The first time I met Paolo was in an Irish pub in Rome. It was 2006, I was 22, and on a six-week tour travelling with a friend around Italy. We were fresh out of university and wanted to have some fun. The pub wasn’t the most romantic place in Rome; down a back alley off Via Del Corso, jam-packed with tourists and filled with the smell of beer and body odour.

But it was the setting for the most unexpected romance of my life. We all think of summer flings as ill-fated or without a future, but 12 years later, we are married with kids, two cats, and a house in the suburbs.

My friend and I had reached the last week of our trip and drunk way too many free rum-peras when Paolo and his friends walked in – while I was dancing on the bar to Livin’ on a Prayer by Jon Bon Jovi.

After a long night of (more) dancing and a trip to a pool party at someone’s house, Paolo drove my friend and I back to our hotel.

I never thought I’d see him again; oh, how wrong I was.