Page 134 of People Skills

I am not equipped to speak to the general public, especially not right this second. But I dutifully follow Hillary down the stage stairs, and I hover next to Xavier and chat with a writers group who want to follow my program and have a lot of specific questions, and then I listen to an older man tell me about the memoir that he’s been writing for more than twenty years, and then another woman asks me for tips on getting published—and I feel like a therapist.

As the crowd dwindles, I look at the time. I need to check that another session is running smoothly, and respond to about ten urgent emails, and deal with an unhappy festival attendee who wants her ticket refunded. But all I want to do is talk to Xavier. He’s signing the last of the books, and I hover.

Kat taps me on the shoulder. ‘I’m sorry, but I need your help with the mics urgently at the scout hall,’ she says. ‘And, also, one of our volunteers is lost and needs help.’

‘Lost? In this town?’

‘They know where they are, but they don’t know how to get to where they need to be.’

‘Sure, okay,’ I say, casting a final look at Xavier.

Kat notices me looking at him. ‘I saw some of the session,’ she says, bumping me with her hip. ‘That was full-on. You two were practically going for it on the stage.’

‘Oh my god, we were not.’

‘Eye-fucking, at least,’ Kat says as we walk outside and hurry towards the scout hall.

‘We were not!’

‘Charlotte. Come on.’

‘We have a history, that’s all.’

‘And a future?’

‘No. I don’t know. It’s complicated.’

Kat is walking so fast I am having to jog to keep up with her.

‘You’ve had great sex and he’s clearly into you, what’s complicated?’ she says.

‘The Hillary factor. I can’t date her son and be her assistant. I’d have to resign. Or she’d get rid of me. And she was going to offer me a programming role, remember? That will be out the window. And then Xavier will realise he does want to be with Lana after all, not some unemployed loser in a small town, and he’ll leave me and I won’t be able to pay my rent because I have no job, so I’ll use all my savings to break my lease, and then I’ll have to go and live with Murray O’Healy because otherwise I would be homeless and I’m too proud to go back to my parents again.’

‘Well, firstly, Simone and I would take you in before we let you live with Murray,’ Kat says.

‘No, in this scenario Murray offers me employment as a live-in researcher and editor on his next book and I take the job.’

‘That could actually be a good career move,’ Kat says. ‘Go from town to town, helping middle-aged men get published.’

‘Shut up,’ I say.

We’re at the scout hall doors now, and the room is full of people. I am breathless from ranting and running.

Kat turns to me. ‘You know everything you just told me? That’s all just stuff you’ve made up in your head. You’re talking yourself out of it because you’re scared. Just tell him how you feel, and then see what happens.’

‘And what if everything I just said happens?’

‘Then you end up living with Murray O’Healy and you get really into ships.’ Kat grins at me. ‘Now please fix the microphones before Hillary hears they’ve broken again and yells at me for not buying new ones.’

I follow her into the hall, and it’s only in this moment I realise I have been tightly clutching Xavier’s manuscript this whole time.

40

IT’S LATE WHEN I walk into Simone’s bar, which is the unofficial gathering place for festival attendees and authors after the last session of the day. I looked for Xavier as I hurried from one event to the next, but I haven’t seen him since I left the signing table. I think he might have spent the rest of the afternoon with Murray’s walking tour. He sent me a message to say he’d be here, but the bar is so packed it’s impossible to tell.

The first person I run into is James.

He greets me with a hug. ‘That was a killer session this afternoon,’ he says.