FRANCESCA
then what
ELLIOT
first entry will be filed by morning
FRANCESCA
that’s a lock?
Elliot didn’t know what he was promising, but committing to a deadline was at least one thing he was good at.
Birdie noticed his phone’s constant vibrations.
“Someone at this port of call?”
Elliot wondered if it was possible for ears to blush, and if they could, whether she noticed that his felt like they were on fire.
“You know that I don’t just bounce from city to city looking to fall into bed with someone, right?”
Birdie raised and lowered her eyebrows like she’d heard differently, and Elliot wanted to argue with her, prove to her that she didn’t know him as well as she thought she did, but he did often fall into bed with women in different cities, so he lost his will to debate the finer points of the argument before it even started.
“It’s my editor,” he said instead.
“Tell her we’ll get her the most amazing happily-ever-after,” Birdie replied. “I genuinely think this is brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. I didn’t expect to be this excited to see Ian, but, honestly, I am.”
Elliot tried not to let it get to him, the way that her demeanor had shifted, the way that she seemed lighter at the idea of a reunion with her first love.
“So you and Ian. How did it end? It can’t be because of his cooking. Because, wow, I do love his mussels.”
“You love his muscles?” Birdie replied. “That’s a little weird, but I don’t tell you how to do your job. Is he, like, super in shape now or something?”
Elliot laughed and thought again of how she got the lyricswrong all those years ago in the back of his Honda. “No, mussels. The seafood. I love his mussels.”
“Oh, he used to make me those too,” she said, then something passed over her face, unreadable. Another pause. “Though they were never my thing. I pretended for him, though. I didn’t want to let him down.”
“Can I ask you something?” Elliot posited.
“You can ask me anything you want.” Her eyes were dead ahead, her posture ramrod straight.
“Okay, let me rephrase. If I ask you something, will you answer honestly?” Birdie chewed her lip and didn’t answer him. “Fine,” he continued. “I’ll ask, and you decide.”
She offered a curt nod and adjusted both hands on the wheel. He could see that she wasn’t comfortable, that she’d give him a pat answer or some clipped little sound bite. One of Elliot’s better qualities as a journalist was being able to read his subjects, and he knew that this was not the time to press her, rather the time to ease off and let her come to trust him. He’d just thought that she would already—that trust between them would be innate. Though he knew he’d given her reasons to be wary.
“It’s okay, actually,” he said. “We have time to get into everything else.” There was a shift, small but still detectable, in her body language. Like this was exactly what she needed from him. He took note. “Do you think that Ian was intimidated by your fame?”
Birdie shook her head. “I wasn’t famous when we were together. Also, fame is... I mean, I don’t want to sound too woo-woo Hollywood, but it’s what I said to you yesterday, and I mean it: fame is just, like, it’s window dressing, it’s an extra complication to having a normal life. It’s, not to sound too much like aridiculous movie star, but it really is a construct. And Ian would be the first one to point that out.”
“It’s way more than a construct, Birdie,” Elliot pushed back. “It’s changed everything about you.”
She froze, and he realized that he hadn’t meant to say it like that. Goddammit. He should have said:I would like you if no one on the planet knew your name. I would like you if you were so famous that they planted a flag on the moon with your photo. I would like you under any circumstance.But why would she believe that from him? They’d had their chance, and they hadn’t spoken to each other in seven years.
Words were words were words. Elliot was very good at words. Actions were a totally different beast entirely.
Dear Readers:
I am excited to introduce you to the first in a multipart spotlight series set over the course of a whirlwind week, give or take a day, contingent on just how deep we get into this. I know some of you through your emails and through social media, but I’m taking a different beat here, one that I am no less exhilarated by. I don’t have to be embedded in a war in a far-flung country to tell thrilling, blood-pounding stories. This time out, we’re uncovering a mystery in real time, and I’ll be reporting developments as we go.
