Peter did not reply. I was struggling to judge his mood. The air was cold, and I gripped his arm. Even in heels I barely reached his chin.

“Silly shoes.” I pointed at my toes.

“Pretty.”

“Christian.”

“You naughty thing.” But he didn’t want my hag routine. Instead he ran a hand through his hair and sighed and I was possessed by a memory of Peter turning to me at our infant school thirty years earlier and whispering, “Your Ws are like wobbly bottoms, Andy. Like bums. Fat wobbly bums. Mine are much better. See.”

I scavenged a cigarette from a young man with glistening eyes standing among a group of smokers by the River Doors. A pale bridesmaid in light blue chiffon hung from his arm as he cupped his hands to offer me a light. I walked back to offer it to Peter.

“Shares?”

“Of course.”

We took another turn of the gardens. The young man was watching us. I handed Peter the fag. He inhaled and then made a face. “I think we should get very drunk together.”

“Really, Peter?”

“Oh absolutely. Don’t you think so?” There was a note in his voice. If I hadn’t known better, I would have said it was need. And I suppose I heard in it another kind of offer, one I wanted to grab with both hands: Get wasted with me, get happy with me, like old times … So I replied quickly that of course I thought we should. Even though I’d already had more than enough, even though there are compelling reasons why I shouldn’t drink at all.

When he was a child, Peter’s parents told him there was an angel writing down everything he did in a book. There were two columns, one for the good things and one for the bad things. When I first knew him, when I was the rough kid with a kitchen-scissors haircut, hunched over my free school dinner, knife and fork clutched in my fists, there was a sort of physical stutter to Peter, like he couldn’t ever trust an instinct, not even to get out of the way of a ball hurled at his face, without checking in first with his angel. I don’t know if that was what marked him out. I would have been the more obvious target—no dad, jumble-sale clothes, mum off her hinges—but then my teeth and claws were sharper.

Back inside we fetched drinks and went to stand in a corner with a good view of the crowd. I watched Peter as his eyes moved over the guests and wondered if the angel was still there, invisibly keeping track of accounts. I showed Peter the keycard to my room.

“Why not a taxi?”