“Well,” she leaned back, high heels glinting in firelight, “We love you too, of course. Just—for fuck’s sake—take care of yourself. You’re the only Theodore Beaumont we have. We’ve gotten attached.”

She waved a hand as if it were all distasteful, talking about feelings, but her face was soft.

“Yeah.” He took another sip, thought about—about the coffee date, and about a marriage that didn’t work, and holding on to him when he couldn’t bear to get out of bed, quite yet, and the two crooked teeth behind his lower lip and the way he was so stunning in his artlessness. “I’ll be careful.”

The room was silent other than the snapping of logs in the fire, and they drank their Manhattans, and all three of them knew that he wouldn’t be careful at all.

He lit the next cigarette with the burning butt of the last.

Six in the morning, and the sun was on its way to rising. Theo’s head was still a bit thick from last night; a group of American girls had homed in on him as a fellow countryman and bought him a couple of shots of Jameson before they figured out that he would definitely not be going home with any of them.

“Sorry, you’re not exactly my type,” he’d shouted in an upturned ear.

She looked at him, perplexed. “Blonde?”

“That too,” he laughed, “But no.” He made an extravagant gesture in his chest region. And a bit of a disgusted face.

For a moment, he worried. And then the group of girls broke out into giggles, and the petite redhead yelled out, “You should meet my brother!” And all was well.

That was when they started drinking tequila.

“Oh God.” He massaged his neck with his left hand, the muscles coiled up into knots.

Finishing his second cigarette, he wedged himself into the closet-shaped shower, not waiting for the cold water to heat up. A quick scrub with Tesco-brand soap, a brush of his teeth, and he fluffed his hair with a threadbare towel before running a bit of pomade—his last luxury—through the asymmetrical strands.

It had taken him a while to get used to living without all the money he’d taken for granted his whole life. Oh, he could do it. He learned quickly what it was like to need basic priorities like food and shelter and care very little about the rest, and... He’d wanted to live a different sort of life. A simpler life. But it was new.

He wondered, if he had been born without all of that marvelous privilege...

Would he have been happier?

He pulled the lapels of his jacket up around his ears and began the walk down into the city center. His apartment was up the hill above the university, and it was a nice twenty minutes or so to his job.