“I’m not saying you’re an idiot Lizzie babes, but it’s a bit convenient that you ‘forgot’ your phone that night, isn’t it?”

Lizzie flushes and drops her gaze. She’d been enjoying telling her story, but Gav drags the attention back to himself again, looks victoriously around the group. No-one challenges him.

“I’m not saying I definitely saw a ghost, Gav - It was just that -”

But Gav interrupts her.

“I think someone had one too many alcopops that night, didn’t they, babes? You spilled a bottle when you got back too - you were pretty pissed. I expect you started seeing things that aren’t there. Seriously, you have to be a total moron to think ghosts exist these days. I mean, everyone has a camera on their phone - someone would have filmed one by now.”

Lizzie stares miserably at the ground, but she doesn’t speak up for herself.

“Well, Gav,” I interject. “No-one’s ever really taken a scientific approach to filming a ghost. The ghost hunters on telly are all a bit, you know, woo woo, aren’t they? If you’re so confident you’re right about this, why not set up a proper experiment in The Cherry Tree where Lizzie saw - whatever it is she saw - and prove us all wrong.”

Gav prides himself on being the scientist of the group. He is hooked but won’t admit it.

“You can’t prove a negative,” he scoffs. “How can I prove that something isn’t there?”

“So you are a bit worried about going back there, then? I mean I would be too. Everyone’s heard the stories and I think Lizzie’s amazing going anywhere near that place after dark…” I give a theatrical shudder.

“Of course I’m not worried,” he’s flustered now, doesn’t like the idea that he looks weak compared to Lizzie. “Fine, I’ll go to The Cherry Tree tonight and set a trap to catch the fucker on film if it exists. Which it doesn’t.”

The Cherry Tree burned down twenty years before we all came here for University. That no-one has done anything with the place only feeds the rumours that the proprietress stalks the ruins at night, her face and hands scorched to grey ash, her clawed, bloody hands reaching through the shadows to gouge at trespassers and gawkers.

As we leave I grin to myself having trapped Gav into an uncomfortable, cold few hours staking out an abandoned building in the middle of a Welsh winter for the sake of his ego, while we treat ourselves to a few quiet, Gavless drinks in a warm bar in town.

But when we see Gav the next day, he is ashen and silent. We came expecting boasts and crowing, but he will not speak of the night before, just mumbles and tries to turn the subject. When we push him to show us what he filmed, he mutters that he forgot his phone, that he must have left it somewhere. That it doesn’t matter anyway.

And at the edge of the group I notice Lizzie sitting quietly as usual. She makes no move to comfort Gav, but I could swear that there’s the ghost of a smile dancing at the edges of her pretty face and her normally immaculate fingernails are ragged and bear the faintest traces of blood red at the tips…