Eventually, Priya dragged Bridge out the door, leaving me alone with the distant, emotionally distraught boyfriend I wasn’t totally sure wanted to see me. And having spent a week wishing Oliver was here so I could do something, I found myself wishing I knew what that something actually was.

We stared at each other like every easy habit we’d built up over the last few years suddenly didn’t count.

“Sorry”—Oliver cast a weary glance around my flat—“I think I interrupted…something.”

I couldn’t work out if telling him I’d had an I Was Sad Without You party would be reassuring or guilt-trippy. “We were just hanging out. I mean…” I gazed at him helplessly. “Like, how are you?”

He was silent for a couple of months. “I’m tired. And I…and I…”

“Do you hate me?” I blurted out. “Did I ruin your relationship with your father? Did we leave everything in a bad place? Are we broken now? And I’m making it all about me?”

“Honestly, you are making it a little all about you.” I thought he was trying to smile, but I might have just been wanting him to really, really hard.

“Fuck. Shit. Sorry. Do I at least get self-awareness points for realising that?”

“That’s making it slightly more all about you.”

I cringed. “Sorry. I suck.”

For the first time in what felt like forever, he almost laughed. “You don’t suck, Lucien. I realise I’ve probably been…worrying recently. And I shouldn’t have done that to you.”

Oh God, his dad was dead and he was being reassuring. I did not deserve this man in any way. “No, no. You’ve got to…let yourself…take your time and feel your feels or whatever. And this must be so fucked up.”

“Yes.” There was something in his voice—something more there than when he’d come in. “I suspect I’m still working out quite how fucked up it is.”

That had only half been what I meant. “And, well, having a massive fight before you went couldn’t have helped.”

“It wasn’t ideal.” He’d stopped smiling, but it didn’t seem like he was going to dump me on the spot, which was the closest thing to a win I felt I could reasonably expect.

“I hope,” I tried, “it wasn’t in your head too much. Like, I know we got kind of heated and it might have felt like I don’t…like I’m not…like I’m not on your side. But I am. And I’m totally here for you and stuff, even if we’re fighting. You do…you do know that, right?”

For a moment, Oliver looked like he was wrestling with something, but at last he said, “I sometimes let myself forget but, in general, I do.”

It wasn’t a ringing endorsement, but there was a mild tinkle to it.