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suspect people thought he was good for me, that’s what my mother said, and I resented that—I’d point out that, in spite of appearances, he was the one who had sought me out, who wanted to sit next to me in class, who waited to walk home with me. I’d been there for him when he failed his French O-levels, when he got dumped by the cricket first XI, when he first smoked, drank, snogged. I’d been best man at his wedding to Lisa, and I’d arranged a very nice stag night in a Greek restaurant, and given at the reception a speech that made everybody laugh. And I tried to be there for Max when Ian died. We’d meet up at the pub, at first it was just like the good old days! And I’d get in a round. How was he feeling? “Not so good, matey,” he’d say, and stare into the bottom of his pint. “Not so good.”
    We drifted apart. And I’m sorry. I would have been a good friend if he had wanted me to be. But he didn’t want me to be.
    Max and Lisa sold their house and moved up north. We exchanged Christmas cards for a couple of years. In the last one, Max told me they were moving again, this time overseas. He promised he would write to me with his new address. He didn’t.
    One evening I was at home reading in my study when there was a phone call. “Hello? Is that you, John?” The number was withheld, and so I’m afraid I gave a rather stiff affirmation. “It’s Max. You remember, your old friend Max? Don’t you recognize me?”
    And I did recognize him then, of course; he sounded like the old Max, the one who’d call me every evening and ask for help with his homework, the one who always had a trace of laughter in his voice.
    He told me he was down in the city for a ‘work thing,’ and the firm had given him a hotel for the night. “Would you like to meet up on Thursday?” he said. “We could go to the pub. No problem if it’s too short notice. But we could go to the pub.”
    It was rather short notice, to be fair, but I didn’t want to let Max down.
    The pub was heaving with businessmen—it was just after the banks had shut, and the pub Max had chosen was right in the financial district. And I felt a sudden stab of discomfort—what if I couldn’t remember what Max looked like? What if I couldn’t tell him apart from all these other smart suits? (What if he couldn’t remember me?) But he’d arrived first, and he was guarding a small table in the corner, and I knew him at once, he really hadn’t changed a bit. He was standing up, and laughing, and gesticulating wildly to catch my attention. No, I was wrong—he
had
changed—a bit, just a bit, actually, as I got closer I could see he’d put on some weight, and his hair was grey. But I’m sure just the same could be said of me, I’m sure that’s true, I’m not as young as I was, though I try to keep myself trim, you know? I stuck out my hand for him to shake, and he laughed at that, he was laughing at everything. And he pulled me into a hug, and that was nice.
    “What are you drinking?” was the first thing he said. “My round, I’ll get the drinks.”
    We stayed rather late that night, and we had a lot of beer, and I suppose we got quite drunk. But that was all right. For a while we had to shout over the crowd to make ourselves heard, and that was a bit awkward, but pretty soon all the bankers began to go home to their wives and left us in peace. He asked me what I was up to these days, and I explained it the best I could, and my answers seemed to delight him and he laughed even more. I asked him how long he would be in England.
    “Oh, we’ve moved back now,” he said. “Mum’s dying, I wanted to be close. Well, not too close. But the same country is good. Back over last year, sorry, should have been in touch.”
    I told him that it didn’t matter, he was home now, he’d found me now—and I expressed some sympathy for his mother, I remember quite liking her, when I went to Max’s house she’d give me biscuits.
    “We’ve got this