45. Nell
45
NELL
Morning, Nell!
Feel free to come and sit with us today – Charlie’s just called in sick.
Bishi
I stare at the email as guilt begins to prickle in my chest.
This, surely, is not a coincidence. Charlie failing to show up on the day after he missed a big interview. On the day after I totally blanked him without explaining why. No way is he sick. He’s probably curled up under his duvet, feeling sorry for himself.
But screw him – that’s exactly where he deserves to be right now. He must know why I blanked him. No one should be feeling sorry for him. He’s the one who kissed Daphne, and he’s the one who lied about it.
I ignore the guilt, stand up and grab my bag.
‘Off to the vending machines?’ Jarrod asks. ‘Bit early, isn’t it?’
I laugh. Jarrod and I have developed a routine where one of us makes a snack run at least once a day. ‘No, sorry. The other intern’s sick, so I’m going to sit with the writers.’
Jarrod puffs out his cheeks and shakes his head. ‘You traitor, Nell.’
‘I’ll get you some Tangfastics after lunch to make up for it.’
He nods, gives me a fist-bump and puts his headphones back on. I’m actually going to miss Jarrod when I leave this place.
IfI leave this place. As I wind my way through the corridors towards the nook, I think about Talia mouthing the words ‘Writers’ Assistant’ at me yesterday in the edit suite. In just three weeks, I’ve done plenty to get myself into the team’s good books. And what has Charlie Francombe done? Nothing – except be the boss’s son. And, as of yesterday: screw up one of the biggest interviews the show has ever had.
Surely the job has to be mine? It has to be. I deserve it.
So why do I still feel that guilt prickling away? All day yesterday I swung between feeling like I’d sabotaged him and then reminding myself that he’d already sabotaged me, just by barging his way into this internship and hoofing me all the way into the IT department.
I turn the corner into marketing. Daphne gives me a cursory nod over her monitor as I pass. I nod back, wondering how much she knows. Are she and Charlie actually together, or was it just that one kiss? Was Charlie cheating on her when he slept with me?
The idea of it makes me wince, convincing me once and for all that I was definitely right to leave yesterday without waking him up.
My phone buzzes with a message on the group chat.
Chloe
Have you seen him yet??
She and Mica literally jumped on me as I walked through the front door last night. They frogmarched me to the sofa, shoved a glass of wine in my hand and demanded every last detail about the past twenty-four hours. So that’s what I gave them. I told them everything – the walk along the Thames with Charlie, him opening up to me about his dad, telling me the truth about that Ed Sheeran video. And then I told them about that first kiss, by Tower Bridge – how incredible it had been. How I’d honestly never had a kiss like it.
Then I told them about the hours that followed – the sex, obviously, but also the talking and laughing and snuggling afterwards. How I couldn’t remember ever feeling so comfortable with a guy.
And then – when even Mica had started to go gooey at this tale of such a ‘perfect’ night – I delivered the twist. The bombshell that had knocked me sideways the next morning.
Chloe literally screamed when I told them about the photos. The neighbours pounded on the wall, but we ignored them.
‘I knew it!’ Mica hissed. ‘I knew that nepo baby dickhead was too good to be true!’
She stamped around the flat for a while, detailing all the various ways she was planning to torture and kill Charlie Fucking Francombe. But Chloe just shook her head sadly and reached for my hand. ‘I’m so sorry, Nell,’ she whispered. And with that, finally, the tears came – the ones that had been threatening to arrive ever since I found those photos.
My best friends pulled me into a hug, and by the end of the night, after we’d demolished the rest of the wine, the consensus was unanimous: forget Charlie Fucking Francombe. Just focus on landing this job.
So that’s exactly what I plan to do.
‘Nell!’ Talia stands up to high-five me as I enter the writers’ nook.
‘Hey!’ I drop down at Charlie’s desk as the other writers grin and nod at me. They seem genuinely pleased that I’m here.
‘Just in time for the morning meeting,’ Kerri says as they all stand up. ‘Come on in . . .’
Being in the meeting is as great as ever – I even chip in a few ideas that everyone laughs at. But the rest of the day is even more giddily thrilling. I haven’t sat in the nook since my very first day, and I’ve forgotten how fun it is. Everyone riffing back and forth as they type away, honing the final sketches for the show that night. In the space of a single day, I think I bond with Noah and Anna more than I have in three weeks. Because I’m actually working in the same space as them, rather than being marooned on the other side of the building. It’s a taste of what I’ve been missing. A taste of what this internship could have – should have – been.
Later that evening, when we all head down to the basement for the show’s recording, I’m about to go up to the back of the studio as usual, but Talia takes my arm and guides me into a chair with the rest of the writers, down the front, just behind the cameras.
It’s beyond incredible. Just a fortnight ago I was sitting at the back of the auditorium, wishing more than anything that I could be down here with them. And now I am. Between the sketches, the monitors show clips of my Kay DeBlue interview – and the audience roars with laughter throughout them. It’s like one long adrenaline rush. Talia and Kerri and Nate and the rest of them are all beaming at me brightly, offering their fists for me to bump. It’s like something out of my wildest dreams. Beyond my wildest dreams.
So why can’t I stop thinking about Charlie?