Oh my God – that moment. If I could have bottled it, I’d have showered in it for the rest of my life. Goosebumps raked my body like a violent storm. ‘Flying Without Wings’ was playing inside my head and Westlife were about to get up off their stools for the big finish. I glowed from the inside out.

‘You were talking to my nephew.’

‘Oh, I thought he was your son,’ I said, gesturing to the boy. ‘I had some shells and he was admiring them. I wasn’t hurting him.’

He looked back at the boy who was dispensing the shells around his gaggle of friends. Then back to me. ‘I didn’t think you were hurting him.’

‘Well, felicidades on your wedding,’ I said, nodding towards the party.

He frowned, big eyes shining in the fairy lights around the railings. ‘It’s not mine. It’s my sister’s.’

‘Your sister?’ I said, stupidly relieved. ‘The bride, with the blonde hair?’

‘My sister Olivia, yeah.’

‘Oh right.’ Another of my world-famous boo-boos. Fun Times at Guantánamo was his sister. Who he was most definitely not having sex with, so my jealousy was entirely misplaced. ‘Well, I have to go. Sorry for… sorry.’

‘I thought I might see you before now.’ He stepped closer.

‘Huh?’

‘Sal gave you my note?’

‘Yeah,’ I said, scratching a new mozzie bite on my wrist, recalling the day I’d screwed up said note and chucked it. ‘I didn’t think you were serious.’

‘It was just hanging out, no biggy. It’s cool if there’s another guy or—’

‘There’s no other guy. I wanted to see you too.’

‘I thought about you yesterday at the supermarket. There was this dude getting his blood pressure checked and he had this cough that was driving me crazy. And I kept thinking—’

‘—just fucking die already?’

He stared. I knew that look. It was the same one everyone gave me when I’d crossed the line. But the most astonishing thing was that he didn’t berate me or walk away or gasp like most people do. He laughed.

‘You took the words right out of my mouth.’

We were laughing then. And adding more irritants to our imaginary kill lists – the guy yanking his dog’s lead when it was trying to sniff a trash can, tourists who wore sombreros, tourists who are surprised that Mexican food tastes better than the shit they’ve always eaten back home, and tourists who slam their tequila. He had it in for tourists in particular.

‘You wanna go grab a bite somewhere?’

‘Don’t you have a wedding to get back to?’

He looked back at the terrace where ‘Despacito’ had kicked in and every single couple was up slow dancing. ‘They won’t miss me. Come on.’