“Do you remember Jae?” he asked.
I walked upstairs to the kitchen and started choosing fruit to make a smoothie. “Your best friend from school?”
“My best friend, period.”
“Yeah, I remember him.”
I always thought Dillon and Jae were like chalk and cheese. Like me, Dillon had been pretty active growing up. We had both played football and rugby and done karate. We’d been big for our age, tall as well as broad. However, I’d always been bigger than Dillon in every dimension, even before I’d started working on having and maintaining muscle definition.
Jae, on the other hand, had been a slip of a kid. He’d been the shortest in their class and one of the skinniest. At fourteen, he’d shot up like a beanpole but stayed slender. He’d always had his nose stuck in a book or fashion magazine. He was the kid at school who sat up straight, listened in every lesson, and always put their hand up—and knew all the answers too—and he’d been into singing, acting, and dancing. Ballet. Tap. Jazz. You name it, and he’d done it. The number of times Dillon had had to stand up for Jae was unreal.
“He’s who I need to ask a favour for,” Dillon said.
I tipped some frozen fruits of the forest into my blender. “Oh?”
“He wants to be a model.”
I wasn’t sure what that had to do with me. “I’m listening.” I tossed in some blueberries and a banana.
“And he’s got a chance to wow five modelling agencies in a month. The snag is that they’re all in London. Travelling there and back isn’t cheap and accommodation is even worse.”
As Dillon talked, I added some chia seeds, goji berries, a dash of cinnamon, and some honey. “Right…”
“Is there any chance he could stay with you?”
I’d just opened the fridge door, but I froze and stared at the contents as though I’d forgotten what I wanted. Cool air blew across my bare skin. I blamed it for the goosebumps covering my arms. “For a month?”
“I know it’s a long time, but he’ll be quiet as a mouse. You’ll barely know he’s there. You’ve got two bedrooms, haven’t you?”
I took out a carton of milk and a pot of natural yoghurt and added some of both to the ingredients in the blender. I did have two bedrooms, but one of them was set up as my studio. I did two live streams every weekday, one for YouTube and the other for True Fans. I didn’t mind doing my YouTube one with someone else in the apartment, but the True Fans one? That would be weird. Not that I could use it as a reason not to let Jae stay. I hadn’t told Dillon I had a True Fans account, and I wasn’t going to.
“Xander? Say something?”
“One sec.”
I pushed the power button on the blender. The noise of it smooshing the ingredients into pulp filled the open-plan living space and gave me an excellent excuse to stay quiet for around thirty seconds. When it finished, I poured the thick smoothie into a tall glass and took a long sip. It was refreshing.
“Being a model is his dream,” Dillon told me. “He needs somewhere to stay. I’ll owe you one.”
I rubbed my temples with one hand. Dillon wasn’t going to let up. I knew from experience that my brother could turn on the charm and get anything he wanted.
“Fine. He can stay here.”
“Really? You’re amazing.”
“I know.” I’d need to remember not to wander around my loft apartment naked while Jae stayed with me. “Let me know when he’s coming. I’ll meet him at the train station.” Something told me Jae wouldn’t be travelling light, especially if he’d be staying for a whole month. I sighed. “Tell him to come a few days early. I’ll show him around and help him get his bearings.”
“Really?”
“Yes. We can’t have him being late because he doesn’t know how to get to the modelling agencies, can we?”
“You’re the best, Xander.”
“Yeah, yeah. You’re going to owe me, though. Big time. A month is a long time.”
“You won’t know he’s there.”
“You said that already. I don’t believe you.”
