‘Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.’

Unfortunately, my prediction that she would ultimately accept the proposition was incorrect. My series of arguments, rather than progressively breaking down her resistance, seemed to have the opposite effect. Even my strongest point—that Gene was the best-qualified person on the entire planet to assist her in completing her thesis—was rejected on essentially emotional grounds.

‘No way. Absolutely no way is that narcissistic, cheating, misogynist, bigoted, unscientific…pig sleeping in our apartment.’

I felt that accusing Gene of being unscientific was unfair, but when I started to list Gene’s credentials Rosie went to the bedroom and shut the door.

I retrieved George’s card to enter it into my address book. It included the name of a band: Dead Kings. To my amazement, I recognised it. Due to my musical tastes being formed primarily by my father’s record collection, I was familiar with this British rock group whose music had been popular in the late 1960s.

According to Wikipedia, the band had become active again in 1999 to provide entertainment on Atlantic cruises. Two of the original Dead Kings were actually dead, but had been replaced. George was the drummer. He had accumulated four marriages, four divorces and seven children, but he appeared, relatively, to be the psychologically stable member. The profile did not mention his love of beer.

When I went to bed, Rosie was already asleep. I had made a list of further advantages of Gene living with us, but decided it would be unwise to wake her.

Rosie was, unusually, awake before me, presumably as a result of commencing her sleep cycle early. She had made coffee in the plunger.

‘I figured I shouldn’t be drinking espresso,’ she said.

‘Why?’

‘Too much caffeine.’

‘Actually, plunged coffee has approximately 2.5 times the caffeine content of espresso.’

‘Shit. I try to do the right thing—’

‘Those figures are approximate. The espressos I get from Otha’s contain three shots. Whereas this coffee is unusually weak, probably due to your lack of experience.’

‘Well, you know who’s making it next time.’

Rosie was smiling. It seemed like a good time to introduce the additional arguments in favour of Gene. But Rosie spoke first.

‘Don, about Gene. I know he’s your friend. I get that you’re just being loyal and kind. And maybe if I hadn’t just discovered I was pregnant… But I’m only going to say this once and we can get on with our lives: we do not have space for Gene. End of story.’

I mentally filed the ‘end of story’ formula as a useful technique for terminating a conversation, but Rosie contradicted it within seconds as I swung my feet out of the bed.

‘Hey, you. I’ve got writing to do today, but I’m going to kick your arse tonight. Give me a hug.’

She pulled me back to the bed and kissed me. It defies belief that a person’s emotional state could be deduced from such an inconsistent set of messages.

In reviewing my interaction with Rosie, I concluded that her reference to kicking my arse was metaphorical, and should be interpreted positively. We had established a practice of attempting to outperform each other at The Alchemist. In general, I consider the artificial addition of competition to professional activities to be counterproductive, but our efficiency had shown a steady improvement. Time at the cocktail bar appeared to pass quickly, a reliable indication that we were enjoying ourselves. Unfortunately there had been a change of ownership. Any alteration to an optimum situation can only be negative, and the new manager, whose name was Hector but whom we referred to privately as Wineman, was demonstrating this.

Wineman was approximately twenty-eight years old, estimated BMI twenty-two, with a black goatee and heavy-framed glasses in the style that had once marked me as a nerd but was now fashionable.

He had replaced the small tables with longer benches, increased the intensity of the lighting and shifted the drinks focus from cocktails to Spanish wine to complement the revised menu, which consisted of paella.

Wineman had recently completed a Master of Business Administration, and I assumed his changes were in line with best practice in the hospitality industry. However, the net effect had been a fall in patronage, and the consequent firing of two of our colleagues, which he attributed to difficult economic conditions.

‘They brought me in just in time,’ he said. Frequently.

Rosie and I held hands on the walking component of the journey to the Flatiron neighbourhood. She seemed in an excellent mood, despite her ritual objection to the black-and-white uniform that I, personally, found highly attractive. We arrived two minutes ahead of schedule at 7.28 p.m. Only three tables were occupied; there was no one sitting at the bar.

‘You’re cutting it fine,’ said Wineman. ‘Punctuality is one of your performance measures.’

Rosie looked around the sparsely populated room. ‘Doesn’t look like you’re under any pressure.’

‘That’s about to change,’ said Wineman. ‘We’ve got a booking for sixteen. At eight.’

‘I thought we didn’t take bookings,’ I said. ‘I thought that was the new rule.’

‘The new rule is that we take money. And they’re VIPs. VVIPs. Friends of mine.’

It was a further twenty-two minutes before anyone ordered cocktails, due to absence of clientele. A party of four (estimated ages mid-forties, estimated BMIs between twenty and twenty-eight) arrived and sat at the bar, despite Wineman attempting to direct them to a table.