Page 81 of People Skills

‘I don’t have a picture of him.’

‘His social media.’

I open my mouth to deny knowing it, but Xavier will know I’m lying.

‘Why?’

‘So I can identify him if I have to.’

‘What, in a criminal line-up?’

‘Yes. Or if he comes to pick you up one day, so I know he’s not some lunatic.’

‘You’d assume a man who came to the door asking for me was a lunatic?’

‘You’d rather I just let any man into the house if he says he knows you?’

‘I don’t think that’s a scenario you need to worry about.’

‘Just show me a picture.’

‘No. I don’t want you to say something to put me off.’

‘I won’t.’

‘You will. I know you will.’

‘I will say absolutely nothing, I will observe his face and keep mine completely neutral.’

‘Fine.’

I grab my phone, which is not locked in the cage because I need to take it with me. I bring up Nathan’s social media and scroll back, quite a way back, to find the best photo of him. He’s standing in front of a temple in Vietnam, wearing sunglasses, half-smiling.

‘There.’ I hold out my phone and Xavier leans over to look.

‘Hmm,’ he says.

‘What?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Say it.’

‘He looks nice.’

‘Exactly. He looks nice.’

Xavier puts down his fork and tries to take the phone from my hand and I pull it back.

‘I just want to see a bit closer—’

‘No, you are not scrolling through his whole—’

We grapple over the phone for a second and then it happens. A red heart. I hearted Nathan’s picture. From a year and a half ago.

‘Shit.’ I look at the phone in horror, but it’s scrolled away from the picture and it takes me a few seconds with shaking hands to scroll back and find the image and undo the heart. Was I quick enough that he won’t get a notification?

‘I liked his picture, ten minutes before our date.’ I sit down and bury my head in my hands.