He said it easily, but the silence that followed was like the hush after a bomb blast. She lost her bearings.

‘I saw you with that little girl,’ said Dan.

‘Nell?’

‘You want one. A baby. We want one.’

‘I know –’

‘So, let’s get a house.’

‘But I don’t –’

‘Just that, OK? Bea, a house, come on. Nothing massive. Three bedrooms.’ His voice sounded restricted, his fingers stroking the sensitive skin behind her knee. ‘So the house, and the money for the year. This is good, but what about now?’

‘Now?’ she asked quietly.

‘For travelling. We don’t have a tenant now.’

‘No, but we’ve got the Cushion.’

‘The Cushion.’ He laughed, dismissing it.

‘What? It’s fine. We worked it out. We’ve got nearly four grand.’

He made a noise, derisive. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Be a lot less stressful if we top it up. We could put a few grand in there – maybe, ten?’

‘We’re only away three months.’

‘We could stay in places with, like, clean bathrooms?’

‘No, we’ve decided on a house.’

‘Babe –’

‘A house!’ she said.

‘Puritan.’ He smiled, his hand moving on her thigh.

‘So is that it?’

‘We’ll need to work it out properly,’ he said.

‘But that’s enough?’

‘Sure.’

‘Really?’

‘It’s not extreme,’ he said.

‘No. You’re right. It’s a house.’

‘And a baby.’

‘A baby,’ she said.

He kissed her again. She loved the taste of him. She had missed it. He was kissing her. He wanted her. His need was urgent. It caught like touchpaper. His fingers pressed into her thighs. A house. And money. A three-bedroom house and a year to breathe. Thirty-five thousand pounds, in a house without a mortgage. He fucked her on the floor while caterers and electricians passed through the rooms below, and afterwards lay sweating by her side.

‘Christ, it’s hot up here,’ he said.

He got up and put on the air conditioning. He flicked the temperature arrow down; twenty-one, twenty, nineteen.

‘D’you mind?’ he said. ‘It’s all over the house, one more room isn’t going to make any difference.’

Linen beanbags, mismatched chairs; lavender, cornflowers, roses. Decorations filled the house. Tea lights in silver glass hanging from the trees. Fattoush, baba ganoush, labneh, samboussek, batata harra. Food for North Africa because Alex had loved it. Broderie anglaise cloths for France, because he had loved it there, too. A stage for his friends’ band, draped with white, and a white backdrop. White amps and speakers.

‘I love it,’ said Liv. ‘It looks like that John Lennon video. It’s gorgeous. No black, anywhere. I don’t want black.’