‘Come on, let’s sit? I’ll explain better.’ He guided me through the flat to the sofa, and I let myself be led like a woman in shock. No, wait, I fact-checked, I am a woman in shock. He encouraged me onto the settee, then he perched on the edge of my coffee table so he could be opposite me. I hate it when he does that and he knows it. But I shook the thought away; it didn’t seem like the time. ‘We would still be together. And life would absolutely carry on as normal in lots of ways. But imagine, okay, imagine you’re on a night out with the girls and a man comes up to you and says, hey, can I get you a drink? If you wanted to say yes, you could! It wouldn’t matter, and I – well, I might be a bit jealous, but you’d still be coming home to me at the end of the night and—’

‘Oh,’ I interrupted, ‘as much as a bit?’

He sighed. ‘It’s a terrible idea.’

‘Besides—’ I ignored his comment and ploughed ahead ‘—I’d only be coming home to you if I weren’t going home with him.’

His eyebrows pulled together. ‘I don’t follow you.’

‘If we’re together but we’re not, I can go home with someone else. Is that what you’re saying?’ It looked like the thought had thrown him, and I wondered how well he’d thought this suggestion through. ‘And I guess, in that same scenario, or sort of the same anyway, if you were out with the guys and you saw a girl you liked and you wanted to buy her a drink, you’d just go right ahead and offer?’ He nodded instantly, as though that were a much easier question to answer. ‘Right. I – right.’

He lowered himself into my eyeline, forcing me to look at him. ‘Are you with me?’

‘Like, in the room, or with this idea?’

‘It’s a terrible idea?’ he said again.

Yes. But I’d become so accustomed to my role as the reassuring one that even this, even with this bloody terrible idea elbowing between us, I still said, ‘No, no it’s not that.’ I pulled in a greedy breath and steeled myself for his answer. ‘Do you think you’re missing out on something, Rowan? By being with me, I mean?’

‘Baby, not even.’ He dropped to his knees. The last time I’d seen him from that angle had been when he’d proposed, and the association stung. ‘I am so, so happy with you, Edi. But I guess Dad’s point was, what if we get to their age and wonder whether there was more? Do you know?’

No. No, I don’t know. ‘So, you don’t think you’re missing out on anything, but you just want to be sure you’re not?’