“Which one?”

I was already getting up, but Rosie threw me a look and pushed my pint towards me. “Sit down there, you, and drink that. I’ll sort him myself.” She slid onto the bench next to me, close enough that our thighs touched. “That fella there, lookit.”

Rugby jersey, no neck, turning away from the bar with his precarious double handful of pints. Rosie gave him a wave to get his attention back; then she batted her lashes, leaned forward and swirled the tip of her tongue in little circles in the head of her pint. Rugby Boy’s eyes popped, his mouth fell open, he got his ankles tangled in a stool and half his pints went down someone’s back. “Now,” Rosie said, giving him the finger and forgetting about him. “Did you get them?”

I put a hand into my coat, slung over the arm of the seat where I could keep an eye on it, and found the envelope. “There,” I said, “all ours,” and I fanned out two tickets and laid them on the banged-up wooden table between us. DUN LAOGHAIRE-HOLYHEAD, DEPARTING 06:30AM, MONDAY 16 DECEMBER. PLEASE ARRIVE AT LEAST 30 MINUTES BEFORE DEPARTURE.

The sight of them made my adrenaline spike all over again. The breath went out of Rosie in an amazed little laugh.

I said, “I thought the early boat was better. We could’ve had the overnight one, but it’d be harder to get our stuff and get away in the evening. This way we can head out to the harbor on Sunday night, whenever we get a chance, and then wait there till it’s time. Yeah?”

“God,” Rosie said after a moment, still breathless. “My God. I feel like we should be-” Her arm curved round the tickets, shielding them from the people at the next tables. “You know?”

I wove my fingers through hers. “We’re all right here. We’ve never seen anyone we know, have we?”

“It’s still Dublin. I won’t feel safe till that ferry’s out of Dun Laoghaire. Put them away, will you?”

“Will you look after them? My ma goes through our stuff.”

Rosie grinned. “Not surprised. I wouldn’t be surprised if my da goes through mine, as well, but he won’t touch the knicker drawer. Give us those.” She picked up the tickets like they were made of fine lace, slid them carefully into the envelope and tucked it into the top pocket of her jeans jacket. Her fingers stayed there for a moment, over her breast. “Wow. Nine days, and then…”

“And then,” I said, lifting my pint, “here’s to you and me and our new life.”

We clinked glasses and took a drink, and I kissed her. The pint was top-notch, the warmth of the pub was starting to thaw out my feet after the walk through town, there was tinsel draped over the picture frames on the walls, and the bunch of students at the next table burst into loud tipsy laughter. I should have been the happiest camper in the whole pub, but the evening still had that precarious feel to it, like a brilliant sparkly dream that could turn nasty in a blink. I let Rosie go because I was afraid I was going to kiss her hard enough to hurt.

“We’ll have to meet late,” she said, hooking one knee over mine. “Midnight, or after. My da doesn’t go to bed till eleven, and I’ll have to give him a while to go asleep.”

“My lot are conked out by half past ten, on a Sunday. Sometimes Shay stays out late, but as long as I don’t run into him on his way in, no problem. Even if I do, he won’t stop us; he’ll be delighted to see the back of me.” Rosie flicked an eyebrow and took another swig of her pint. I said, “I’ll head out by midnight. If it takes you a little longer, no bother.”

She nodded. “Shouldn’t be much later. The last bus’ll be gone, though. Are you up for walking to Dun Laoghaire?”

“Not carrying all our stuff. By the time we got to the boat, we’d be dead on our feet. It’ll have to be a taxi.”

She gave me an impressed look that was only half put on. “La-di-da!”

I grinned and wound one of her curls around my finger. “I’ve a couple more nixers coming up this week; I’ll have the cash. Nothing but the best for my girl. I’d get you a limo if I could, but that’ll have to wait. Maybe for your birthday, yeah?”

She smiled back, but it was an absent smile; she wasn’t in the mood for messing. “Meet in Number Sixteen?”

I shook my head. “The Shaughnessys have been hanging out there a lot, the last while. I don’t fancy running into them.” The Shaughnessy brothers were harmless, but they were also loud and thick and mostly stoned, and it would take way too long to get it through their heads why they needed to shut up and pretend they hadn’t seen us. “Top of the road?”

“We’ll get seen.”

“Not after midnight on a Sunday. Who’ll be out, except us and the Shaughnessy eejits?”

“All it’d take is one person. And anyway, what if it’s raining?”

This wasn’t like Rosie, this kind of edginess; mostly she didn’t know what nerves were. I said, “We don’t have to settle it now. We’ll see how the weather’s shaping up next week, decide then.”

Rosie shook her head. “We shouldn’t meet up again, not till we go. I don’t want my da getting suspicious.”

“If he hasn’t by now…”

“I know. I know. I just-God, Francis, those tickets…” Her hand went back to her pocket. “It’s this close to real. I don’t want us relaxing, even for a second, in case something goes wrong.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. Someone stopping us.”

“No one’s going to stop us.”

“Yeah,” Rosie said. She bit down on her fingernail, and for a second her eyes slipped away from mine. “I know. We’ll be grand.”

I said, “What’s up?”

“Nothing. Let’s meet up at the top of the road, like you said, unless it’s lashing rain. Then we’ll go for Number Sixteen; the lads won’t be out if the weather’s awful. Yeah?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Rosie. Look at me. Are you feeling guilty about this?”

One corner of her mouth twisted wryly. “I am in my arse. It’s not like we’re doing it just for the laugh; if my da hadn’t acted like such a bleeding muppet about the whole thing, we’d never have thought of this. Why? Are you?”

“Not a chance. Kevin and Jackie are the only ones who’ll miss me, I’ll send them something nice out of my first wages, they’ll be delighted. Are you going to miss your family, is that it? Or the girls?”

She thought about that for a moment. “The girls, yeah, I am. And my family, a bit. But, sure… I’ve known for ages that I’d be moving out soon enough. Before we even left school me and Imelda were talking about maybe heading to London ourselves, up until…” A fleeting, sideways grin to me. “Up until you and me came up with a better plan. Whatever happened, I’d say sooner or later I’d have been gone. Wouldn’t you?”

She knew better than to ask whether I’d miss my family. “Yeah,” I said-I wasn’t sure whether it was true or not, but it was what both of us needed to hear. “I’d have been out of here, one way or another. I like this way a lot, though.”

That flicker of smile again, still not a whole one. “Same here.”

I asked, “Then what’s up? Ever since you sat down, you’ve been acting like that seat’s itching the arse off you.”

That got Rosie’s full attention. “Look who’s talking. You’re a laugh a minute tonight, so you are, it’s like going out with Oscar the bleedin’ Grouch-”

“I’m up to ninety because you’re up to ninety. I thought you’d be over the moon about the tickets, and instead-”

“Bollix. You got here like that. You were only dying for a chance to punch the head off that pathetic eejit-”

“And so did you. Are you having second thoughts? Is that what this is about?”

“If you’re trying to break it off with me, Francis Mackey, you act like a man and do it yourself. Don’t you try to make me do your dirty work.”

We glared at each other for a second, balanced on the edge of a flat-out row. Then Rosie let out her breath, slumped back on the bench and pushed her hands through her hair. She said, “I’ll tell you what it is, Francis. The pair of us are nervous because we’re after getting above ourselves.”