"Fine!" Alfie yelled it when he didn't mean to, but he wanted to cut Julien off. He didn't want to hear him apologize or say how wrong it had been. How bad it had been. He didn't want Julien to say anything because somehow that had been wonderful even in the middle of everything, and Alfie didn't want to lose that.
Except that Julien did. Obviously did. And Alfie mumbled a broken sort of 'fine' again and didn't even look at him as he ran out of the room.