Page 21 of Last Dance, Second Chance

“Can’t say I blame him. I wouldn’t have let my sister touch this if my mum and dad hadn’t made me.” Nathan produced a games console from the bottom of the box. “I present to you my Xbox360. I was given this bad boy for Christmas when I was fifteen. I was the envy of all my friends for months.”

“I bet.”

“My mum dropped it off when she came to visit a couple of weeks ago. She didn’t want it cluttering up her house anymore.”

“I can’t understand why...” Jessica said with a giggle.

Nathan shot her a look. “You can make yourself useful by untangling these cables. I’m going to check that the TV has the right sockets.”

“I think I’ve drawn the short straw here — these are as bad as Christmas lights.”

“Stop complaining and get untangling, or I won’t make you a cup of coffee in a minute.”

“Yes, sir!”

The wires weren’t as badly knotted as Jessica had thought, and it only took a few minutes for Nathan to set up the machine. He handed Jessica one of the controllers. “What do you want to play?” he asked.

“Honestly?” said Jessica. “I have no idea about computer games.”

“Well, they’re much more fun to play with someone else, so please play one with me. Just for half an hour?”

“OK,” said Jessica with an exaggerated sigh. “Half an hour, and only because you cooked me such a nice dinner.”

“Hooray! What sort of game would you like? The football ones are pretty simple to pick up.”

Jessica screwed up her nose in disdain.

“Fair enough . . .” muttered Nathan.

“What’s your favourite?” Jessica asked.

“Fable II,” Nathan said immediately. “I bought a second-hand copy after I finished my A Levels. I spent days of that summer holiday playing it. It’s a wonder I managed to pull myself away from it for long enough to go to university.”

“What’s it about?” asked Jessica suspiciously.

“It’s like an adventure game. You’re the hero and there’s the main quest and then loads of little quests you can do. It’s fun, I promise.”

“OK, I believe you. Definitely sounds better than a football game anyway.”

“Right, I’ll be the main player, and you be the secondary player so you’ll need to stay near me, but it means I can show you around.”

“Man, you even get to boss me around in the video game?”

“Yep, ’fraid so.”

“Half an hour, right?”

“I swear.”

* * *

“It’s 1a.m., Jess. I’ve got to go to bed — I’ve got work in the morning,” Nathan said, rubbing his eyes.

“I know, I know, I’m sorry! I just want to explore that creepy old mansion on the hill for some treasure, and then I promise we can stop. And since when did you call me Jess?”

“Since you took over as main player because I’m apparently not ‘forceful enough during confrontations with gargoyles’. I won’t call you Jess if you’d rather I didn’t. It just seemed like a natural thing to call you.”

“It’s fine,” she said. Somehow his calling her by the shortened version of her name served to make them seem closer, like real friends. She liked it.

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