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I cock my head to one side to see her eyes fade a little at disclosing this. ‘Tell me about him.’

‘Oh, he was magnifique…’

I pause to hear her say that word. ‘We met later in life. I guess the universe is funny that way. The timing was strange but sometimes you know in your heart when it makes sense. I was thirty-five, he was forty. He was the most beautiful soul. Also, très bien monté…’

I try and sustain my laughter as this wonderful old lady tells me how well-hung her husband was.

‘What is Charlie’s penis like? Tell me…’ I fear the alcohol may have taken my new friend to a point of indiscretion but I’m not sure I mind too much. I sit back in my comfortable chair re ady to tell her all. ‘Hold on, before you start. Let me get you a brandy. Garcon!’

By the time I finish talking to Henriette in that swanky hotel bar, I am three brandies down.

For her, this hasn’t touched the sides, but for me, I swear you could light me up and put me on a Christmas pudding.

It’s a gorgeously warm drunk feeling, the sort that reminds me a little too much of sangria-soaked rooftops in Seville, but also has helped set me up for an evening of Parisian partying.

Henriette is my new heroine. My favourite part of the evening was when she told me in detail about her husband’s cock.

It was very refined, girthy but quite hirsute. Oh, the images I had in my head.

I reach my room now looking for texts from Lucy.

Maybe now is the time to just have a bath, wrap myself in towels, and see where French television takes me while I wait and get ready for whatever Paris has to offer.

Room 912. I enter the room, seeing my bag and belongings exactly where I left them but someone has been in to switch on the cute tasselled lamps at the bedside, turn down the beds and leave some chocolates on our pillows.

It’s all very sophisticated. I head to the window and gaze out over the city.

I don’t mind this view at all. Paris. The city of lights.

It’s like standing in the middle of a Christmas tree, all lit up, the rows of lights running through the buildings and darkness, like arteries, giving the city life, heart.

And at the very edge, tiny like a small pylon on the periphery, the Eiffel Tower in the distance.

I’m supposed to feel big waves of overwhelming romance now, aren’t I?

But tonight I feel differently. I feel calm, entranced, neither in heaven or hell but just floating above this glorious city.

I turn back to the room and open up my bag.

I smile at the first thing I see. I should have given this back maybe, there was opportunity and chance, but it’s Charlie’s T-shirt.

The one he lent me the first time I met him on those rocks in Mallorca.

I kinda held on to it and possibly packed it subconsciously.

It’s one of those T-shirts that have been through the wash so many times that the cotton is aged and super soft.

You can’t buy T-shirts like this. And it’s become my favourite thing to sleep in.

I can’t tell if that is sweet or desperately sad.

I’ll hold on to the former sentiment. I get out the T-shirt and some toiletries before I notice a text on my phone.

Can you order me some room service? I need a snack before we head out or I’ll drink and just snog random French men.

Anything in particular?

Cheese, bread. Frites? And extra frites?

Done.

I pick up the room service menu, scanning the choices and dial the number on the hotel phone by the bedside.

‘Bonsoir, le service de chambre.’

‘Bonsoir. Je voudrais un croque-monsieur et des frites, s’il vous plait.’

‘Bien s?r, Madame Callaghan.’

I smile. You know the hotel is posh when they say your name and make you feel important. That calls for more frites. ‘Actuellement, beaucoup de frites?’

‘Beaucoup? D’accord, et à boire? Il y a un menu à prix fixe?’

‘Oh, a set menu,’ I blurt out in English, a little merry, forgetting where I am and who I’m speaking to.

‘Sept?’

‘Oui. Un coca.’ The line goes a bit fuzzy.

‘OK, that will be with you in about half the hour,’ the staff member says in broken English.

‘Merci beaucoup.’

I hang up the phone. I look at Charlie’s T-shirt and run a hand over the slightly faded logo.

I think about a time when I first wore this in the summer when the weather was warm and sultry and I had just emerged from the sea, clambering over rocks onto the warm sand.

The temperature has plummeted since then.

An Indian summer in the autumn gave us a touch of warmth but now I’m looking over the banks of the Seine lined with the skeletons of wintry trees, the breeze making them dance in the shadows.

We really are in the belly of winter, people are bundled up in wool coats, shielding themselves from the bitter cold, scarves wrapped around their necks, headed towards the warmth of all that light.

I look out the window again, watching, waiting.

Charlie

‘Bonjour? êtes-vous avec Laurent-Sabra?’ a woman in a suit by reception asks me.

I look around at all the other suited and booted people by the desk.

‘Pour le d?ner?’ she asks. Oh, does she think I’m some corporate bigwig here for a function of sorts?

I look at the other partygoers in the foyer, all older men in suits, and look down at my brown boots and black wool coat wondering how she got that idea.

‘Aah, non. Je suis désolé?’ I reply.

‘Quel dommage…’ she mumbles, and winks at me.

I feel an elbow to my back as Max nudges me sharply.

Look at you, Charlie. The French are flirting with you.

That’s a lovely form-fitting red dress but the fur coat and the fact she’s possibly twenty or so years older than me is completely intimidating.

I don’t think I’ve got the couilles to survive that sort of encounter.

‘Merci. Bonne soirée,’ I say politely, as she sashays away.

I stand there in this gloriously festive foyer, furrowing my brow from the encounter .

‘I think she just made a pass, Monsieur Shaw,’ Max says in hysterics. ‘Go on, have some fun. I won’t mind.’

I like the fact that he’s given me permission but I don’t think I could do that to Max, nor have the energy.

Today, to make up for the fact that his stag do was a bit of a disaster, we took an early Eurostar over to Paris to attend a beer festival.

I’ve liked the fact that Max planned it all, chose this very swanky hotel, and that like our dad, he kept our passports in a Ziploc bag.

A weekend away from responsibilities and work felt very grown-up, to sip our way through tasters of golden French lagers, not watered down at all, and keeping up with our European counterparts, is the ultimate treat.

Paris is like a dream. As Brooke would say, it’s one of those cities that’s pure vibes.

Even in the cold, it’s the density of it, the narrow streets, the unpredictability of what you’ll find on any cobbled street corner.

Will it be a quaint boulangerie, its misted windows filled with delights and baguettes just casually stacked in a basket or will it be a motorist in a retro Renault trying to kill me, swearing profanities into the air?

And it’s just chic, so nonchalant. Even the bollards are more slender, the railings on the windows of every ornate building are more sophisticated, the people are so damn fashionable.

This morning, there was an old lady I met in the lift wearing a velour tracksuit and an LV bum bag.

‘Where to next then?’ Max asks, as we walk through the foyer of this grand hotel that Max has booked for us.

I notice his spine straightens as he walks through here with his shopping bags.

He’s not just come here to get drunk with his big brother but also to splurge on gifts for Amy.

Max is not like me. He’s not travelled much outside of the usual holiday destinations so everything is magical and wondrous to him.

I took him for raclette earlier and I’d never seen someone so blown away by a bit of melted cheese and potatoes.

‘What was that place you were talking about before? To get the steak-frites?’

‘A bouillon?’ I tell him. ‘Or any brasserie really? ’

‘Do we need to get there before they close?’ he asks, his eyes big, possibly a little sozzled.

‘Most of them never close.’ Max’s eyes open in wonder. We’re not in London anymore where our food options after midnight are kebab vans and 24-hour McDonald’s. ‘We have time to dump our bags, recharge?’

‘We could go in the jacuzzi, Charlie!’ Max tells me excitedly as he enters the lift.

‘We could.’

‘I just feel like we’re only here for a night, we should take full advantage.

Pose now…’ he says, holding his phone up to the mirror in the lift as the doors close.

This is also part of the weekend, as Max has said he’ll send pictures of everything to Amy.

I think her photo roll must be full of pictures of me half sipping on pints.

I hope she liked the comedy picture with the baguette.

So like a mug, I do pose now in this lift, not because selfies will ever be my thing but because I can see how incredibly happy Max is to be here, spending time.

With me. It’s a different face to the one I saw on his stag do.

That one looked like it was just trying to have a good time, playing the role of a stag, fear in his eyes about what would happen next.

Here he just looks like happy, excitable Max. The lift doors open.

‘What was the room number again?’ I ask him.

‘922.’