“Mine are as well,” she said. “I think they want me to come home too, but they aren’t saying. The trip to Cornwall would be too long, anyway. And Bristol is just as bad. You’re right.”

This confirmation made me feel a bit better. I hadn’t just been making things up.

“What are you doing tonight?” I asked her.

“I thought I’d stay in and work on this German essay. And then I really need to put in a few hours of cello practice. I was in terrible shape this morning.”

“Or,” I said, “we could go out. To . . . a pub. With Jerome.”

Jazza chewed a strand of hair for a moment.

“To a pub? With Jerome?”

“He just asked me to ask you.”

“Jerome asked you to ask me to go to a pub?”

“He said it was my job to convince you,” I explained.

Jazza spun around in her chair and smiled broadly.

“I knew it,” she said.

Jazza and Jerome, I supposed, had had an ongoing flirtation, and now they had me to bring their love to life. If that was going to be my role, it was better if I accepted it. Or, at least, looked fake cheerful about it.

“So,” I said. “You and Jerome? What’s the story?”

Jazza cocked her head to the side in a decidedly birdlike fashion.

“No,” she said, laughing. “Don’t be disgusting. Me and Jerome? I mean . . . I love Jerome, but we’re friends. No. He’s asking you out.”

“He’s asking me out by asking me to ask you?”

“Correct,” she said.

“Wouldn’t it have been easier just to ask me?”

“You don’t know Jerome,” Jazza said. “He doesn’t do things the easy way.”

My spirits perked right up again.

“So,” I said, “do you want to go, or . . .”

“Well, I should,” she said. “Because if I don’t, he might get nervous and not go. He needs me there for support.”

“This is complicated,” I said. “Are all English people like you guys?”

“No,” she said. “Oh, I knew it! This is perfect.”

I loved the way she said perfect. Pahh-fect. It was pahhfect.