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“Your best friend’s being an asshole,” I say without preamble.
He takes that in. “Ok, I have questions. One, when did you run into Luke? And two, why do you always give him such a hard time?”
“I’m not the one being difficult!” I protest. I pinch the bridge of my nose. “He hired me to help write his memoir. Except we’re on a tight deadline, and he keeps canceling our first interview.”
“Ah,” Cooper says. There’s a wealth of knowledge in thatah.Like he knows exactly why Luke’s doing this to me.
“I need you to tell me what to do to get him on board with this,” I say. “I thought he was, but now he’s...” I trail off, too frustrated for words. “What do I do, Coop?”
I dodge around a group of tourists, waiting for Cooper’s answer.
“Here’s what you need to know about Luke. Not only is he responsible for thousands of people’s jobs, but his division is also responsible for maintaining quality control of every plane Helius Airlines puts in the air.”
“I get it, he’s busy—”
“No, he’s effective. Since they put Luke in charge of Strategic Planning and Performance, not a single Helius Airlines flight has had any kind of performance issue. Do you know how insanely rare that is?”
Ok, that’s impressive.
Not that I’m ever going to tell Luke that.
“If he’s canceling on you, it’s not because he’s being a dick. It’s because he’s personally invested in making sure millions of people can travel safely to their destination,” Cooper says.
“Look, I’m glad he’s a conscientious airline owner,” I say. “Really. But that doesn’t mean he gets to hire me to do a job, then make it impossible for me to do it.”
Cooper sighs. “Yeah, that’s the second thing you need to know about Luke. He doesn’t trust reporters. And he hates being interviewed.”
I stop walking. “...What?”
“His dad made him give this interview when he was fifteen, right after his mom died. It was a shitshow,” Cooper explains. “It was supposed to be a puff piece about how Helius Airlines is a family-run company. But the reporter was a total asshole.”
Takes one to know one, I think, but then the rest of what Cooper said catches up with me.
That story means that Luke’s dad was making him give interviews when he was in high school. I assumed Luke had been in the public eye his whole life. But I never thought about what that meant in practice.
If someone had interviewed me in high school, I would have sounded like an idiot.
Luke’s made plenty of mistakes. But he’s also had his mistakes publicized to the whole world since he was teenager.
MaybeI can see why he’s avoiding our interview. Maybe.
“How do I get him to open up?” I ask.
Cooper laughs. “Fuck if I know. But don’t be afraid to show up at his office and drag him out into the sunlight. Sometimes you need to remind him there’s more to life than work.”
“Says the man who’s about to go on a month-long scientific expedition to the heart of the Amazon rainforest,” I say. My brother is a cheerful, deeply nerdy environmental biologist—pretty much the opposite of his grumpy billionaire best friend. But both men clearly share workaholic tendencies.
We chat about his upcoming trip, until I get to Luke’s offices.
I look up at the glass and steel building towering above me and swallow.
“Wish me luck,” I say.
“Nah,” Cooper chuckles. “He’s the one who needs luck.”
5
HAZEL
