The velvet’s making my spine itch.

It’s antique, supposedly. Some red chaise dragged in from one of the abandoned ballrooms upstairs. Half-moon shape. Gold legs. Faint smell of dust and something vaguely church-like. And here I am—shirtless, barefoot, a smudge of graphite on my ribcage like I’m someone’s messy little sin.

“Have I never noticed or do you always make that face when you’re sketching?” I ask, stretching a little. Not too much. Just enough that the muscles along my stomach shift like light against wet stone.

She doesn’t look up. But I feel her side eye and hear her not-there sigh.

I lean back further into the velvet and spread my legs like I’m trying to get arrested by the spirit of John Ruskin. “Serious question. Am I being drawn or being judged?”

“You’re always being judged,” she mutters, flicking her wrist over the page. “You just usually like it.”

“Oh, ow.” I press a hand to my heart. “Accusing the model of narcissism while still drawing him feels a little… ungrateful.”

She snorts, biting back a smile. That’s the real prize here. Not the sketch. Not even the fact that I’ve successfully wormed my way into her studio slot again under the pretence of “study”—it’s that split-second crinkle in the corner of her eyes. The one that shows up when I make her laugh despite herself. The one that proves she’s not immune to me, no matter how many faux-exasperated sighs she lets out when I start monologuing about set theory.

“How’s my symmetry?” I ask, head tilted. “Still golden ratio adjacent? I’ve been slouching in lectures lately.”

“Hold still, Valentino.”

Outside, the light’s turned that late afternoon kind of gold—the good kind, the kind that makes everything look slightly more expensive. Which is saying something, because this room already looks like the inside of an oil painting: tall windows, thick Oxford stone walls, a ceiling mural. The kind of room you could spend five hours in and still discover something new.

“I’m serious,” I go on, wanting to hear her talk.

“You’re ruining it,” she says, but her voice is smiling now.

“Ruining it or improving it? Because there’s a very thin line between those two. Just ask Duchamp.”

She hums like she’s pretending to consider it. “You’re more Boucher than Duchamp. Flushed and reclining like some overfed nobleman waiting to be fed grapes.”

I grin. “Say you wanna feed me grapes, then. Don’t be coy.”

She throws a paintbrush at me. Misses. Barely. And I laugh.

The velvet groans as I shift, one hand lazily tracing a curve into the upholstery.

“Tell me something interesting,” she says suddenly, not looking up.

I blink. “Mathematically interesting or just… Romulus interesting?”

“Either.”

I pretend to consider it. “Did you know Fermat’s Last Theorem was unsolved for three hundred and fifty-eight years because of a single line he scribbled in the margin of a book?”

{{user}} pauses her pencil.

“In Latin, obviously,” I go on. “Something like, ‘I have a truly marvellous proof of this proposition which this margin is too narrow to contain.’ Which—sorry, but imagine being that smug. Dying with the answers and just never telling anyone. Legend.”

She glances up, smiling, properly now. “Sounds like you.”

“Excuse you. If I had a marvellous proof, I’d have it printed in the Financial Times and tattooed on my thigh.”

“You’d post it on an Insta story.”

“Touché.”

Another beat of silence. Not the awkward kind. The kind where our brains are just… walking alongside each other. I like those. I don’t get them often. Most people make me feel like I’m narrating a documentary in my head.

“Teach me something in Italian,” she says next, still sketching. Her tone’s offhand, but I catch the edge in it. Like she’s testing something.

I shift again, sit up a little straighter. “What do you want to know?”

“Something useless. Pretty.”

Useless. Pretty. I search for a phrase, something decadent and just a little too much. Something like her.

“La bellezza non chiede il permesso,” I say slowly, watching her eyes flick up. “Beauty doesn’t ask permission.”