Page 20 of Fake It 'til You Make It

At the end of the interview, I show theGQteam back down to the foyer and Kirsten tells me that once she has combined Roman’s interview with mine, she’ll send the feature to her editor in chief. I make polite noises but I couldn’t care less. What I just told her isn’t real, it isn’t truth. It’s all publishable crap.

The camera guys head out to the street, where they’ve temporarily parked their van, and start packing up. Kirsten shakes my hand and tells me, ‘If you don’t mind me saying so, Ted, you’re not a typical rich guy.’

I raise one brow questioningly –what exactly did you expect from me?

‘You’re very… considered. Most of the tech millionaires I meet are eccentric at best and otherwise full of themselves.’

I smirk. ‘Like Rome?’

She releases my hand and smiles mischievously.

As I watch her leave the building and climb into the van, all I can think is that being more like a typical millionaire, more like Roman, is exactly how I should behave. Then, maybe I wouldn’t feel like someone has ripped out my soul every single day from the moment I wake up until I eventually fall asleep.

8

ABBEY

As is typical of Nate’s wife, Meredith has booked a restaurant as far away as she could get. Dee and I are riding the subway. Tonight is the night that she’s going to tell Nate she’s pregnant. First stop, Nate. Second stop, Mom and Dad.

‘How’s the morning sickness?’ I ask when she stops WhatsApp-ing with Brett.

‘Real. But the fatigue is worse. I feel like I’ve been clubbing and having wild sex all night for days in a row.’

‘Well, I guess you’d know. Isn’t wild sex precisely the reason you have nausea?’

Dee grins at me, despite her tiredness. ‘Brett and I were friends with benefits for a while; you know this. But disappointingly, I think the deed that sewed the seed was actually an unmemorable hangover quickie.’

I snort. ‘I probably wouldn’t lead with those details when you’re telling Nate.’

Our brother is the kind of man whoalwayscolors inside the lines. There’s black and white and no grey area when it comes to his ‘good person’ code.

‘Ha, imagine.’ Her laughter turns to an actress version of a groan – theatrical, eyes to the ceiling, as if the world is about to end. ‘Grrrr, tell me why we have to trek to the Upper East Side.’

‘Because Nate is paying and you and I otherwise can’t afford to eat fine-dining.’

‘Solid reasoning.’

We get off the subway on 77th street and walk on to a restaurant on 78th. I realize I’ve subconsciously become even more protective of my sister since finding out she’s carrying my niece or nephew. I’m making myself stand taller, broader, filling a bigger space and walking so close to her through busy areas that no one can knock her. When she climbs steps, I brace myself for her to trip or slip.

By the time we arrive outside the restaurant, Dee is folded over laughing at the story of how I got caught in my bedwear byGQmagazine when I tried to chase after Mike to give him what for about his noise nuisance.

When tears of humor are rolling down her cheeks, I start to see the funny side, a little.

‘Imagine if I end up on the cover ofGQ! I definitely won’t be laughing then.’

She rubs her knuckles under her eyes and I confirm that she doesn’t have smudged mascara.

‘Anyway, we have a name for the man in apartment 8B now. Mike?’

I nod. ‘Michael Thomas. Not that it matters.’

‘Of course it matters. Not only do you have an actual name to vent at or swoon over but we can also find out how he’s famous.GQdon’t interview just anyone.’

I’ve been so concerned with being exposed in hardly any clothes and the relentless banging from upstairs at ungodly hours of the morning (and sometimes during the day) that Ihaven’t bothered to think about who the man living above me might be.

Dee is already typing his name into a search engine and I hold open the heavy glass door to the restaurant, relieved when a member of staff from the eatery takes over and welcomes us.

‘He’s a Major League Baseball player!’ Dee announces, turning to smile at the suited man holding open the door. ‘That’s settles it, the banging in the penthouse is definitely sex.’

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