"Would you like to go to the kitchen?" Ben asked as he let Nyra in the door. The living room was fine, but Ben had always found a kitchen to be a home's heart. From the kitchen where he sat with his parents, learning from both of them, whether it was traditional meals or economics or the history of distant lands, to the one in the flat he'd shared with three mates in university, arguing about sports and philosophy while he tried to teach three young men who could barely boil water for tea what it meant fold ingredients in, to the one he shared now with his girlfriend, who couldn't cook but still sat with him as they chatted about their day and he made a meal that she didn't need but always said she enjoyed all the same. It was a place for friends and family and conversation to go along with a meal, and while it wasn't the best place to actually have books, it was still good for a lively sort of discussion.

Ben put a kettle with water on the stove and turned it on before looking back at Nyra. "Do we talk about work, or do we... blatantly avoid talking about work?" he asked. "I don't mind either way, I assure you."