Did he want me to find the photo? Did he leave his phone deliberately, right there on his pillow while he had a shower, knowing I wouldn’t be able to resist having a little peek? And knowing I wouldn’t be able to confront him either, not after I’d made such a thing about privacy last week. Fuck him.

I abandon the search and pad down to the kitchen, hoping that I might catch a glimpse of whatever he is up to. He is making pancakes—little American ones with their bubbly surfaces, light and fluffy—while he hums a song, one I know from somewhere but can’t recall the name of: a vague memory of singing along in a car, feeling wind whipping at my hair. The air is salty, cool. 2002. The summer Leah and I went to Dublin on a school trip, hours and hours on a cramped coach, desperate for a pee. The second night, Leah had met these boys who took us for a ride in their dad’s convertible, driving us out of the city and over the wooden bridge toward the long sandy beach at Dollymount. Leah had gone off with one of the boys and left me with his friend—or possibly brother, I don’t really remember—trying to make polite conversation while I tried not to imagine what my twin was doing behind the men’s swimming shelter.

“You don’t fancy…” the one I was left with had said to me with a gesture toward the shelter.

“I have a boyfriend,” I’d replied, prim and proper, waiting for the perfect boy and the perfect time.

Chris has laid the small table in the corner of the kitchen, a French press of coffee alongside a few white flowers in a narrow vase. The one I bought at the same time as the forget-me-not bedding, along with a pair of soft gray cushions for the living room and a bale of new towels. I have a photo of each. Chris wasn’t impressed with my choices, but then I hadn’t expected him to be. We’d had a row about the towels. His mother had bought us some for a wedding gift, ones I had to throw away because I accidentally covered them in hair dye but hadn’t been brave enough to tell him. I had thought I was replacing like for like, that I could shuttle them into the airing cupboard and he would be none the wiser, but he had noticed immediately. Of course he had; he always notices when things are out of place. Ever since we moved in together, I have painstakingly tiptoed around him, going to great lengths to ensure that everything is just so. I even make sure the toilet roll is the “correct” way in its holder and load the dishwasher per his exacting specification, knowing that he would notice the second anything was out of place, out of line, out of the order he imposed on the world around him. He’d accused me of being slovenly. Forgetful. A disaster. Just like your mother.