‘Anger?’ I repeat, my head feeling hot and heavy. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. All I said was that I didn’t feel like drinking much.’

‘Yes, but you said it in a very aggressive way,’ he says.

‘No I didn’t,’ I say, feeling my chest tighten. ‘I said it in a normal way, maybe even a tired way, but I didn’t say it angrily. You’re the one who’s raising your voice.’

‘You’re doing it again,’ he says, lowering his voice now.

‘Doing what?’

‘Projecting,’ he says, biting his bottom lip. ‘Making out that I’m the one ruining this, that I’m the pissed-off one, when you’ve spent the entire evening with a face like thunder.’

‘Your drinks.’

He looks up at the woman and his face changes in front of me. The dark expression switches to a thousand-kilowatt smile in a matter of seconds.

‘Wonderful,’ he says as the woman places the glasses on the table and pours a small amount of wine in each.

‘And here are the menus,’ she says, handing one to Connor while putting mine down on the table. ‘Our specials are on the board.’

She gestures to a blackboard on the wall to the right of us.

‘Thank you,’ says Connor as the woman walks away.

‘Well,’ he says, lifting his glass. ‘Let’s start again, shall we? Cheers.’

I don’t feel like toasting. I feel like I want to get to the bottom of why he said I was angry, but the truth is I don’t have the energy. I feel hot and tired and still shaken up by the sight of that blood. So I let it go and take a sip of wine.

I open the menu, but my appetite has gone.

‘I think I’ll just have a salad,’ I say, closing it.

‘You need more than that,’ says Connor, craning his neck to look at the board on the far wall. ‘Oh, look, they’ve got Rabo de Toro.’

‘What’s that?’ I ask, dabbing my forehead with a napkin.

‘I shouldn’t say.’

‘Why? What is it?’

‘Well, it’s a classic Spanish dish,’ he says, leaning across and taking my hand. ‘Basically, after the bullfight, tradition has it that the bull is slaughtered and the meat fed to the poor. The tail is full of flavour and goodness, and they remove it immediately and make a stew.’

‘And that’s what’s on the specials board?’ I say, shaking my head. ‘But that’s sick.’

‘It’ll just be oxtail of some sort,’ he says, his eyes still on the menu. ‘As we don’t have bullfighting in this country, they won’t be able to serve up the tail of the freshly slaughtered bull. It’s just their take on it.’

‘It’s still sick,’ I say, the smell of the blood that filled the room earlier lodged in my nostrils.