It was a little harder for us, the three men. Gaston had done his best to start a conversation about hockey, but in the face of our flagrant lack of interest, not to mention our total ignorance, he’d turned his attention to a second beer and fallen into a silence from which it was hard to extract him. Sébastien was visibly delighted to see us all together and went from one of us to another, a gratified child who doesn’t know how to thank his benefactors: he had kisses and cuddles for everyone, and affectionate words, and I really don’t think that the prospect of Christmas presents provided any ulterior motive; he was just glad to have us all within reach and he was letting us know.

Mathieu was rather pale. He kept looking towards his mother and his former wife; I thought I could detect, not regret or nostalgia but a sort of guilt, perhaps at having come between two women who were so fond of each other, unintentionally causing them pain. He told me much later, when we were alone and exchanging our impressions of what had happened, that the deep understanding between Louise and Rose had been one of the only successes in his marriage and that witnessing it again had infuriated him. Just now, though, what I saw in him was very different from fury; instead, it seemed a sort of fatalism mixed with ­resignation.

As for me, I sometimes felt like a spectator at an event that had little to do with me, although it had actually been one of the most decisive days of my life. But I was so worn out from a variety of emotions, of exhausting efforts, of ­contradictory feelings, that I simply withdrew into myself and looked rather coolly at what was taking place in my own house, events that concerned some individuals I’d known for only a very short time. On the one hand my existence was at stake and I had an important choice to make, but on the other hand, it was hard to believe it was all really ­happening. To really take it in, I had to focus on Mathieu, on my great love for him. And then a certain sense of ­reality was restored, I felt a lump of emotion in my throat and I told myself yes, because of Mathieu I can accept it all, I must—the child, the mother-in-law, the ex-wife, the ex-wife’s new boyfriend . . . But the confirmed bachelor in me was rebelling too, and it was time to kick over the traces.

One notion of freedom was disappearing from my life that evening, and I was aware of the sense of vertigo brought on by important choices.

Sébastien fell asleep all at once; he collapsed in his ­mother’s arms after one last tickle, and that brought the evening to an end. Everyone seemed relieved to have found a reason to separate. Gaston offered Rose a lift and they left fairly quickly amid a rustle of winter coats, of new boots, of pecks on the cheek and awkward handshakes.