‘Let’s,’ I agreed, my desire to avoid John from Good Luck outweighed by my desire to get tipsy enough not to worry about my mum having a wardrobe malfunction. The delicate straps of her dress were doing work they were not built for.

Adrian leaned against the bar with a knowing smile on his face while we waited for John to finish rummaging with bottles at the back of the bar.

‘OK, I’ve waited long enough, out with it.’ Adrian reached across the bar and plucked a maraschino cherry from a little black pot while John’s back was turned. ‘What did you text back to Patrick?’

He popped the cherry in his mouth in one, gurning like a madman while he attempted to knot the stalk with his tongue.

‘There’s literally nothing sexy about that, you know,’ I told him. ‘You look like you’re having a seizure.’

‘You’d be amazed at how many times this has worked,’ he replied right as his eyes bugged out of his head and he coughed up the stalk, spitting it elegantly onto the lawn. ‘Answer the question. What’s going on?’

‘Sumi told you?’

‘Sumi told me,’ he confirmed. ‘No judgement.’

A likely story.

‘Maybe I didn’t text him,’ I said with an unconvincing shrug.

Adrian brayed with laughter.

‘Fine, yes, I messaged him back,’ I said, coiling my hair into a high ponytail to get it off my sticky neck. ‘But don’t look at me like that, it’s not that weird. Lots of people are friends with their exes.’

‘Oh, I see,’ Ade replied, nodding. ‘You want to be friends with Twat-Faced Wank Chops. OK, sure, definitely, that’s your plan, is it?’

‘Maybe,’ I shrugged. ‘Maybe not. It actually makes sense to me. Why waste my time, my incredibly valuable time, on dates with complete strangers who are most likely going to turn out to be utterly shit, when I could dig into my contacts and see if there’s anyone worth a second chance?’

Adrian shook his head, refusing to play along. ‘Ros, your contacts are where dates go to die. You only keep your exes’ numbers so you know not to answer when they call.’

‘Speak for yourself. I can think of a couple of people I went out with once or twice but the timing wasn’t right. Including Twat-fac— including Patrick,’ I said, beginning to feel flustered. ‘What if I messed up something good with him when I left? And why not skip all that awful getting-to-know-you stuff and pick up where I left off with someone who’s already seen me naked?’

I gave my head an aggressive toss to make my point and caught a passing pensioner in the eye with my ponytail. ‘Oh, Christ, I’m sorry. Are you OK?’

‘I just had my cataracts done!’ he wailed as I grabbed a handful of napkins off the bar. Behind me, I heard a muted chuckle.