“That is,” Oliver went on, “if you’re not… If it isn’t too… And, of course, you wouldn’t have to give up your flat if you didn’t want to. It’s just, I don’t think you like your flat very much.”

“Since I originally got it with Miles, no, I really don’t.” My brain was still in crisis mode, which meant all it could think of were endless variations of worst-case scenarios. “But that could happen to you as well. What if something goes wrong with us and then you start to hate this house, which you love and clean all the time, because you used to share it with this guy who cheated on you.”

Emerging abruptly from the cupboard, Oliver stared at me wide-eyed. “Lucien, are you trying to tell me you’re cheating on me?”

“What?” I cried. “No. It’s the kind of thing I would do. I mean, it’s not the kind of thing I would do. It’s the kind of thing the kind of person I am would do if they were going to fuck up their relationship with the kind of person you are.”

Oliver took a deep breath. “You are not that kind of person. You just worry you might be every time somebody likes you.”

That was at once reassuring and embarrassing. “Stop knowing me,” I whined.

“It’s a little late for that. I have, as you’ve observed, actually been living with you for at least a year and a half.” He paused. “And as for the house, if it came to it, I’d get a new one. And I’d have more money for the deposit because you’d have been paying half the mortgage.”

I stared at him helplessly. “Oh God, you really mean it, don’t you? You want me to, like, move in and shit and keep stuff here and—”

“You already keep quite a lot of stuff here.”

“No,” I said decisively, “I’ve left stuff here. It’s a different vibe.”

“You’ve left stuff here, in increasing quantities, for nearly two years.”

“That’s not emotionally significant. I left a pair of formal shoes at Priya’s after my graduation, and she’s still got them.”

Oliver’s mouth was doing that thing where he tried to pretend he wasn’t smiling. “I find that very easy to believe. But I don’t think you have an entire drawer of variously salacious underwear at any of your friends’ houses.”

He was right. I didn’t. This was unintentional, but it was real. It was very real and it had always been very real. You couldn’t get realer than a drawer of pants. “And you…trust me to…” I made a gesture that, frankly, could have encompassed anything.

“Of course I trust you, Lucien. For a start, as I’ve said many times, you’ve already been…” He imitated my gesture.