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I nodded, thinking how confident he must be to even put himself out there in the first place. I’d tried acting once, when I was at school and had had such extreme stage fright that I’d begged Nan to call and tell them I was sick (which, of course, she refused to do).
‘Is it as hard as they say, then? Constant rejection and all that?’ I asked.
I handed him the package, wondering why I was still holding it.
He took it, putting it under his arm, laughing softly. ‘It’s tough, yeah. But the thing is, when it goes well, when you actually get the part and you’re up there on stage in front of a couple of hundred people – twenty people, even – it’s the most amazing job on earth.’
‘That’s why you keep doing it,’ I said, understanding. I got what it was like to crave recognition for your work, although in my case it was on a much smaller, subtler scale.
‘It’s the unpredictability of it that gets you,’ he added, drumming his fingers on his parcel. ‘I mean, I could never afford to live somewhere like this usually,’ he said, waving his arm around the stairwell. ‘I’m only here because Tom wants to keep the flat on while he’s in New York and he’s charging me a token rent. Otherwise I’d be back living in a crappy house-share.’
‘I know the feeling,’ I said. I tightened my ponytail thinking I ought to get going on my run because as the minutes passed, I felt more and more like sacking it off.
He looked doubtful. ‘You do?’
‘Why did you look at me like that?’ I asked him, narrowing my eyes.
‘Like what?’ he said, all innocently.
‘Like you don’t believe I know the feeling.’
He looked sheepish. ‘Well, you’ve probably got a nice stable job, haven’t you? So I just thought you probably don’t have to worry about making the rent.’
I hung my mouth open in mock outrage. ‘I’ll have you know that I rented the place with my ex-boyfriend, so everything was split two ways. And then when he moved out, my intention was to move out too, because I couldn’t afford it on my own.’
What had I mentioned Dan for? Not that Jack would necessarily care, but I was still smarting from the humiliation of moving in with someone I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with and then having them move out six months later.
‘Sorry to hear about that,’ said Jack. ‘And I apologise for making assumptions about your finances. It’s not cheap to live round here, is it?’
‘You can say that again. Mind you, it’s nice in Hampstead, isn’t it?’
‘Yeah,’ replied Jack, looking over his shoulder as an appliance beeped in his kitchen. ‘Even if I am surrounded by rich people 24/7.’
I smiled. ‘I can’t decide if I find it aspirational or if I’m just insanely jealous.’
He looked up at the ceiling, pretending to consider it. ‘If you’re anything like me, I would suggest insanely jealous?’
I fiddled with my Fitbit strap, rotating it back and forth. He was probably exaggerating about his financial status, anyway. I could tell by his voice that he was one of those middle-class boys who’d had everything handed to him on a plate and couldn’t quite get his head round the fact that the one thing he wanted more than anything – i.e. an acting job – was permanently evading him. There were loads of them round here, guys wearing beanie hats and tracksuits because they wanted to look all street and then going back to their parents’ five-storey family home for Sunday lunch. His parents were probably paying his rent on this place anyway, however ‘token’ he’d declared it.
‘Sorry, I’ve just realised I haven’t asked you a single question about yourself,’ said Jack.
‘A self-obsessed actor? Shocker,’ I teased.
We both laughed, which felt nice. He was actually quite easy to talk to when he wasn’t ranting at me about something.
‘We’re not all like that, you know.’
‘If you say so.’
‘What have you got against actors?’
‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘I’ve never even met one before.’
‘Well there’s Tom,’ he said.
‘Oh, yeah.’
Obviously I could hardly start slagging off his friend, but I had the feeling that even Jack could see that Tom was exactly the sort of luvvie type that most people would find irritating. His cocky, resonant voice would ring out across the landing at all hours and his too-cool-for-school attitude meant that he appeared permanently aloof. I didn’t suppose it was fair to tar all actors with the same brush, but Tom was all I had to go on.
