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“I am, and I am regretting it already⁠—”

“You are asking my advice on a man. I have been waiting for this moment since the day I met you. I want you to know that I have been preparing.”

“You’re making this weird.”

“Okay. Okay. I am going to be serious.” She sits forward. Crosses her legs. Clasps her hands like a TV therapist. “Option one: You could play the whole game thing. There are ways to find these things out that involve going on his iPad while he’s in the shower and a whole, like, sting operation. I can talk you through it. I know people who have done it. I will not name names, but I know it has been successful.”

I groan.

“Yeah,” she says, satisfied. “I thought that would be your response. So. Seriously, Bea, your only actual option is to ask him.”

“That feels so…immature.”

“Immature?”

“It does.”

“Bea. It is the opposite of immature. Knowing where you stand with someone is, like, the single most mature thing you can do. That is rule one-oh-one of modern dating. The people who don’t ask are the people who get blindsided. The people who ask are the people who get information. Information is power. Information is adult.”

“But what if —” I look at the ceiling. “What if we’re on totally different pages?”

“Then, babe, it’s way better you find that out now than in three months. Trust me.”

There is something in her face when she says trust me that makes me think she’s thinking back to her own experiences.

I lean across and give her a hug. She lets me. She is, briefly, smaller against my shoulder than she usually is.

“Thanks,” she says into my collarbone. “I have, officially, given up on college men.”

“Oh no.”

“Oh yes.”

“You could—you know—date a rockstar.”

She pulls back. Looks at me with an expression of pity.

“No thanks.”

“No? I thought you loved bands and music and fandoms?”

“No offense. Callum seems sweet. He looks at you in a way that’s so lustful it’s almost gross. But my only other interaction with the rockstar species has been with Luca, who is, Bea—and I want to be precise here—a dickhead.”

I open my mouth.

“Don’t.”

“I haven’t said⁠—”

“You’re going to ask me about that night.”

“I am.”

“I am not going to tell you.”

“Sydney.”

“Nope.”