Eventually Sacha spoke again. "Hannah, haven't we already talked about this?"

"Yes, but you didn't take me seriously!"

"Should I have?"

"Then?" Hannah shrugged. "Maybe not. But now - seriously, I need a new housemate. And I don't want to live with a stranger. I want to live with someone I know."

"Hmm." Sacha paused again for a few moments. "Why's your housemate moving out?"

"I don't know, she says she wants to live by herself or something. To be honest her and me never really got along all that well. Clash of personalities, you know." Sacha raised her eyebrows in open query. "But you know me, Sacha" Hannah smiled, to counteract Sacha's unspoken concerns. "We get along, don't we?"

Sacha's mouth tightened. "Sure" she said.

"So what's the problem?"

Sacha thought about this. She thought about it for what seemed like a long time. Why was she so reluctant? She kept asking herself that, kept looking for the answer. All of a sudden, she realised there wasn't one: not a good one, not really. Just a general indefinable concern. She said, at last: "It's just sudden, I guess."

"Okay" said Hannah. She'd known this would take a bit of persuasion. "Have you ever been to my house?" she asked.

"I don't think so . . . Oh, wait, yeah. For that party."

"Oh. That." Hannah rolled her eyes. "Forget about that. We were excited, the house isn't normally like that. It's really nice and quiet. And warm. And . . . it's a home, you know?"

"Sounds lovely."

"It is. But it's better to live in than to visit." Hannah could see that Sacha was still undecided. "Listen" she said, "I know you don't like your flat. There's no shame in that. We've all lived in places we hate; it's nothing to be embarrassed about. And I know you don't get along that well with most people. There's nothing wrong with that either, that's their loss. But . . . What I'm saying here is, we get along, us two, we get along pretty well. And I've got a lovely place, not a flat, a house. A home. And I need someone. And I want it to be you. So . . . What d'you say?"

Sacha opened her mouth to reply - her quickest reply of the conversation so far - but suddenly had second thoughts. It was too easy to say 'no'. It was too easy just to not bother changing anything. But where did that get her? It was true, she did want to get out of her flat. And it wasn't like Hannah's place was much further to commute to work and back. And it would make things simple. She wanted things, just once, to be simple. So she changed her mind about what she'd been on the verge of saying. Instead, she said:

"Sure. Okay. Why not?"