I waited two days before I said anything. I turned it over in my head the way you turn a stone in your pocket, smooth it down, look for the angle, find the version that doesn’t make you sound like you were eavesdropping in the dark.

I didn’t find one. So I just said it.

Thursday night. His apartment, not mine. He was in the kitchen making something that smelled like garlic and burnt olive oil, and I was sitting on his couch with my legs pulled up, and I said: “I was at the bar Wednesday. I heard you on the phone.”

He went still. Not the whole body,...