Page 47 of The Hopelessly Bromantic Duet

17

IT WILL BE A WONDERFUL DEATH

TJ

I daydream more than I should the next few days at the office. Normally, reporting on the falling pound and the Bank of England’s plans for interest rates keep my mind trained on the here and now.

Also, you know, deadlines.

But that didn’t help me on Monday. Tuesday. Or today.

This article is due at four, and I’m only half done, and it’s one-thirty. I need to call another source, but as the rain patters down on the city outside my office window, I’m someplace else.

I’m in the park three days ago, my fingers threading through Jude’s hair.

I’m outside in the rain this afternoon, kissing him in an alleyway, up against a wall.

I’m at home in our flat tonight?—

And I can’t.

I have to shut down those thoughts. They’ve zigzagged through my head since Sunday.

I swivel my chair, return to my laptop, and crank up the music in my earbuds. I need to drown out the sounds of the office, of other phone calls in other cubicles, of reporters tapping furiously on keyboards, of editors barking out orders.

Need to focus.

I laser in on the next few sentences in my assignment. But one paragraph later, my fingers itch to recheck my phone. I give in and tap out a quick text.

TJ:Any word yet?

Jude:No. It’s been eighty-four years, and I’m dying.

TJ:Don’t die before you get the part.

Jude:It’s no use. I’ve keeled over. It was lovely knowing you.

TJ:Does it normally take this long to hear about a callback?

Jude:This is a message from Jude in the afterlife. He says that waiting to know if you got a gig takes approximately a millennium.

TJ:Well, if you need a distraction, there’s a band playing tonight at The Cat’s Meow. The lead singer is in some show on the West End calledWicked(*shudders*) but when the theater is dark, she moonlights with her band, Ten-Speed Rabbit.

Jude:There is so much to unpack in that text that you raised me from the dead. First, is the band named after a vibrator? Second, YOU MEAN AMELIA STONE? Third, you don’t likeWicked????????

I smile as I reply, the music ricocheting through my head—a sexy, dirty song from Ten-Speed Rabbit.

TJ:I hate musicals. And before you ask why, it’s because no one breaks out in song in real life. And yes, it seems Amelia named her band for a very specific sex toy. I’m guessing because Sex Toys was taken, or maybe she went with Ten-Speed Rabbit out of cheek.

Jude:Never underestimate the value of cheek. But the flaw in your rationale for your dislike of musicals? International teenage spy Rhys Locke didn’t actually rappel from buildings to save millions in stolen sapphires, and yet you still like those Alistair Edwin’s novels. Since when did something have to be real for you to like it?

TJ:When music was added to plays.

Jude:I will never understand you. And yes, I would love a distraction, but I have to work tonight.

Jude’s been working every night. I haven’t seen him since Sunday—our schedules this week are the opposite.

Maybe that’s for the best. Maybe I should stop texting him. Maybe that’ll make me stop feeling things for him.