‘Things haven’t been good for a while, probably the last couple of years? We kept having the same old arguments. Suz was always on at me for staying out late after work and drinking too much when we were out. It got to the stage where I didn’t really want to be around her because she was just nagging. Then one day she told me she wanted me to leave. She got an estate agent round, put the house on the market and that was that.’

‘Where are you living?’ I ask.

‘In a flatshare,’ he says with a hollow laugh. ‘I share with two other guys from my office, in a flat in Wapping.’

‘Why didn’t you tell us?’ asks Joel. ‘We would have understood.’

Douglas pushes the hair out of his face in an attempt to tame it.

‘It’s embarrassing, having your wife leave you. Having to tell everyone that it’s all your fault.’

‘People break up all the time,’ I say. ‘Nearly half of all marriages end in divorce.’

‘But I love Suz, I really do. I just didn’t realise until she made me leave.’

‘And there’s no hope that you can work things out? Have you told her how you feel?’

‘So many times, but she says it’s too little, too late.’

I rub at his arm, wishing it would somehow take away his pain.

‘How’s Isla taking it all?’

‘Oh,’ says Douglas, taking a sip of his drink, ‘here’s the real kicker: I’m not allowed to see her. Suz says she can’t trust me with my drinking.’

Joel looks up in surprise.

‘Surely she can’t stop you seeing her, you’re her dad.’

‘Yes, she can. It’s with the courts now and according to my solicitor the next time I see Isla it’ll probably be under supervised conditions.’

I shake my head. What a mess.

‘So, you see, Joel, when you’re there shouting at me about how I almost flushed my life down the toilet you really had no idea, because all I could think about this morning sat in that tiny cell was how if I got charged I might not be able to see Isla again. It would have been exactly what Suz needed for the court documents for her to get sole custody.’

Joel’s jaw hardens and I’m wondering if another lecture’s brewing.

‘So, what are you going to do about it?’ he says instead in a calm voice.

‘What do you mean, what am I going to do about it? I’m going to forget it ever happened.’