Noise. Chatter. Fucking laughter. I didn’t need to hear it, and I didn’t need to be there. I was nursing a beer. The once cold beverage of choice was now warm after my hands evaporated the beads of condensation around the glass. I wondered if I could be poisoned from a beer that had hit room temperature thirty minutes ago. Maybe if it made my guts roll, it would delay the journey home by another hour.

‘Mate! What the hell? In here again?’ A firm grasp on my shoulder made me jump. ‘Don’t you have a home to go to?’

‘Funny. How’s your life? Obviously not great or you wouldn’t be in here either.’ I eyed him from behind my shoulder and gave him a wry smile.

‘You know me too well,’ Mark laughed as he pulled a bar stool over, clanking me on the knee.

‘Fuck me. I was fine until you rolled in,’ I said, circling my palm to reduce the sting. Mark was gigantic. A man-mountain rugby stereotype. His trademarks were cauliflower ears and a wonky nose moulded by a sharp elbow on the field. He normally wore a rugby shirt and jeans, and you could hear him before you saw him. Loud didn’t cover it. We met fourteen years ago when we both started uni, unsure and fucking terrified to be sitting amongst a plethora of confident women and very few men on a social work degree course. He took the loud, obnoxious route, and I took the isn’t he sweet and adorable? route. I quickly realised that women loved a shy but funny guy, and before long, I was batting them off with my Social Work Theory and Methods textbook.

‘I’m hiding in here for a few hours. Big deal.’ He shrugged his huge fucking shoulders.

‘I guessed you were hiding.’ I shook my head beratingly. ‘How is your lovely wife?’

‘Fucked if I know. No one told me I’d need to be a mind reader when I said I do.’

‘Isn’t that in the vows? I promise to love, cherish and learn to read your mind so I know when the fuck to stay away,’ I laughed as we both sat staring into our beers.

‘What the hell am I going to do without you?’ His tone conveyed seriousness through all of the male sarcasm.

‘You’ve managed before.’

I’d moved from London after graduating. The lure of a golden handshake where I secured a couple of grand in my wages before I’d even done a day’s work had totally done it for me. Before I knew it, I was getting on a train to Nottingham, saying goodbye to my mother, my home, my friends, and, essentially, my life. I’d tumbled off the train at the other end with a suitcase that contained two pairs of jeans, three t-shirts and a white dress shirt. Slipped in my pocket was a printout with directions to the flat I was renting in a neighbourhood I was afraid to walk around after dark and on the same street as many of my first-time clients.

‘That was different. I had things to occupy me. I was happy. I wasn’t sitting in a pub every night after work delaying going home because I was pretty fucking miserable. Who the hell am I going to sit with now?’ Mark said.

‘Bastard. You only need me as a distraction. Go home and face the music.’

‘I can’t, mate. Bea stuck the remote control down the toilet this morning and she was going ballistic. I have no idea what mood I’m walking into.’ Mark’s daughter, Bea, was a firecracker. She took after his wife.

‘How do you know all of this? You were in a case conference all morning.’

‘Texts. All fucking day. Just because she couldn’t change the TV channel to Loose Women when Bea went for a nap after lunch. Add teleportation to the long list of marriage requirements,’ Mark said, shaking his head.

Forget warm beer. I needed cold vodka to take off the chill of the realisation that marriage really did seem to fuck with people’s heads. Mark had met his wife at uni, but they only got together two years ago after he got her knocked up quicker than you can say, ’Have you heard of these amazing things called condoms?’ His bouncing baby girl, destined for a life of being spoilt rotten, was almost a year old and already walking. In the words of Miley Cyrus, she was like a wrecking ball.

‘So, I can’t believe I’m saying this again. How long before you leave London?’ Mark asked.

‘I go back to Nottingham in two weeks. I need to finalise stuff with the flat. Set up rent, get a car, all the boring stuff. On my first day, I’m meeting with the bloke I’m taking over from. He’s going to show me the ropes. Then I’ll either stay there or come back to sort things here. Depends how things are.’

‘Yeah, of course. It’s a big step. Take it all a bit at a time.’

‘That’s the plan.’ I didn’t tell him I was counting down the days to get away. Breathing space and time were calling me to them every night when I closed my eyes to sleep and every morning when I woke up to exactly the same feelings—guilt, loss and regret. Every day. Over and over until I was numb.

‘How are you feeling about going back?’ Marked asked as he winked weirdly at the girl behind the bar. She folded her arms sulkily. He ignored the brush off and asked for a bag of pork scratchings. I was going to miss this tit.

‘I’m shitting it,’ I lied. I couldn’t have been more pleased about starting again, giving my life a second try. ‘I’m worried they’re going to take one look at my gormless face and realise I have no idea what the fuck I’m doing.’

That was the truth. I was still pinching myself at the thought that I was going to be a manager of a child protection team. I’d received the call offering me the job as I walked through a block of flats on my way to a home visit. I stopped mid stride and whooped loudly with my fists pounding the air. As I continued walking, I stopped again and felt a ripple of what the actual fuck? Similar moments had occurred at least once a day ever since.

‘Bullshit. You can do the job standing on your head while riding a surfboard,’ Mark laughed. ‘Seriously, though, have you thought about her? It’s likely she’s still in Nottingham.’

He had to ask. I’d thought about nothing else. She dominated every thought, every decision, every minute. ‘I’ve never stopped,’ I replied without wasting a second to think about it. ‘I can only say that to you.’ And that was the most honest statement I’d made in years.

‘Fuck.’

‘Maybe that’s why I took the job,’ I replied, the alcohol now encouraging complete honesty.

‘Fuck.’

‘Is that all you’ve got for me?’ I rested my fingers on either side of my head as I felt the stirrings of pain. Migraines had plagued me since my teenage years; stress and anxiety encouraged them, and I had to wonder what the fuck I was doing taking a job in social work management.

‘Are you sure you’re doing this for the right reasons?’

‘What are the right reasons?’ I quizzed.

‘I don’t know. Career development? A new start after a shitty year?’

‘Those reasons are certainly up there,’ I replied, rubbing my hand across the top of my head. ‘I can’t stay here. I don’t want to wake up in ten years’ time and feel like everything has passed me by before I’ve even lived. I just need to let go, be challenged again, have a different focus. I can’t do pain anymore. Or sadness, sorrow or regrets. It’s eating me alive.’ I clocked a slight unease in the corner of his eyes, so I changed direction. ‘Basically, I don’t want to end up as fucking miserable as you.’

Mark knew. He understood the tone. He got the meaning, and because of that, we laughed loudly without restraint and ordered another beer.