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“Whatever, you loved it. Already destined to be a history teacher given your taste in films.”

“History is the best.”

“Yeah, yeah.” I wave a slice of pizza at him. “Just press play.”

Throughout the movie, Tom provides an unsolicited running commentary on the film’s historical inaccuracies.

“Sure, because obviously the Emperor would just stroll into the arena alone to fight a gladiator. That’s not wildly impractical or historically impossible at all. Just another Tuesday.”

Tom stretches his arms up and rests one leg on the coffee table in front of us. The light plays off his face, which is lightly tanned from the sun. As he stretches I have to quickly look away from the sliver of very exposed, and very defined, stomach. Damn, I wish he’d left that shirt tucked in.

Or maybe not. He has a nice stomach.

“Thanks, Professor.” I roll my eyes. “Maybe they should get you to consult on films in your spare time, given you’re such a bundle of fun.”

He scowls at me.

We get two minutes of chastised silence before he has to comment again for my “health”, because apparently the Colosseum wasn’t even called the Colosseum back then (“It was The Flavian Amphitheatre, even my Year 7 class knows that”).

Eventually, I pause the film to go and refill the wine and grab our dessert whilst Tom washes up the plates.

“I think last time we watched this I was crying over another idiot boy,” I tell him as I crack open the Ben & Jerry’s. “Over ten years later and nothing has changed. What was he called, maybe your sister would remember—Charlie? John?”

I hunt for an ice cream scoop in the drawer, the name of the guy who upset younger me continuing to elude me.

“It was Dave, and he was a twat,” Tom tells me.

Ah, yes, Dave. Tom’s right, he was a twat.

“I can’t believe you remember that.” I finally find the ice cream scoop, not where I thought I’d left it. “I think I’d blanked it from my mind, along with the other boys.”

“Yeah, well, he made you cry because he told you that you were stupid, so I definitely remember him.”

“Oh well, I was never that great at school,” I tell him awkwardly. “Not like the rest of you guys anyway.”

“You were good at school. You were just surrounded by people who were loud about being clever.”

I glance over at him. Tom’s still drying up the dishes, oblivious to the fact that he’s just said something that’s burrowed right into my chest. Something I wish someone had said to me ten years ago.

“And anyway,” he adds, “you were always smart in the ways that actually matter. And you think before you speak, which is more than I can say for ninety percent of people. Also you’re really creative, I remember how great your painting and photography was at school.”

“I remember Dave telling me I was ‘endearingly slow’ once.”

Tom snorts. “Dave couldn’t find the capital of France on a labelled map.”

That makes me laugh again. A proper belly laugh. But there’s also a small knot in my throat. The sort you get when someone is unexpectedly kind to you, and you weren’t ready for it.

“Thanks,” I say quietly.

He nods at me. “Any time. Now give me that ice cream. I need fuel for my next lecture on historical accuracy when Maximus starts doing parkour again.”

I smile and hand him a bowl, before unpausing the film.

When the credits start rolling neither of us make any effort to move. Somehow over the course of the last thirty minutes we’ve slowly been gravitating closer to each other. Tom nudges me with his knee.

“You never told me what was so awful about your date earlier.”

I groan and rest my head against the back of the sofa. “I don’t know where to begin. The intense boredom, the fact that he only asked me two questions in an hour, or that the whole date was my mother’s idea.”