They had known each other for almost two years and, with their final exams a few months ahead, Clare knew her running days with Mark were nearing the end. He was leaving to do a post-graduate degree at another university and Clare would return home and look for work. She knew she’d miss him and wondered if they’d stay in touch. He, it emerged, was thinking the same.

“I met your old boyfriend over the weekend,” he said, as they ran on the path near the river. “William?”

“Oh. Will. How is he?”

“Still hung up on you, I think.”

“That’s ridiculous. How did you discover you both know me?”

“He’s seen us running.”

Clare shuddered. She hated the idea of Will watching her run and making whatever assumptions he was bound to make. She was curious though, why Mark would think he was “still hung up” on her. She hadn’t seen Will since he’d cast the pitying look in her direction at the end of first year. She knew Mark wouldn’t make her suffer the indignity of asking him to explain himself and kept quiet until he inevitably went on.

“He was at a birthday party of a mutual friend on Saturday, saw me and asked if you were there. I had no idea who he was. Turned out he has seen us running together and thought we were a couple. I said no, which was obviously a relief to him.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because he then proceeded to tell me how you and he had been an item.”

“That doesn’t mean he’s still hung up on me, Mark.”

He didn’t say anything for several paces. Then, “Would it be so weird?”

“What? Will being hung up on me? Of course. We’ve been—”

“No. Us? A couple?”

Clare nearly laughed but caught herself in time. Mark was a joker and a tease, but this wasn’t his kind of humour. Was it?

“Are you joking?” she asked, looking straight ahead.

“Do you want me to be?”

They finished the run in silence. Clare’s head whirled. She wasn’t sure what to think. Mostly, she was sad. She realised her running days with Mark were over even though the term hadn’t come to an end yet. She also wondered what had happened to suddenly make him decide he was interested in more than running with her.

“Listen, Mark,” she said, as they pulled up at their tree. “It’s never been like that for us. Just because you meet a guy who I was with for a short while years ago, shouldn’t change the way you see me.”

He stepped in front of her. His face was red from running and his eyes shone. “Is that really what you believe? That meeting William made me think of you as girlfriend material? I truly hope I’m not that shallow.”