I had no idea how to reply to that. Part of me wanted to point out that he probably shouldn’t put boys ahead of his career, but since I was the boy, that would have been pretty self-defeating. “Yeah, I think I’ll be pulling a sickie too.”

“I don’t think it counts as pulling a sickie if you’re actually having a hard time.”

“What?” I watched the muscles in his back as he stirred his pan—and couldn’t tell if noticing that kind of thing again meant I was getting my shit together or my shit had never been together to begin with. “I should ring them up, and say ‘Sorry, I gave myself a nervous breakdown with a Guardian article’?”

He came over with a pair of mugs and set them down carefully on coasters. I folded my hands around mine, letting the warmth seep into my palms, as the rich scent of chocolate and cinnamon wafted over the table.

“You’ve been through a lot today,” he said. “There’s no need to diminish it.”

“Yeah, but if I don’t diminish things I have to face them at their normal size, and that’s horrible.”

“I think it’s usually better to face the world as it is. The more we try to hide from something, the more power we give it.”

“Don’t be wise at me, Oliver.” I gave him a look. “It’s unsexy.”

With the air of someone with a lot on his mind, he turned his hot chocolate a quarter circle, and then back again. “While we’re on the topic of—”

“Unsexy?”

“Trying to hide from things.”

“Oh.”

“You mentioned in the bathroom that our arrangement was no longer feeling quite as artificial as it hitherto had?”

“Are you trying to stop me freaking out by using words you know I’ll mock you for using?”

His eyes met mine across the table. “Did you mean it, Lucien?”

“Yes.” Was there anything fucking worse than being called on your own sincerity? “I meant it. Can we please go back to what’s important here, which is that you actually just said ‘hitherto’?”

“As it happens”—he continued adjusting the angle of his mug—“I’ve been having similar thoughts myself.”

At that moment, I couldn’t tell whether I’d been waiting desperately to hear that or terrified I might. But it showed how far I’d come, and how seriously committed I was to doing better by Oliver, that I didn’t run away screaming. “Okay. Good? That’s nice?” In my defence, my voice had only gone up half an octave.

“There’s no need to panic. We’re just having a conversation.”

“Can I go back in the bath—”

“No.”

I wheezed. “Look, I … Like I said, I have these feelings. And I’m not used to having these feelings. And every time I have these feelings, I have these other feelings which are…like… When’s he going to the press, when’s he going to let me down, when’s he going to fuck me over.”

“Lucien—”

“And”—I ran over him before I could stop myself—“I don’t think I could take it. Not from you.”

He was quiet for a moment, frowning thoughtfully. “I know the last thing that can possibly help you right now are promises and platitudes. But I do feel quite confident in assuring you that I will never sell your story to the tabloids.”

“I’m pretty sure Miles would have said that too.”

“But in a different context.” His tone was very measured, almost detached, but he also reached across the table and took my limp, damp hand in his. “I’m not asking you to trust in me personally. Obviously, I would be gratified if you could, but I understand that what you’ve been through renders that difficult.”

“I want to trust you, though.”

“You don’t have to. But you can trust that I have nothing to gain and everything to lose by turning our relationship into a public spectacle. I don’t particularly need the money, and I’ve invested more than a decade in a job that relies on my reputation for discretion.”

I gave him a brittle smile. “I’m probably worth a lot more now that my dad’s on TV.”

“My career means far more to me than any sum of money I could reasonably be offered.”

It took me probably too long to Rubik’s cube my brain into something that could make sense of this. “Okay. Yes. I see that.”

“And, for that matter,” he went on, “so are you.”

Well, that was a thing. “Thank you. Really. I…fuck, how do we do this?”

“I confess”—Oliver had gone a little pink around the ears—“I hadn’t thought that far ahead. This is new territory for both of us.”

“Um. I don’t want to sound cold-feety, but what if we just…carried on as we were?”

“You mean,” he said slowly, “you want us to continue pretending to be in a relationship that we admit feels real to both of us?”

Wow, trying to do the right thing was hard. And seemed very similar to fucking everything up. “I’m worried that if we try to change too much all at once, it’ll go wrong somehow and then I’ll have let you down and you’ll be on your own at your parents’ anniversary and it’ll be my fault.”

“That’s kind of you, but I’m not going to put a family party above our relationship.”

“You don’t have to.” I put my other hand over his. “Leaving aside my occasional meltdowns, which I promise I’ll learn to deal with, this is working well for us, and will definitely do what we need it to do. Why rush? Or mess with that?”

He was giving me an “I’m not quite sure who you are, but I like it” look. “I’m beginning to think you might be better at relationships than you’ve claimed.”

“I,” I announced, “am growing as a person.”

“Perhaps I…I could also do better.”

I smiled at him, too tired to care how goofy it was. “You don’t have to. You’re already perfect.”

Bed happened pretty soon after that. And, having just exposed the full depth of my emotional wibble, it seemed a bit pointless to worry about what Oliver would think of my boxers or no-pack. As far as I could tell, he wasn’t disappointed or repulsed—instead, he pulled me down into his arms, where I lay quiet and cared for, and quickly drifted off to sleep.

* * *