“Nothing. Let’s meet up at the top of the road, like you said, unless it’s lashing rain. Then we’ll go for Number Sixteen; the lads won’t be out if the weather’s awful. Yeah?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Rosie. Look at me. Are you feeling guilty about this?”

One corner of her mouth twisted wryly. “I am in my arse. It’s not like we’re doing it just for the laugh; if my da hadn’t acted like such a bleeding muppet about the whole thing, we’d never have thought of this. Why? Are you?”

“Not a chance. Kevin and Jackie are the only ones who’ll miss me, I’ll send them something nice out of my first wages, they’ll be delighted. Are you going to miss your family, is that it? Or the girls?”

She thought about that for a moment. “The girls, yeah, I am. And my family, a bit. But, sure . . . I’ve known for ages that I’d be moving out soon enough. Before we even left school me and Imelda were talking about maybe heading to London ourselves, up until . . .” A fleeting, sideways grin to me. “Up until you and me came up with a better plan. Whatever happened, I’d say sooner or later I’d have been gone. Wouldn’t you?”

She knew better than to ask whether I’d miss my family. “Yeah,” I said—I wasn’t sure whether it was true or not, but it was what both of us needed to hear. “I’d have been out of here, one way or another. I like this way a lot, though.”

That flicker of smile again, still not a whole one. “Same here.”

I asked, “Then what’s up? Ever since you sat down, you’ve been acting like that seat’s itching the arse off you.”

That got Rosie’s full attention. “Look who’s talking. You’re a laugh a minute tonight, so you are, it’s like going out with Oscar the bleedin’ Grouch—”

“I’m up to ninety because you’re up to ninety. I thought you’d be over the moon about the tickets, and instead—”

“Bollix. You got here like that. You were only dying for a chance to punch the head off that pathetic eejit—”

“And so did you. Are you having second thoughts? Is that what this is about?”

“If you’re trying to break it off with me, Francis Mackey, you act like a man and do it yourself. Don’t you try to make me do your dirty work.”

We glared at each other for a second, balanced on the edge of a flat-out row. Then Rosie let out her breath, slumped back on the bench and pushed her hands through her hair. She said, “I’ll tell you what it is, Francis. The pair of us are nervous because we’re after getting above ourselves.”

I said, “Speak for yourself.”