I have just lost my first friend to the depression/recession/credit crunch/banking crisis/global loss of confidence in the very notion of money and likely reversion to a subsistence system of barter and prayer.

Well, I haven’t lost him, per se. He’s still around. He just doesn’t make a million pounds a year any more. He makes no pounds. His job at the very top of a major corporation has simply ceased to be.

I can, as a result, no longer expect him to pay his way on nights out, or take his turns in the reciprocal lunching pattern that we have been operating during the seven (or more) fat years that preceded these impending ones of leanness. Obviously, I cannot always pay for him on these occasions, for that would be patronising. And we can’t very well start hanging out in McDonald’s. So I guess we’ll be seeing each other less and less now. We will gradually grow apart, and eventually lose touch altogether.

For me, it will be a great loss. But for Tom, at least, there will always be the consolation of seeing my face in the paper as he tucks it around himself to keep warm at night in the Archway underpass. And he may even, should he be unable to sleep on account of the strip lighting and frequent kicks from the rozzers, choose to read about where I have been most recently for dinner. (Tom is not his real name, by the way. I am protecting his identity for obvious reasons.)

The text message in which Tom broke the harrowing news to me of his altered circumstances read: “Will henceforth be free for lunch on a far more regular basis – although you will be paying. Am available today, for example. River Café?”

I called him back but got his voicemail. That is always what happened when one called Tom in the fat years – he was always too busy to take an actual call, and employed SpinVox to convert your message to text because he could not abide blatherers – but I was surprised to find him still so unapproachable. I texted back to tell him I thought the River Café was still closed for refurbishment after the fire.

My phone rang. “Not any more,” said Tom. “They open today. And, guess what? They’ve got a table going at 12.30. Imagine, an early table at the first lunch back. You can review it and then put it on exes.”

I said I guess I could.

I arrived at 12.25 (always be five minutes early when it’s your table, five minutes late if you’re the guest) and saw Tom climbing out of a taxi.

“I thought you might walk it,” I said. “In the current circumstances.”

“Walk?” he roared. “From Ladbroke Grove? That’s practically a mile. And, anyway, in these hard times it’s the poor old cab drivers that suffer most, along with the nannies and cleaners and gardeners. It’s very important to do one’s best to keep them afloat. It’s just my way of saying, you know, mea culpa, I got rich, I rode the wild money hog to hell and back, but now that I’m down on my luck I’m still going to look out for the little people.”

“You got a pay-off then?”

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