High Fidelity by Nick Hornby

was me. Like Liz said, I’m an arsehole.
    The night before Liz and I were supposed to have a drink in Camden, Liz and Laura met up somewhere for something to eat, and Liz had a go at Laura about Ian, and Laura wasn’t planning on saying anything in her own defense, because that would have meant assaulting me, and she has a powerful and sometimes ill-advised sense of loyalty. (I, for example, would not have been able to restrain myself.) But Liz pushed it too far, and Laura snapped, and all these things about me poured out in a torrent, and then they both cried, and Liz apologized between fifty and one hundred times for speaking out of turn. So the following day Liz snapped, tried to phone me and then marched into the pub and called me names. I don’t know any of this for sure, of course. I have had no contact at all with Laura and only a brief and unhappy meeting with Liz. But, even so, one does not need a sophisticated understanding of the characters in question to guess this much.
    Â 
    I do not know what, precisely, Laura said, but she would have revealed at least two, maybe even all four, of the following pieces of information:
That I slept with somebody else while she was pregnant.
That my affair contributed directly to her terminating the pregnancy.
That, after her abortion, I borrowed a large sum of money from her and have not yet repaid any of it.
That, shortly before she left, I told her I was unhappy in the relationship, and I was kind of sort of maybe looking around for someone else.
    Did I do and say these things? Yes, I did. Are there any mitigating circumstances? Not really, unless any circumstances (in other words, context) can be regarded as mitigating. And before you judge, although you have probably already done so, go away and write down the worst four things that you have done to your partner, even if—especially if—your partner doesn’t know about them. Don’t dress these things up, or try to explain them; just write them down, in a list, in the plainest language possible. Finished? OK, so who’s the arsehole now?

EIGHT
    WHERE the fuck have you been?” I ask Barry when he turns up for work on Saturday morning. I haven’t seen him since we went to Marie’s gig at the White Lion—no phone calls, no apologies, nothing.
    â€œWhere the fuck have I been? Where the fuck have I been? God, you’re an arsehole,” Barry says by way of an explanation. “I’m sorry, Rob. I know things aren’t going so well for you and you have problems and stuff, but, you know. We spent fucking hours looking for you the other night.”
    â€œHours? More than one hour? At least two? I left at half-ten, so you abandoned the search at half-twelve, right? You must have walked from Putney to Wapping.”
    â€œDon’t be a smartarse.”
    One day, maybe not in the next few weeks, but certainly in the conceivable future, somebody will be able to refer to me without using the word arse somewhere in the sentence.
    â€œOK, sorry. But I’ll bet you looked for ten minutes, and then had a drink with Marie and thingy. T-Bone.”
    I hate calling him T-Bone. It sets my teeth on edge, like when you have to ask for a Big Heap Buffalo Billburger, when all you want is a quarter-pounder, or a Just Like Mom Used to Make, when all you want is a piece of apple pie.
    â€œThat’s not the point.”
    â€œDid you have a good time?”
    â€œIt was great. T-Bone’s played on two Guy Clark albums and a Jimmie Dale Gilmore album.”
    â€œFar out.”
    â€œOh, fuck off.”
    I’m glad it’s Saturday because we’re reasonably busy, and Barry and I don’t have to find much to say to each other. When Dick’s making a cup of coffee and I’m looking for an old Shirley Brown single in the stockroom, he tells me that T-Bone’s played on two Guy Clark albums and a Jimmie Dale Gilmore album.
    â€œAnd do you know what?