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“Printed what?”
“Any written or printed matter that w-wasn’t supposed to be preserved. W-we have one of the most important collections in the world. Over 1.5 million items.”
“Wow.” He looked gratifyingly impressed. “I had no idea that was even a thing.”
I nodded. “It…it shows you the smallness and the nearness ofhistory. The w-way a society reflects its preoccupations and prejudices in its minutiae.”
I risked a glance at Adam. He had his chin propped on his hand, and he was watching me just as I’d thought he might. As though my own minutiae had value. “Do you have favourites?” he asked.
“I love w-whatever it is I’m working on.” It was true, but also an evasion of a kind. I wanted to give him more than that. For those eyes and all his smiles, I wanted to give him everything that mattered to me. “I…I came across a handbill once for a sapient pig.”41
He laughed. “You’re pulling my leg.”
“Unlike some people I could mention”—I gave him a prim look—“I wouldn’t do that. Toby the Sapient Pig made his debut in 1817 to great public acclaim. He even wrote his own autobiography.”42
“Is it the sort of thing you could show me? Or does it live in a temperature-controlled vault or something?”
“It’s carefully stored, b-but it’s a piece of paper about a pig, not the crown jewels. It’s also been digitised, so you can find it online.”
“I think I’d like best to see it with you.”
Unexpected heat surged to the surface of my skin. Why was I blushing? He’d asked to look at ephemera, not ravish me over the bench. And that was when I realised he’d focused the conversation on me, and on my passions, so adroitly and so naturally that I’d barely noticed. I’d thought myself such an expert at listening, at fading, at creating space for others. It was power of a kind. But here I was, all overthrown by a sandbag philosopher who listened because he wanted to listen, not because he was afraid to speak.
“I’m shu-s-sh…”I’m sure I could manage something. But I wastoo flustered, and I couldn’t get it out. Not even a little bit. So I just ended up nodding frantically at him like a cartoon dog. “I need to…”
I gathered up the cups and plates and disappeared into the kitchen with them so I didn’t have to look at him anymore, or the crinkly red-gold hairs that danced with the freckles on his forearms.
By the time I was sane enough to return, he was leaning back in the chair, his torch illuminating the empty hook and the dusty square of wall above the chimney piece. “I really like this,” he drawled in an unconvincing BBC accent. “It’ssoantiestablishment.”
I tried to laugh, but it was stuck in my throat. “I… My…my ex was an artist. He took his paintings w-w-with him w-when he left.”
“Oh my God, I’m sorry. I’m a tactless knob.”
“It’s f-fine.”
“Recent?”
I shook my head. Which made it worse, somehow. I should have been waving it aside, telling him it didn’t matter, smiling and being insouciant (which is a word I’ve never been able to say), not standing there, struck dumb and surrounded by spaces on walls, so utterlyleft.
“What happened?”
He asked the question gently, eyes full of an understanding I didn’t want, and I wished I’d been more careful with what I’d said before so I could lie to him now. I imagined being able to tell him,Oh, he died, with an air of noble melancholy, and then he would be able to comfort me, and I would be brave and slightly wounded,not just someone somebody else didn’t want. It was a terrible thing to think, but I thought it.
I sat down, folded my hands neatly in front of me on the table, and told the truth. “Nothing happened.”
He cocked his head curiously.
“He…f-fell out of love with me. Or didn’t love me enough. Or had never been in love with me. Or something. S-so it was over.”
“Oh, petal.” His hand covered mine in a sprawl of long fingers and chapped skin. “I’m so sorry.”
I pulled away. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what? Be vaguely sympathetic?”
“I d-don’t know. I don’t know how I want people to react.”
“It’s okay. Sometimes you just lose people. And it sucks.”
