Page 113 of Secret Paths

No discussion. No plan. No awkward negotiation of whether this counts as domestic. I turn on the telly, she folds herself into one corner of the sofa, and I sit at the other end with enough space between us to satisfy whatever rule she thinks we are still obeying.

It lasts eight minutes.

Then she tucks her feet under the blanket.

By the second property, her feet are against my thigh.

By the third, she is arguing with a man from Kent who has bought a terraced house with rising damp and described it as “full of potential”.

“That wall is green,” she says.

“He seems optimistic.”

“He seems delusional.”

“Estate agents call that vision.”

“Doctors call that mould.”

I laugh, and she smiles without looking at me.

That is the dangerous part.

Not the sex. Not her turning up in the rain. Not even the way she admitted she needed me and then tried to stuff the words back into a safer shape.

This.

Her on my sofa. My jumper on her body. Rain sliding down the windows. Her outrage over damp plaster and bad renovation budgets. The ease of it.

Ordinary life, quietly making its case.

Halfway through the episode, she stands.

“Just going to the loo.”

“Top of the stairs.”

“I remember.”

Of course she does.

My brain, traitorous little bastard, immediately does something with that.

When she comes back down, she stops in the sitting room doorway.

The change in her is small. A tightness around her mouth. One hand resting at her stomach before she drops it.

“You all right?” I ask.

“Yes,” she says.

Then she grimaces.

“No.”

I sit up a little. “No?”

“I have started my period.”