‘Shame on you. Five,’ his hand slipped warmly over hers, ‘don’t be ashamed to talk about what’s happened to you.’ She pulled a face and he smiled because he knew it was a hard one for her.

‘I was Five,’ she pointed out mulishly, deflecting.

‘You have to take this seriously, Pax.’

‘I am taking it seriously!’

‘Take Six and Seven then.’ He let go of her hand and put his up in mock surrender.

‘Six,’ she thought about it for a long time, ‘ask each other’s advice.’

She waited for a quickfire comeback. When he didn’t say anything, she removed her glasses, pulled her slouch hat down over her face and then put then on again, a move guaranteed to reduce Kes to prolonged giggling hysterics. ‘Tell me, Luca, does this suit me?’

‘You’re still not taking it seriously,’ he sighed.

‘I am.’ She kept the hat and glasses on, voice muffled. ‘I’m asking your advice.’

He didn’t answer, and she suddenly started to panic that he’d walked out in a huff, leaving her at a pub table with glasses over a woolly face mask.

She was about to reach up and snatch it off when she felt his fingers brush her neck as he removed them, her hair tumbling everywhere. ‘That suits you. You’re beautiful, you know that?’

He studied her face, red tendrils everywhere like medusa.

‘So are you… Seven: point out each other’s strengths.’

‘Eight. Ah yes, Eight.’ He sat back, rubbing his mouth. ‘In AA that’s the one where we list all the people we’ve hurt, harmed or wronged through our drinking.’

‘And Nine is tracking them down to tell them we’re sorry, yes?’

‘Up to you. Start with someone you love and trust, maybe, and work out from there.’

She picked up her glass, watched the bubbles rise, looked at him over it. ‘I’m sorry, Luca. I was hell when we met. I passed out on you, threw up on you and DT-ed alongside you. I hated you for seeing me like that.’

‘It was one of the most amazing nights of my life.’ He held her eye again. On and on. Then he smiled, the big sugar-rush smile that started in his eyes and burst out across his face. ‘Ten: forgive yourself and love yourself, because no matter how many times you hear it, you have to be able to believe it, Pax. Keeping things bottled up shatters self-esteem.’

‘That’s Ten and Eleven, surely?’ She looked away uncomfortably.

Her phone buzzed on the table. He stretched across to mute it and turn it over. ‘No distractions.’ His hand had been inching towards hers on the sofa back, now the warm tips of his fingers ran to and fro across her nails. ‘You know, I don’t know anything about your marriage to Mack: how you met, how you got wed, what went wrong.’

Her anxiety spiked instantly, making it hard to breathe. She tried to mask, watching his fingers, hypnotised by the rings on them. ‘You don’t really want to know about it, do you?’