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‘No, I just …’ I trail off and smile. ‘I’m just happy you’re doing so much with your artistic side. What’s it about?’

‘Two people,’ he murmurs softly. ‘They are sort of childhood sweethearts. Know each other better than anyone else ever could.’

Something tightens in my stomach at his words. He won’t meet my eyes.

‘They don’t end well,’ he continues. ‘Something happens. They lose each other.’

I swallow. ‘Sounds heavy.’

‘It is. The boy is distraught and heartbroken. He thought he was doing the right thing, but he lost the person he loved most in the world,’ he says quietly. Then his eyes lift to mine, and the breath gets trapped in my lungs at the pain in them. I see exhaustion, too. Regret. Things survived rather than processed, as if he’s been carrying the weight of a hundred unsaid words, a thousand nights spent replaying the same moments over and over in his mind, wondering how everything went so wrong. I know he feels this way, because I’ve felt the same.

‘Years later, they find each other again.’

I can barely hear the noise of the bar over the thud of my heartbeat in my ears.

‘And?’

‘And they’re different people now,’ he says. ‘But they’re still in love with each other. They could never quite let each other go.’

‘I see. So, it’s a romance?’

His gaze is dark and unreadable. ‘I suppose so. I guess it’s a romance.’

‘You suppose?’

‘A dark romance, maybe.’

‘Right. Do they get back together, then? The couple?’

‘Depends.’

‘Depends?’

‘I haven’t written the end yet. They’ve only just reconnected.’

His words sit between us. I curl my fingers tightly around my glass, my knuckles whitening.

He’s writing about us.

A strange mix of emotions swirl inside me: warmth, fear, and a yearning that I’ve tried to push away for so many years. I feel exposed, as if he’s holding up a mirror and asking if I recognise the reflection.

‘And how’s that going for them?’ I ask lightly, forcing a smile.

His gaze stays on me. ‘Complicated.’

I nod slowly, staring at the condensation sliding down my glass. ‘Sounds familiar.’

There’s a moment of silence as he studies me, waiting to see if I’ll say it. If I’ll acknowledge the truth he’s laid bare between us, but I don’t. I still don’t know what I want, or what I’m ready to face, because admitting it – that I’m standing at the beginning of a story yet to be finished – is terrifying.

‘Sounds like you’ve got a lot to work through,’ I manage to say, the words feeling thick in my throat.

His lips twitch. ‘You could say that.’

A desperate part of me is wondering how the story ends. How I want it to end.

Reaching for my glass, I tip my head back and finish my drink in one greedy gulp.

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