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I want to ask him about the heartbreak, about what he was feeling, about everything he said on stage, but I can’t find the words.

He speaks first. ‘I wrote it for you,’ he says.

‘You wrote what for me?’ I ask.

‘Chess Lessons. The new book. It’s for you.’ He leans down to the bag he left backstage and pulls out a bound manuscript and hands it to me.

‘What do you mean it’s for me?’

The manuscript is pleasingly heavy in my hands. As much as I love a finished book, there has always been something special about holding a printed manuscript, four hundred or so pages of A4 paper, the sheer bulk of it.

‘You write for one reader, and, this time, I was writing for you. I reread all your annotations in my first two books and I had it all in my head when I wrote this: what you find funny, what you like.’ He smiles at me and shrugs. ‘You’re my reader.’

‘Oh. Xav.’ I feel unexpectedly shy and can’t think of what to say.

‘And now I want your notes on this one. I want your edit.’

I burst into surprised laughter.

‘My edit?’

‘If you have time. If you want to read it.’

‘Of course I want to read it.’

‘I’ll pay you of course.’

‘You don’t need to pay me.’ I hug the manuscript to my chest.

He’s looking at me like he used to, and we’re standing close to each other. It would be so easy to kiss him right now.

Over Xavier’s shoulder, I see Hillary appear at the top of the stairs.

‘Xavier, there are people waiting for you at the signing table, you need to get down there,’ she says briskly. I can see her taking in the sight of us in, how close we are, how I was looking at him, the way I’m hugging the manuscript.

‘Oh, sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt,’ she adds, and her voice is as smooth as silk. It sends a shiver down my spine.

‘You weren’t interrupting. We were, we were just…we were nothing,’ I babble.

Xavier touches my arm. ‘Talk later?’ he says. I nod, and watch him follow Hillary down the stairs.

I want him, I want him.

No.

I love him.

So much my chest is hurting. I feel raw, unprotected, exposed.

‘Charlotte? Are you coming?’

I look up and Hillary is back, staring at me.

‘Coming where?’

‘To the signing table. People want to meet you too.’

‘Oh, right.’