The next morning, Evie called Ben over to thank him for the soup and to help her, for lack of a better word, snoop. After Hugo had explained who Chloe was, Evie couldn’t push the woman from her mind, and had spent most of the night awake, tossing and turning. An ex who Evie definitely did not remember Hugo ever mentioning—was there more to the story? Evie was determined to find out.

‘So, we’re looking for signs of what exactly?’ asked Ben, standing awkwardly in the corner of Evie and Hugo’s bedroom while Evie pulled open Hugo’s bedside table drawer.

‘Love letters, sexy lingerie, engraved keepsakes, any traces of another woman! Ben, I can’t just leave it alone,’ Evie said as she lifted up their mattress.

‘I’m not sure I’m comfortable invading Hugo’s privacy like this,’ Ben said, not budging from the corner, where he stood stiffly, hands in his pockets.

Evie looked up at him, her arm still stretched up under the half-raised mattress. She nodded. He was right, of course. Chloe was just an ex. Someone with whom things had ended badly. Everyone had baggage. She trusted Hugo wholeheartedly. And she was happy. Really, very happy. So why was she searching for something to mess it all up?

‘Damn it, this is ridiculous, I know,’ she said, sitting down on the slightly askew bed. She picked up the packet of chocolate popcorn by her feet and scooped it onto the bed with her, grateful that her cold had abated enough to make food more tolerable again.

‘Do you carry that popcorn with you everywhere you go?’ Ben asked, laughing as he walked over to the bed, plonked himself beside her and grabbed a handful for himself.

‘It’s called sustenance,’ she replied, then sighed and put her face in her hands. ‘Benny, I feel a bit crazy.’

‘I wouldn’t have you any other way.’ He smiled, pulling her into a side hug.

‘Do you think I should be worried about this?’

‘You trust Hugo, right?’

‘With my life,’ Evie replied, a little more defensively than she’d intended.

‘Then trust him.’

The word trust hung in the air between them like a limp, half-deflated balloon which awaited its slow descent to the ground. Of course Evie wondered if she was being unfair to Hugo. She could feel herself unravelling, becoming obsessed with all that had been left unsaid about his ex. And the time away from him only seemed to exacerbate her anxiety. Maybe all they needed was a long, uninterrupted spooning session and everything would be better. Then she would get over it. Surely.

‘But seriously, are you sure you’re okay?’ Ben asked.