"I collapsed to the sand. It had been a garrulous journey with Jim and Jake (Jake had driven and stayed sober. Jim and I had drunk the best part of a bottle of Scotch between us. 'People think we're queer,' Jim confided in a bellowed drawl, meaning him and Jake. 'People think we're homosexual.'

'Easy there, brother,' Jake said loudly, to the windscreen.

'Not that there's anything wrong with that,' Jim said. 'Apart from the sin of sodomy, unfortunately -'

'Let he who is without sin,' Jake interrupted. 'Let he who is without sin.'

'But we're just...' Jim's face had taken on a curious expression of pain and happiness. 'We're just friends, for Christ's sake.'

'Friends in Christ,' Jake said, swerving for something.

'I mean, Jake's always... Jake's always been there for me, haven't you, Jake?'

'I have, Jim.'

'Fucking everyone thinks... Fucking no one really appreciates the importance of fucking friendship, these days.'

'Friendship,' Jake said, chin up, hands at a quarter-to-three on the wheel, 'is bigger than love.' Then, after a pause, 'Which is why Jesus most definitely did not, probably, fuck Mary Magdelene. Or any apostles, for that matter.'

After which, all three of us had observed a few minutes of respectful silence.)"