She looked down and spoke to the table. ‘I was working. I got a lot done.’ Then she met my eyes. ‘And I did wonder what it would be like to be away from him. I wanted to remember what it was like to be on my own.’

‘What was it like?’

‘Strange. Though that might have been the particular circumstances. But thank you for letting me stay there. Here, I’ve got the keys for you.’

‘You’re welcome. I wish you could go back there again.’

She grinned. ‘Well. I’m not sure I’m in such a big hurry to go back.’

‘Did you see our friends from the pub again?’

‘No. I stayed right away.’

‘Did you go to the discount retail park?’

‘Eventually, actually, I did,’ she said.

‘Sorry to hear that. I’ll miss the place though. The town, not the retail park. Some nice things happened there as well as the awful ones.’

‘Um, yeah.’ She folded her arms across her chest.

‘Amy and I’ll have to go back soon to start to pack the place up.’

‘Have you got a new place sorted?’

‘Yes. But it’s too boring to talk about. Something in the pipeline. Literally in the pipeline. A pied-à-terre in the sewers.’

‘Underground is the new above ground,’ she said.

‘Exactly. Perpetual darkness is the new sunlight.’

She unfolded her arms and spread her fingers across the table and looked at them.

‘Do you still want me as a witness at the wedding?’ I asked. ‘The man who wants to split you up?’

‘You don’t want to, do you?’

I looked at her and didn’t say anything.

‘Not as a witness,’ she said. ‘That was Andrew being silly. But you’re still welcome. Do you want to come?’

‘Andrew wants me to come?’

‘Yes. If we’re going to be friends.’

‘If? I’d like to be.’

‘I didn’t know if you’d… Oh, let’s not be too dull.’

‘No.’

‘You could come with Sophie. She’s decided her diary permits her attendance.’

‘Maybe.’

‘Aren’t you…?’

‘We were never really…’

‘Really what?’

‘Serious.’ This sounded untrue, suddenly.

‘Are you ever serious?’

I reached over and put my hands over hers. ‘Of course I’m serious.’ The couple eating pie and chips at the next table looked up at us. I let go of her hands and focused on her face, though I wanted to turn away from what she was seeing about me.

‘It would be easier sometimes to take you seriously if you said what you mean and stopped joking about everything. You’re difficult to work out.’

‘Well, how about this? I don’t like your fiancé. Don’t marry him.’

Emily put her hands under the table. ‘I’m going to marry him.’

‘I know you are.’

‘Oh, Paul…’

‘So let’s not be serious.’