Chapter 19
It was a mark of how stressful the morning had been that Kate trudged up the stairs to her flat, locked the door and crawled straight into bed.
She didn’t want food or wine or conversation, just the oblivion of sleep, preferably dreamless.
The sun had slipped behind the building by the time she roused again, curling herself into a grumbling ball under the quilt when she remembered the series of unfortunate events.
Why was she always like this? It would never happen to Jojo Moyes, she thought, remembering the book recommendation from the guy in the supermarket.
She’d followed many of her favorite authors on social media to get an insight into the kind of life she needed to attempt to emulate as Kate Darrowby, and from what she could see, none of them lived the haphazard, pressure-cooker kind of existence she did.
She really needed to get her shit together.
Mug of tea in hand, she fired up her laptop, hesitating to open her emails in case Fiona’s name loomed large and furious.
Turning to social media instead, she squinted at the number of new followers she’d gained since she’d last looked.
Did these things glitch? Not if the bombardment of posts and messages was anything to go by.
She was inundated with empathy and sympathy from people who couldn’t get enough of that morning’s drama, new followers who’d ordered the book on the strength of shared clips of the interview, because if her book was half as entertaining as she was, they wanted in.
A message alert from Rachel in PR slid across the top of her screen.
Kate! I’m so sorry I wasn’t around to help you this morning, but I’m also kind of #NotSorry, because no run-of-the-mill interview could ever have created this much coverage!
Well done, you! I can’t believe you bumped into your first love on the train too, how fabulously random, you couldn’t make this stuff up!
Excellent for promo purposes! Speak tomorrow, R x
Kate stared at the message, putting her mug down slowly.
Yes, Rachel, you could make this stuff up, actually.
She hadn’t had time to think through the bigger picture when she’d thrown Kate Darrowby’s first crush anecdote into the mix that morning.
The soccer guys on the train had been well up for going along with the subterfuge, amused to be part of a story on national radio.
Should she tell the publishing team it wasn’t true?
Her first instinct was yes, absolutely, but then…
what would they think of her? Sure, the whole job was based on fabrication, but the lines were being fed to her and now she’d veered off script.
Was that allowed? She really didn’t want to tell them that she’d outright lied, it made her feel shoddy and about seven years old.
Would it shake H’s faith in her? And then, of course, there was Charlie.
However much he’d urged her to walk in Kate Darrowby’s shoes, he probably hadn’t been suggesting she invent star-crossed meetings with ex-loves.
Prue was next up on the message chain, letting her know the “Darrowby effect” had sent the ebook rocketing up the online charts.
Kate clicked over to check, doing a double take at the way it had bobbed up the numbers like a champagne cork fired from a shaken bottle.
It seemed there really was no such thing as bad publicity.
She closed her laptop, rattled by the whole thing.
Wrapping her arms around her knees, she slumped into the corner of the sofa, feeling blue without being able to put her finger on exactly why.
The fiasco of the morning had taken its emotional toll, but it was more than that.
If The Power of Love were truly her own book, she wouldn’t have felt the need to pepper the truth with an attention-grabbing lie, and all of those reassuring messages would probably have lifted her flagging spirits.
As it was, though, they added to her ominous sense of unease.
A copy of the book lay on the coffee table, and she picked it up and folded her arms around it, trying to summon her inner guardian angel, when her mobile buzzed yet again.
Free for a quick video call?
Speaking of guardian angels. Charlie.
That’d be really good actually, thanks.
Within seconds, her phone was buzzing again with his incoming call. Pushing her hair behind her ears and pinching color into her cheeks, she clicked “Join.”
“Hey,” he said, his face filling her screen. He was at the desk in his sunlit hotel suite, making her wish she could climb into the phone screen to escape.
“Hey, you,” she said, flat. “How’s L.A.?”
“Manic, but I’m on the home run now. I fly back this evening. So…” The pause on the line was definitely more than the usual long-distance lag. “It sounded like you had a stressful morning.”
“You heard it, then,” she sighed.
“I did. You okay?”
She was grateful he wasn’t making light of it, and she curled deeper into the corner of the sofa, miserable enough for a rogue tear to slide down her cheek.
“Hey, don’t cry, there’s no need. Everyone over at the publishing house is thrilled,” he said, concern thickening his voice.
“I’m all right really,” she said, swiping it away. “Rachel and Prue have both been in touch about their plans to maximize on what happened, but I just feel like such an idiot, Charlie. I’d planned everything so carefully, and then it all went out the window in a sea of soccer shirts and joggers.”
“Don’t beat yourself up,” he said. “You’re putting too much pressure on yourself.”
“The book deserves better,” she said.
“The book is damn lucky to have you,” he countered right back. “And look at it this way…at least you didn’t join the fun run.”
“There’s that.” She half laughed despite herself. “No need for ice baths or blisters.”
He smiled, but his eyes were serious.
“Things didn’t go to plan, but you adapted.
You were funny and people were invested, and it’s all worked out for the best as far as the book is concerned.
Prue is over the moon…” He paused, and she micro-cringed because she could sense what was coming.
“Especially about the train meet-cute with your first love.”
This was the moment. If she was going to confess to the casual lie, now was the time.
“Even Fiona is impressed,” he said, filling the awkward pause before she could. “Trust me, Kate, today was a good thing, not a bad one. You made lemonade out of lemons, it’s all anyone can ask of you.”
Murky fear that Charlie’s opinion of her would diminish kept her from blurting the truth, and the part of Kate that would be forever seventeen basked in Fiona’s approval. It was such a small, insignificant untruth. How bad could it be to let it lie?
She pressed the phone against her heart after Charlie disappeared, and then closed her eyes and saw herself running down the train platform, waving her notes over her head at the crowd of soccer fans behind her. Hauling her backside off the sofa, she went in search of wine.
Hey Alice,
I can almost hear your eyes rolling at me for emailing, but I’ve called you again a few times just now and I feel like I’m in a one-sided relationship with your voicemail.
Please don’t avoid me. I’m always on your side, even if I don’t always say what you want to hear.
I love you and I want what’s best for you, in the long term as much as right now.
Anyway, this isn’t supposed to be a lecture—I’ve got some news to tell you.
I’ve taken on an acting job over the last couple of months. Don’t panic, you’re not about to spot me in the next Avengers movie or anything! I should be so lucky.
I won’t bore you with all the background details, but a while ago I was asked to represent a book as its official author, because the book couldn’t be published otherwise.
So it has my name on the front (Kate Darrowby, not my actual surname!) and my face on the inside cover, and I answer any public questions as if I actually wrote it, which of course I didn’t.
I don’t know who the real author is, but we’ve chatted by email and they seem really lovely, so I’m glad to be able to do it for them, as well as it being quite exciting for me.
It was small scale in the beginning but it seems to be suddenly gathering popularity, so I’m letting you know just in case you hear or see anything and wonder what the hell is going on. You won’t, I’m sure—I mean, it’s hardly like I’ve gone viral or anything!
No one knows about this apart from you, Liv, and Nish.
Please don’t breathe a word to anyone else, especially not Dad or Belinda.
I know you won’t, but mum’s the word. Literally, in this case!
I’ve had to sign a non-disclosure contract, I might actually get sued or something, so eat this email after reading.
Call me soon, I miss you.
Love Mum xx