I should say no. If any of the other Juliets realised she was in here with me, it’d be disastrous.
But she was sitting across the table from me, right in the spot where she always sat, and some animal part of my brain had sagged in relief.
‘Fine,’ I said. ‘On one condition. Make me another coffee.’
‘Deal.’
I knew the second I tasted it that she’d made me decaf, but I didn’t say anything.
I scrubbed through some footage from the First Night Party. Lily kicked her shoes off under the table and twisted her chair sideways, folding her feet up under her in a way that was so familiar it made something inside me ache. ‘Are you planning to develop anything around her?’ she asked, as wewent through Romeo-Dylan’s first chat with Marija, footage on 2x speed. ‘They’ve got a nice vibe together. I noticed it during the photo shoot date. He likes her.’
‘Marija’s definitely a wifey.’ I made some notes. ‘She’s got a good backstory: cancer survivor, now a philanthropist. Matches up well to Dylan JM’s whole charity deal. She’ll be final four for sure.’
‘You should make sure Amanda gets cut before then.’
I stopped typing and looked at her. ‘What?’
‘Amanda and Marija look too similar. Think of the optics. You don’t want to get to final four on the first ever diversely cast season and have half the top contenders be blonde white girls.’
‘Oh. Yes. Good.’
‘What did you think I was going to say?’
I considered it for a moment.
‘This is strict cone of silence,’ I said at last.
‘Of course.’
‘I mean it.’
‘So do I. Seriously, Murray, who do you think I’m going to tell?’
I ate the last bite of my toast and wiped my fingers on a serviette. ‘I don’t always know what you’re going to do anymore.’
Lily sighed. ‘How long am I going to have to grovel?’
‘Significantly longer than two days.’
She didn’t say anything.
I cracked first. ‘What?’
‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘I’m just putting together a mental list of all your favourite foods so I can plan some apology meals.My skills definitely don’t extend to osso bucco, but maybe if I do some strategic bullying of the right people, I can make it happen.’
‘I can’t be bribed that easily.’
‘Yes you can. Tell me what you were going to tell me.’
I exhaled. ‘Amanda’s bi.’
Lily snorted. ‘No shit, Sherlock.’
I ignored her reaction. ‘She’s not out on the show – didn’t even come out to us in her application – but one of the reasons we cast her is because we were hoping to develop a little queer romance B-plot on the side. A feel-good one, not a Tony special.’
‘Okay.’
‘There are a few other bi women in the mix. Including Marija. I was hoping you would tell me they were vibing and that I should get Amanda cut if I wanted to make Marija believable as a potential winner.’
