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"You found the grinder," he says.

"Third drawer."

"Second cupboard."

"Third drawer first," I say. "Then the second cupboard. Then the one above the stove." I settle back against the headboard beside him. "You have a system."

"Everything has a system."

I look at him. He is looking at his coffee, someone feeling something and choosing how much to show of it. I know this face. I have been learning this face for five months.

"Jan," I say.

He looks up. Something in his expression shifts — the careful composure making room for something else, something he doesn't usually let out where I can see it. I put my cup down. "Last night," I say. "Thank you. For the way you were. You made it easy."

He looks at me for a moment. Something moves in his face — something he lets move.

"You don't have to thank me," he says.

"I know. I wanted to say it anyway."

He looks at his coffee, and something shifts in his face. He is deciding something. I can see it, the internal negotiation, the weighing of what to say against what it costs to say it. Jan does not give things away easily. I have learned this. I wait.

"Last night was…” He stops. Starts again, more carefully. "I don't have a lot of experience. With this. With any of it."

He looks at his coffee.

"I don't relax easily. I don't trust easily. I've spent most of my adult life content with that." A pause. "I've ended things before they became anything because it was simpler."

I don't move. I don't want to interrupt him.

He looks up and meets my eyes with the steadiness he uses when something matters.

"You made me feel something I haven't felt before. Not just physically. I felt safe. With you." He pauses. "I let go in a way I didn't know I could."

The room is quiet. Outside, the canal and the ordinary Saturday morning.

"It wasn't difficult," he says. "Being that way with you. It was just…” He stops, choosing. "You."

There is nothing I can say that wouldn't be less than that.

I take his cup from his hands and put it down too. Then I pull him into me, properly, both arms around him, his back against my chest, and I hold on.

He goes still for a moment. Then he settles. His hands find my arms and he lets me hold him and we sit like that in the Saturday morning light.

I press my mouth to his hair. Then the side of his head. I can feel his breathing, slower now, steadier, and the warmth of him against my chest and the weight of everything he just said still sitting in the room between us.

"Jan," I say, against his temple.

"Yes."

I tighten my arms around him. "I'm here."

He is quiet for a moment. Then his hands tighten slightly on my arms.

"Good," he says. Quietly. Like the word costs something and he has decided it's worth it.

Then he reaches for his coffee and looks at the canal. I reach for my tea.