‘I was hoping you might have some sort of wise counsel. I can say “bloody hell” myself.’

‘All right. So, let me get this straight. She turns up, plonks herself down on a garden bench, and tells you she’s made a terrible mistake and wants to start things up again?’

‘Pretty much, yeah.’

‘And? Were you tempted?’

I shake my head. ‘Not even a bit.’

‘God, poor Alice. What a nightmare.’

‘Yeah.’

‘What d’you think brought it on?’

‘Oh God, loads of things. Well, she started off just casually saying she’d been thinking that maybe she hadn’t been fair.’

Mel gives a thoughtful nod. ‘Reasonable point.’

‘She wanted us to go out for dinner. All I could think was that I had a shitload of coursework to do before Monday morning, and Rob had cooked a meal for everyone and I didn’t want to be rude to a mate.’

‘Romance isn’t dead then,’ says Mel, drily.

‘Look I didn’t plan any of this. Anyway she insisted we go out the next day and said she’d pay. Then we had dinner and talked.’

‘How did it go?’

I shrug. ‘Not great. I mean for one thing, when she said she’d pay, she clearly didn’t actually expect me to go through with that. We had a bit of a silent standoff when the bill arrived.’

‘What did you do?’ Mel asks.

‘I paid.’

‘Alex, you’ve got sod-all money. I bet it wasn’t Pizza Hut either.’

Alice always did have expensive tastes. A bottle of red and two courses in the Grapevine in Holland Park cost me the best part of two weeks’ food budget.

‘I felt like it was the least I could do,’ I say.

‘She turned up on your doorstep.’

‘Yeah, I know, but . . .’

‘So what did she say? I bet she hates the beard, right?’

I laugh. ‘She did make a comment, yeah.’

‘And I’m guessing she’s still not over the whole lawyer to nurse thing?’

I shake my head. ‘Nope. I mean, she knew it was coming. It’s not like I went to work one day with a briefcase and wearing a suit and turned up the next morning dressed in scrubs and carrying a thermometer. Anyway,’ I say, fiddling with the edge of my plate, ‘She came back, said she missed me, said we could make a go of things.’

Mel makes a dubious noise.

‘I didn’t want to make her feel bad.’

‘Oh my God, so you decided to just flannel her with a load of “it’s not you it’s me” bullshit?’

‘No.’ God, sometimes talking to my sister is painful. She’s hit the mark.

‘Anyway, she went back home to her parents’ place that night. She wanted to go for a walk the next day, so we did. I talked about work, and she tried to understand what I loved about it.’