Chapter Eighteen
I tore through my wardrobe like a whirlwind, looking for the perfect outfit.
What would be perfect about it? I didn’t know, but I knew it would strike me when I saw it.
Aha! A dark chocolate-coloured heavy satin YSL minidress with long sleeves and a high neck was the one.
Not just because it was super short, made even shorter by the addition of a deep brown leather belt, but because of the suspenders.
Had I ever worn a dress with suspenders and stockings before?
No. But I knew it was perfect for this occasion.
The high neck and the super-long sleeves gave it that air of strictness and formality that maybe people had come to expect from my outfit choices, but the several inches of exposed thigh between where the dress ended and the stockings began were decidedly new, and very spicy.
I would pair it with the pointiest heels I owned, put a quick loose wave in my hair and do a lightly smoky eye.
When Josh knocked on my door at the agreed-upon time (not late!
On time to the minute!) I suddenly felt a wave of something like shame pass over me.
Did I look ridiculous? I’d chosen this outfit, done my makeup, done my hair in such a rush and when I looked in the mirror I loved what I saw .
. . but it wasn’t the Emily that everyone knew.
Would Josh take one look at me and barely conceal his amusement at me trying to dress sexy?
But I didn’t have time to change. I had to commit.
I opened the front door, and it was the first time I had seen someone’s jaw actually drop.
Josh stood agape on the front steps of my temporary house, surprisingly smartly dressed in head-to-toe black.
It was as if we were completely different people to the ones who had been facing down an extortion attempt in a pub only an hour ago.
Awkwardness crackled in the air, but I had to say something.
‘You look nice,’ I told him, as assertively as I could manage.
My skin prickled with embarrassment at my ridiculous attempts at dressing ‘sexy’. I wasn’t sexy, and I knew it.
‘Uh, thanks.’ He blinked at me in confusion. ‘What’s . . . I mean, this is . . .’ I hadn’t expected my outfit to be causing a scene already, but Josh seemed to be completely overwhelmed by my attempts at spicing things up. He cleared his throat. ‘This is a new look for you.’
Better to get it out of the way. ‘And what do you think?’ I asked, feeling my cheeks flush.
Finally, he spoke. ‘Emily, you look incredible.’
Relief swept over me. We walked to the waiting car and he gallantly held the door open.
We chatted on and off during the journey into London, alternating between an easy back-and-forth and a peaceful silence, as if the silly rigmarole of the evening so far had allowed us to move past something that had been hanging over us for years.
I couldn’t say for certain, but every so often I was sure I could feel his eyes on me when I wasn’t looking.
We reached our destination around midnight, just as Josh had predicted, and were greeted by a couple of paparazzi loitering around the entrance to the underground club on the edge of Chinatown.
‘Smile for the cameras,’ Josh said as we breezed past the doorman. We were used to it by now, just a regular part of our everyday lives.
Down the stairs, we found our castmates and a few members of the crew on the dance floor, a couple taking a breather at a round table nearby. The energy was high, and a cheer went up when they spotted us from across the room, which, in turn, made everyone else look in our direction too.
‘Maaaate!’ Max lurched towards us, beer sloshing over the top of his glass.
Even somewhere this fashionable couldn’t tempt Max away from his beloved pints.
‘You came! Both of you! And Emily, what is this new look we have going on?’ There was only a tiny hint of a mocking tone to his voice, and mostly he seemed surprised and impressed that we had turned up at all.
‘She looks fuckin’ sharp, doesn’t she?’ Josh said, casting another appreciative eye over my outfit.
‘You know what?’ I said, tucking my tousled hair behind my ear. ‘I feel it.’
Darcy was in a booth with one of her fashion minions, surveying the scene and drinking a fluorescent cocktail.
‘Damn, girl!’ Courtney sidled up to us and clasped me in a tight hug as I was wondering if I was expected to go over and say hi to Darcy.
‘You look insane, I’m obsessed! I’d given up on you coming and here you are, looking like a whole meal!
Here, we’ve got a bottle,’ she said, leading me over to the table where champagne was chilling on ice.
I was going to pour another glass for Josh, but he had migrated to the bar with Max and Tommy.
After spending so much of the evening with him, I felt a tug of disappointment that I now had to share him with everyone.
I swallowed that thought down with a mouthful of champagne.
There was only one thing for it: hit the dance floor.
I danced and danced and danced. I danced with Courtney, with Max, with Tommy, with Maria, the second AD, with Jurgen, director of photography, all of us giving ourselves over to the night, trying to shake off the pressures and trials of shooting a film like Wonderwick.
I wasn’t used to letting myself go, dancing unselfconsciously, feeling that cathartic rush of a cocktail in one hand and a sense of infinite possibilities in the other.
The truth was, my outfit was making me feel like a new person.
Or not exactly a new person, the same Emily but more energised, more open, more .
. . something. The whole time I was dancing, my glass being periodically topped up by invisible hands, as much as I tried to lose myself completely in the moment, I felt a prickling consciousness of where Josh was at all times.
By the bar, chatting to the boys at the table, taking selfies with fans, and then . . .
‘Hey, you.’ There he was. ‘Having fun?’
I nodded, suddenly feeling the effects of the champagne. ‘I’m glad we came. Thanks for making it happen.’
‘It’s been a fun evening, right?’ he asked, a smile creeping across his face. The music was so loud he had to lean close to my ear, the heat of his body radiating against mine.
‘Yes, all of it,’ I said into his ear. I leaned back and we just looked at each other for a moment, looking each other right in the eyes, as if we were waiting for something to happen, daring the other one to move first. And then the music shifted, a beat dropped, and the spell was broken.
‘Fuck, I love this song!’ Josh grabbed my hand and we danced together, my body close to his but with a cautious distance because really what the hell was happening?
This wasn’t happening, this was just a weird madness that had taken over us this evening.
This wasn’t a thing. Instead, we danced.
But I couldn’t deny the electric spark I’d felt, or thought I’d felt, between us in that moment.
Finally, it was time to head home. The group of us stumbled up the stairs and the club spat us out onto the street where a fleet of cars was waiting for us.
Along with the photographers that had been there on the way in, who seemed to have multiplied in number while we were dancing, no doubt tipped off that the whole cast including Josh and I were there. And my outfit certainly didn’t hurt.
Before I could make it to the car, one of them stepped forward, and sort of went down on one knee, shooting me from below, almost but not quite upskirting me, but still in the realms of plausible deniability.
‘Woah!’ Josh said, slipping a protective arm around my waist and holding up a hand to the photographer. ‘Getting a little too close there, pal.’ And then under his breath he murmured, so no one else could hear, ‘You sell that to anyone and I’ll ruin your fuckin’ life, you hear me?’
Everything had happened so fast that I hadn’t fully registered the feeling of Josh’s arm around my waist, guiding me to the waiting car.
But everyone else clearly had. The sound of shutters going off, the sight of members of the public holding up phones to photograph or video the moment, all signalled to me that something unusual was happening.
And yet the moment he took his arm away to hold open my car door for me, it felt like something was missing.
Josh leaned down and spoke to me through the open car door. ‘See you tomorrow. It’s been a trip.’