‘No, I was coming back tonight anyway,’ he says. ‘My sister just dropped me off.’

‘How was your Christmas? Are your mum and dad all right?’

He swats these questions away impatiently. ‘Never mind all that. What the hell is going on, man? What are we doing here?’

I want to explain, but I’m worried I might start crying again. So instead I find Alice’s message chain and slide my phone across the table.

Harv’s brow gets progressively more furrowed and his eyes progressively more saucer-like as he scrolls down. By the time he reaches the photo-booth kiss picture, he looks like he’s seen several ghosts.

He stares up at me. ‘What the fuck?’

I nod.

‘Alice? Alice-from-uni Alice?’

I nod again.

‘When … when did this happen? How long has it been going on? And what does she mean about Paris? What happened in Paris?’

I opt to take a large gulp of Guinness rather than address any of these questions.

Harv is looking down at my phone again. ‘So Daphne saw all this? The messages, the picture: everything?’

‘Yep.’ I take another swig to try and hold back the lump that’s rising fast in my throat. ‘The phone must have slipped out of my pocket. I tried to explain and apologise, but she just said she wanted me to leave. She said she needed to think. All her family were there too, and the way they looked at me …’ I squeeze the bridge of my nose tightly and feel my voice starting to tremble. ‘I can’t bear the thought that I’ve hurt her. I’ve been such an idiot, Harv.’

‘Mate …’ He exhales and shakes his head. For a few seconds we sit in silence, listening to Shane MacGowan and Kirsty MacColl bicker on the stereo. I feel weirdly grateful to Harv for not judging me – or at least, not judging me out loud. Right now, I’m not sure I could take someone else’s disdain on top of my own.

Finally he says: ‘So, what … are you and Alice, like, a thing?’

‘No! Not at all. I just … I don’t know what I was thinking. I guess all this stuff happened because things between me and Daff have been bad for a while now. Maybe that’s why I arranged to meet Alice in the first place – because I was thinking that Daff would be better off without me.’

Harv scratches his stubble and frowns. ‘Well, that’s pretty fucking patronising.’

‘What? Why?’

‘Because Daphne’s a grown-up, Ben. She’s not some weak, submissive idiot. It’s up to her to decide whether she’s better off without you. It’s not your decision to make. If she’s with you, then it’s because she wants to be with you. Simple as that.’