Chapter Seven #2
‘Nash, that’s not something to lie about,’ huffs Kurt.
‘Well, she died in 2005 and was a total dick, so I don’t mind us using her as an excuse.’
‘I feel morally conflicted,’ Kurt sighs. ‘You know I hate it when I feel morally conflicted.’
‘Fine, forget the grandma.’
‘Nash, I’m going to be real with you a second.
You might be their leading man and yes they might want you for this film series.
But they can and will recast you if you fuck them around.
I’ve seen them do it for properties just as big as Christmas at the Clinic.
Look at The Witcher! They recast Henry Cavill even though everyone and their mom fancied him. Being the fan favourite isn’t enough.’
Kurt clears his throat and softens his tone. ‘I don’t know how much longer I can make them wait. If you piss them off, they might gamble that Barbie has enough star power alone, and that the fanbase might accept someone a bit more studio friendly.’
Kurt’s right. He’s running out of time. He taps his chest with his knuckles. ‘Okay. Let me reread the contracts.’
Kurt sighs, or possibly slurps sauce from somewhere; it’s not so clear over this long-distance connection. ‘Good. Meanwhile, I’ll try to stall them.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Just put that beautiful face of yours onto thinking about this.’
‘I don’t think you think with your face.’
‘Eh, whatever. I’m not the writer.’
Something uncurls in Nash’s chest, but before he can speak, it squishes back up, a hard little stone deep inside him.
‘I will think about it. I promise.’
‘All right. It’s the 21st now. I’ll call you in two days, okay? We need a decision for Christmas Eve if I can’t stall them. Speak to you in a few days, bud.’
And with that, he hangs up. Probably off to surf on a big wave or some kind of activity that you have to get extra insurance for if you go on vacation. Nash can’t really think of anything worse.
Though being stuck in a tiny apartment with a Kermitty stranger is definitely up there.
* * *
Nash lies in guilty silence for some time, until his stomach rumbles so loudly he realises he’s starving. When did he last eat? He doesn’t even know.
He finds Christopher in the kitchen frowning as he crouches in front of a shockingly small fridge with pen and paper in his hand. His round-frame glasses slide ever so slightly down his nose.
He’s quite handsome when he concentrates.
Not in the LA way where everyone is all daily gym sessions and green smoothies and golden and slightly unreal.
But he is undeniably attractive. Those big baby blues, and softly pink lips.
Nash can’t help but notice the freckles peppering Christopher’s forearms, where his sleeves are rolled up.
Yes, he might be inordinately tall, but he’d probably look good in a suit. As long as he didn’t talk or move. It’s easier to appreciate him when he’s not flapping around.
Christopher’s 90s-leading-man foppishness is probably a hit with women.
And he’d probably kill with the Americans – that accent can take you a long way.
Not that there’s any sign of long-term girlfriends here.
Nash is almost certain a man like Christopher didn’t buy the vase in the hallway, but even so, if he had a girlfriend around, it wouldn’t be empty – there’d be flowers or dried ornamental twigs or something in it.
He’s been staring, Nash realises. Not that Christopher has noticed him.
Nash tells himself it’s just because he was waiting for Christopher’s glasses to slide right off the end of his nose and crash to the floor.
But he feels uncomfortable now that he’s lurking, so he announces himself. ‘Anything good in there?’
Christopher startles and looks from Nash to the paper in his hand. ‘Well, unfortunately I spent the week eating everything so that the fridge would be empty for you.’
‘Hospitable of you, even if we now don’t have anything to eat.’
‘Did you or Tessa book in a shop or anything?’
Nash shrugs. ‘No, in the before-times I just figured I’d go to the grocery store when I got here.’
‘We don’t have a greengrocer’s in the village,’ Christopher says, standing up. His knees click as he stands. ‘Oh, sorry, you mean a supermarket, don’t you? Here, a greengrocer’s just sells fruits and vegetables. I think there’s one a few towns over.’
‘Thank you for that thrilling translation,’ Nash snarks. ‘I’m excited to get a cultural exchange thrown in with the accommodation.’
To his surprise, this prompts a very tiny smile in the corner of Christopher’s mouth. Apparently he does have a sense of humour. It must be buried deep inside him along with everything else the British repress.
‘If it helps, I don’t mind missing out on the leftovers and sad bags of salad you must have thrown out,’ he adds.
A huge gale rattles the windows and the lights above them flicker just for a second. ‘I think the storm is trying to tell you not to look a gift horse in the mouth,’ says Christopher.
‘I’m sorry, can you repeat that completely ridiculous sentence you just said to me?’
‘Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth? Is it that weird a saying?’
‘English really is another language over here.’
‘I suppose it has the same meaning as “beggars can’t be choosers”.’
‘Oh yes, an equally complicated phrase. I can absolutely see why you chose an idiom like “gift horse” over that.’
He is almost certain that Christopher shuts his eyes for a few seconds as if he’s counting for patience. ‘We’ve got a few bits in here, and the tin cupboard is full, so we won’t go hungry tonight at least,’ Christopher announces a little too cheerily.
Nash feels a little thrill that he’s annoyed him. ‘Tinned stuff is British cuisine at its finest, isn’t it? Sardines and cold baked beans by candlelight?’
‘It’s not that dire. We still have power after all.’
And with that, as if in answer from the gods, the lights all go out. The fridge makes an ominous groan.
‘You had to say it, didn’t you?’ mutters Nash, turning on the torch on his phone.
‘Christ.’ Christopher tentatively walks to the window and looks out across the town. ‘Everyone’s power is out.’
With a deep sigh, Christopher sets down his list onto the counter and impressively digs out a fresh box of taper candles and matches from a drawer.
‘That was alarmingly well prepared. This is very Boy Scouts of America,’ Nash comments.
‘We just call them Scouts here.’
‘Fine, very golden boy of you,’ Nash says, lighting the way through the cramped apartment to the living room with his phone torch.
Christopher follows with a candle holder, which he sets down on the coffee table and wedges the tapered candles into.
It takes a couple of matches to light all the candles as a rogue breeze from somewhere seems to be snuffing them out.
There’s nothing else to do but sit back down on the couch together. This time, they are bathed in the low golden light of the candles, and the sounds of the snowstorm.
Still, it’s eerily quiet – where are the cars and neighbours and planes and signs of goddamn life? Maybe I’m dead, Nash thinks. That could explain it. Though if he had died and gone to hell, they could have found a better torture than being cooped up with an awkward giraffe man.
‘What now?’ Nash says, wanting to fill the void with anything.
Christopher doesn’t reply straight away. But eventually, quietly, he says, ‘We just wait.’
He says it so simply, like this is just a normal occurrence.
‘Great.’
‘There’s nothing to be done. Sometimes it goes out when the weather is bad. Hopefully it’ll be fixed by the morning. Maybe later because of the weather.’
‘Wow, I really am in the sticks.’
‘Is . . . everything all right?’ Christopher asks, tentatively.
‘I promise I wasn’t trying to listen to your phone call, but the flat is so small.
’ Tentativeness quickly turns to babbling.
‘I suppose your family and friends must be worried about you being here in bad weather? Sorry, is that too much to ask? I shouldn’t have listened. ’
He splutters on, over-explaining himself for a little longer and Nash lets him because, frankly, it is funny. ‘I don’t know what privacy laws are like in the States—’
‘Christopher.’
‘Yes?’
‘It’s fine. I’m not going to sue you for overhearing me on the phone. Yet.’
Christopher stiffens.
‘I’m joking.’
‘Ah.’
‘For a start, I don’t want your tiny flat.
’ The last bit he says in a bad English accent, and the whole thing garners an extremely British sound from Christopher that can only be described as a harrumph.
‘Just don’t make a habit of listening to my conversations.
I’m pretty sure that’s against some kind of short-term let customer–proprietor rules. ’
‘I think, given the situation, those are probably out the window.’
‘Only if we’re agreeing to get rid of basic courtesy,’ Nash says a little too sharply. He adds, more softly, ‘Just a tricky call with my agent.’
‘Oh,’ Christopher says slowly.
And then he doesn’t say anything else.
This immediately arouses Nash’s suspicions.
Whenever he mentions that he has an agent, the next question is usually about what he does for a living that requires an agent, because that’s kind of weird and rare.
Pretty much everyone knows in theory what an agent is, thanks to Estelle from Friends.
And while he doesn’t necessarily want to have the whole yes I’m an actor yes you can watch my films on Netflix chat, it is always inevitable.
From there it is either wow that sounds so cool or do you make any money or, his least favourite, can I get a picture with you, which, when you think about it, is deeply weird, because presumably that person didn’t want a photo with him before he declared he was a potentially famous person, upon which he immediately becomes an object of consumption . . . or whatever.
He gets too stressed out if he thinks about the parasocial relationship aspect of fame.
But this conversation is different. Silence is unusual. And while there have been plenty of awkward pauses today, it is suspicious that the man, who initially seemed keen on prying, is now faking casualness. No follow-up question comes.
There is no doubt in Nash’s mind that this man knows exactly who he is and yet, for some reason, is pretending to have never seen him before in his life.
This trip is deeply cursed.