voice, he said, ‘I met Harlie when I was twenty-five. She was twenty-four. First night I met her, that was it, I was done.’ To my relief, he was picking up confidence. ‘She was my dream girl. Gorgeous, a great laugh, great dancer, hard worker, ambitious. Like me, she was into her fashion, her fitness. We both wanted kids, two, but not for a few years.’

‘Her drinking?’ I prompted.

‘Like, she drank. But so did everyone. Five years ago, weekends were party central—everyone got messy. Monday to Friday though, I’d go to the gym, eat clean, focus on work. I was living with my ma, and Harlie was at home with her pair. Once or twice a week she’d come over and stay. She’d always arrive with her quarter-bottle of vodka but, you know…I thought it was one night a week, not every night. Like, not a problem.

‘So we got married two and a half years ago, and bought a house. Suddenly we had a mortgage so we were on a budget, we didn’t have the same money for going out on the lash, but it was grand. Me and Harlie were together, we had our new home. I was training in the Drill, a Korean fitness model—we were hoping to buy the Irish franchise and set up on our own. We were buzzing, really excited, like, we had a plan. Except Harlie kept buying vodka—’

‘—I didn’t keep buying—’

‘But you did.’ He sounded so forlorn that it silenced her. ‘At the start, money was my worry. But…I don’t drink vodka. So the two of us were knocking around the house on a weeknight, ironing our work clothes or whatever, Harlie drinking vodka and me on the Kinetica Recovery. It was weird. Drinking is for when you go out. But I kept making excuses for her. She said her job was stressy, she needed to relax—’

‘It was stressy and at least I’m not addicted to the gym, like you.’

‘My job was stressy too—’

‘Caleb, you’re not the one in rehab,’ I said. ‘You don’t need to explain yourself.’

‘Oh, okay. Thanks.’ He looked heartbreakingly young and grateful. ‘So. Harlie got drunk. A lot. Often by bedtime she was out of it, like slurring her words and making no sense—after an evening of watching The Sinner and eating turkey stir-fry, you know? Like, it didn’t fit. So I helped her get a new job, one with less pressure.

‘But nothing changed, except the quarter-bottles became half-bottles, became full bottles. Then there were two on the go every evening, the “official” one in the fridge, the “secret” one under the sink. Even when I showed her that I knew, it didn’t stop her.’

This was a familiar story but still horribly sad.