Grace took a breath and then forced a smile. ‘Nina told me about, you know, this,’ she said, opening a hand in my direction. ‘I hadn’t realised it was this bad. Are you okay? I mean I know you’re not okay but—’

‘I am okay,’ I said.

‘You’re not,’ she said. ‘Nina and Seb have both said they’ll have you for as long as you need.’

‘As long as I need? For what?’

‘To get yourself together.’

‘I am together, Mabe. I am together.’

‘Then what’s all this about?’ She dropped her voice to a whisper as a pair of plastic menus were brought to us.

‘Thanks, Udhey,’ I said. He smiled sadly before shuffling away again.

‘Well?’ she said.

‘Well, what?’

‘You’re a highly qualified, intelligent man. You owe it to yourself to do more than this.’

‘I am doing something,’ I said, picking up the menu.

She forced it down with the palm of her hand and looked into my eyes.

‘I know that with Rory …’

I held up a hand to stop her.

‘Okay. I’m sorry, Xander. I know you’re mourning him still and I know it’s going to take time for you to find your way out. But this isn’t the way.’

I traced circles in the menu with my thumb before looking up. ‘But you know the way, I’m guessing.’

She sighed and straightened in her seat. ‘There are a thousand ways to the truth, Xander.’

‘Truth? You think his death had truth? Do you think it was just? That it had its own morality somewhere? Really?’

‘Well, whatever this is,’ she said, ‘it’s not moral.’

The words stung. They always stung when she said them.

‘What? What am I doing that’s immoral?’

‘This! The begging, Xander! You have everything going for you. Some people don’t. Some people are reduced to this because of circumstance. What’s your excuse?’

‘I don’t need an excuse, Grace. It’s called free will,’ I say. ‘You would have understood that a year ago. Before you changed.’

She humphed. The sound and smell of the cooking together squeezed my stomach a little.

‘You tell me what’s so good about your life. If you had twenty-four hours to live, would you spend ten of them working? No, you wouldn’t. You’d be here. You’d be out. Living.’

She sighed then and looked at me, resigned.

‘Let’s just order,’ she said.

When the bill came, I instinctively reached for my back pocket and then stopped in embarrassment. Grace pretended not to see and left a twenty-pound note, telling Udhey to keep the change.

‘You know there are still all those dollars,’ I said. ‘They’re at Seb’s so – just take them when you want.’

‘Yes, he told me. I still can’t believe you took it all out in cash!’