Chris laughs, but it sounds like an attack and he doesn’t feel like the guy she knows any more. ‘So? You can’t have the same phone as any other girl? Jesus, I didn’t think you were that type.’

Selena flinches. She can’t think of anything to say that won’t make everything even worse. She says nothing.

He starts moving again, fast mean-dog circles round the clearing. ‘OK. I gave phones like that to some other girls. Not Alison Whatever, but the others: yeah. A couple more, too. And? You don’t own me. We’re not even going out. What do you care who else I text?’

Selena stays very still. She wonders if this is her punishment: this, like a whipping, and then he’ll be gone and she can drag herself home through the dark and pray that nothing comes skulking to the smell of blood off her. And the whole thing will be over.

After a moment Chris stops circling. He shakes his head, almost violently. ‘Sorry,’ he says. ‘I shouldn’t’ve . . . But those other girls, they were months ago. I’m not in touch with any of them any more. I swear. OK?’

Selena says, ‘That’s not what I meant. I don’t care about that.’ She thinks that’s true. ‘Just: when you say you’ve never told anyone something before, I don’t want to wonder if you’ve actually told the same story to a dozen other people and said “I never told anyone this before” every time.’

He opens his mouth and she knows he’s going to rip her apart, rip this into shreds they can never put back together. Then he rubs his hands up the sides of his jaw, hard, clasps them behind his head. He says, ‘I don’t think I know how to do this.’

Selena waits. She doesn’t know what to hope.

‘I should go. We can keep texting; I’d rather just do that than try seeing each other and have the whole thing go tits-up.’

Selena says, before she knows she’s going to, ‘It’s not like this has to go tits-up.’

‘Yeah? We’ve been here two seconds, and look at us. I shouldn’t have come.’

‘That’s just being dramatic. We were fine outside the dance. All we have to do is talk to each other. Properly.’

Chris stares at her. After a moment he says, ‘OK: I meant it. I never told anyone about the house before.’

Selena nods. ‘See?’ she says, ‘How hard was that?’ and grins at him, and gets a startled half-laugh back. Chris blows out a long breath, and loosens.

‘I survived.’

‘So you don’t have to leave. It won’t go tits-up.’

He says, ‘I should’ve been straight with you about the phone. Instead of . . .’

‘Yeah.’

‘Being a prick to you, and all. That was shit. Sorry.’

‘It’s OK,’ Selena says.