"I thought they'd be safer with you," he says, with the implication that they'd still be in an envelope on his kitchen counter if he'd passed them on. It's a lie, he's careful to the point of precision about fine details, a compulsion he covers well by avoiding work altogether when he can, but forgetting tickets would never be a concern.

He holds the lobby doors for her, standing in the mid-ground of the battle between chilly air and the building's central heating. "If we head back round the building we could walk there through the park."