Adam's message came while Leah was taking her shoes off.
I'm finished at the house. Do you want to talk?
She sat on the floor with one shoe in her hand. For the whole walk home she'd heard Finn saying he would get her back. It had made the good things feel stolen from her after she'd already had them. The game, the dancing, the hours she'd spent telling Mara she liked someone.
She set the shoe beside its partner and answered.
Yes. Come here.
Adam arrived twenty minutes later. He waited outside until she opened the door, then followed her up to the flat. Neither said anything on the stairs.
She didn't offer tea. They stood in the sitting room, where the cushion still held a little crease from Finn's visit on Sunday. Leah picked it up and straightened it. Then she put it down again.
“What happened after I left?”
“People asked questions. Finn answered. I answered.”
“Did Mara?”
“Some. She went out for a while. Came back for her things.”
“With Finn?”
“He was still there when I left.”
Adam looked at the sofa. She sat at one end, and he took the other. It was wider than his. They would have to move to touch each other.
“I didn't know,” he said.
“I know.”
“Any of it. About them.”
“I heard your face tonight.” She shook her head, annoyed with herself. “I saw it. I know you didn't.”
He leaned forward, elbows on his knees.
“He wanted you to leave me.”
“Yes.”
She didn't make it easier by saying Finn hadn't meant it or that Mara had made him. Adam sat with the words. She heard somebody in the flat below turn a television up.
“I want us to stay together,” he said.
Leah looked at him. He had used a different shirt for tonight, but it was the same man on her sofa. He still had the little scar beneath his lip that she could find with her mouth in the dark. She wanted him to come across the space between them and hold her until she stopped hearing her brother.
“I can't do that now,” she said.
He looked down.
“Because I lied.”
“Because when things went wrong you decided what I would do. I'm still angry about it. Even after what Finn said. Even knowing they used you.”
“I won't do it again.”
“I heard you say I was outside with you. I heard how easily you could say my name.”
He pressed his hands together. “It wasn't easy.”
“It came out.”
“Yes.”
Leah stood. Sitting so far away from him had begun to feel like another arrangement made to survive an evening. She wanted the evening over.
Adam got up too.
“I could give you a few days,” he said.
“I'm ending this.”
His face changed at last. He stopped making himself ready for the next thing she'd say.
“I don't want to,” she added.
“Then—”
“I don't trust you the way I did. I won't go back to bed with you and hope it comes back while we sleep.”
He stood with one hand on the arm of the sofa.
“Okay.”
She had expected something more. A plea, perhaps. She hated how much she wanted one.
“I'll get your toothbrush,” she said.
In the bathroom she found it beside hers, blue and green leaning together in the cup. She put his in a small bag from the drawer and brought it back. Adam took it without looking inside.
“Do you have anything of mine?” she asked.
“Your striped top.”
“Bring it to the shop when you can.”
“Okay.”
He picked his jacket up. At the front door he stopped, holding the toothbrush bag against his palm.
“I'm sorry, Leah.”
She nodded. If she spoke, she would ask him to stay. She knew it from the pressure in her throat.
He opened the door and went down the stairs.
Leah kept it open until she heard the outside door close. Then she shut it, slid the bolt across and stood there with her hand on it.
Her phone rang. Finn. She watched his name until the call ended. A message followed, saying he needed to explain properly.
She wrote, You explained. I need some time. Don't come round.
He sent a long answer. She didn't open it. She turned the phone over and went to her bedroom.
Her climbing bag was at the foot of the bed, where she'd put it on Sunday. She moved it into the cupboard. The zip was still open, with the spare top caught in it. She freed the fabric before she closed the doors.
Then she got into bed. She left the other pillow where it was.