“In fact, I wrote to you last night.” Despite my gravity I had to laugh a little, because it sounded silly. “A proper, old-fashioned letter. Well, kind of. I never actually finished it.”

I took the letter out of my pocket and laid it on the tablecloth between us.

Tom raised his eyebrows and smiled.

“Can I read it?”

“I suppose.”

He wiped his hands clean and drew the page from under my fingertips. I resisted at the last moment, before letting it go. Tom’s manner was oddly reverent and careful, as if the paper might turn out to be something valuable—one of his beloved Raphael sketches in the original, perhaps, or a diagram by Leonardo da Vinci. I chewed my lip while he unfolded it and spread it out beside his plate.

“Dear Tom . . .”

“Not out loud!” I covered the letter with both hands.

“Sorry.”

He continued to read in silence and I tried not to watch. I sipped my coffee and scalded my tongue. I squeezed a blob of ketchup onto the rim of my plate, contemplated a group of pensioners walking past the window, scalded my mouth a second time, and finally scraped my chair back.

“I’m going to the loo,” I whispered. “Have my sandwich if you’re still hungry.”

There were two cubicles in the Ladies, and one was already occupied. I locked myself in and stood with my back against the dividing wall, covering my nose against the bleach fumes. The other person flushed and ran the tap and held her hands under the dryer. I didn’t move. My eyes roved over the graffiti on the door, some of it scratched with a blade, most of it in marker pen. There were names, obscenities, doodles—the usual stuff—and the words fly away home in a loose, looping hand, on top of all the rest.

Both plates were empty by the time I returned, and Tom was refolding the letter. Someone had switched the radio off, and the three remaining customers were eating quietly, at separate tables. He gave me a small—puzzled? critical? sad?—smile.

“Did you read it?”

“I did.”

Our voices sounded naked without any background hum, and we drew together across the table.

“You’re right about one thing,” he said.

Only one? “What’s that?”

It was funny, seeing Tom’s face at such close quarters; it felt intimate and unfamiliar at the same time. He had a tiny brown freckle on his left eyelid, which only flashed into view when he blinked, and red dents on his nose where his reading glasses normally sat.

“When you write about wanting to start again,” he said. “Putting the past behind you, handing in your notice at work, writing poetry . . . whatever. I think you should go for it; I think you’ve got every right.”

I narrowed my eyes.

“There’s a but coming, isn’t there?”

Tom didn’t answer immediately. He swirled the remains of his coffee round and watched it slop up the sides of his mug.