Page 21 of Long Story Short

‘I found out something that made me wonder if it was all just… bullshit.’

‘Oh?’ I wondered what could change your opinion about love so dramatically. ‘A bad date?’ I asked flippantly, thinking about my own romance crisis.

‘I wish,’ he said, bitterness tingeing the words. He shook his head. ‘No, it was something that I didn’t want to share with… anyone. And so when I was at that event with Davis, and he sensed I was in a bad mood, he started to wind me up, digging, pushing my buttons, getting me to tell him what was going on. Well, you’ve seen what he’s like.’

‘Yes,’ I said with a sigh. ‘So, you told him a different story to the truth?’ I asked him.

‘Exactly. I threw him off, pretending the issue was work. And not anything personal. I said that I hated writing my books, that I thought my readers were pathetic. Like you said last night, Davis always riles me up no matter how hard I try to ignore him. I used to be able to shrug off what he said to me, but that night, I let him get to me. Because I felt pathetic for believing in love and happy ever afters, for writing love stories and perpetuating the myth to the world. I felt cynical and angry and… hurt. And I took it out on my readers.’

‘That was honest,’ I said when Jake finished his long explanation. He had actually opened up to me. It felt good that he trusted me to do that. But he was still keeping a lot to himself. ‘But was that really preferable to telling him the actual truth?’ I dared to ask, wishing Jake would be completely honest with me. And the world too. Right now though, I just wanted to hear the truth myself.

‘I thought so at the time. And maybe I still do.’ Jake checked the time on his phone. ‘Fancy some fresh air? We could take the long way back to the hotel before the reader session. And I could use another coffee.’

‘Sure,’ I said, my mind whirring from what he had told me.

We left the library and emerged back into sunshine. We started walking, stopping off at a coffee shop to pick up a takeaway coffee each. I drank in the sights and sounds of the city, feeling it humming through my body, enjoying being here. Jake was quiet on the way back and our earlier conversation looped in my head like a song you can’t stop listening to.

As we walked down Fifth Avenue, I checked my phone. Eva had shared the podcast episode featuring her interview with Jake. I told Jake who sighed but didn’t say anything. Looking online, I could see people noting how he didn’t seem to care about his books or readers anymore. It was hard to read so I put my phone away. I had to ask Jake the question that was burning inside of me. ‘Is it really that bad? What happened that made you feel like romance is bullshit?’ I asked.

Jake let out a sigh. He took a while to respond, and I wondered if he wasn’t going to, but then he sipped his coffee and started to speak. ‘It’s private. But it’s also almost… humiliating.BecauseI write romance. And the reason why I was inspired to start writing it in the first place.’ He reached out and touched my arm. Like his few touches since we left London, I felt it everywhere. I hastily sucked in a steadying breath. He let go and I felt a twinge of disappointment. ‘I have never been good at sharing myself. That’s why I like writing novels. I can hide behind my characters and their stories, and keep my own story to myself. And the people I’m close to.’

I nodded. ‘I can see that.’ His cool, reserved personality made more sense to me now. He had been keeping part of himself hidden at work. Knowing that made him far less intimidating. Like when you pull back the curtain and see the wizard. ‘Sometimes though, you need to let people in, and allow them to see the real you. If you ever were going to do it, now is the time. If you want to keep writing romance. But I suppose if you’ve stopped believing in it then maybe you don’t.’

‘Do you think I should keep writing it?’ Jake asked.

‘Of course I do! Your books make me happy, and I’m far from the only one. There is so much darkness in the world, we need all the light we can get. If I had a bad day, curling up with one of your stories instantly made it better. Made me feel better. And after what you overheard me saying to Liv, you know that I’m not sure if I’ll ever find love like it exists in romance stories but they make me want to, they give me hope that it is out there, and it makes me not want to settle for anything that’s less than that.’

‘You should never settle,’ Jake said fiercely.

We looked at one another. I was surprised, he looked serious.

‘I still want to hope that it does exist. And help others hope it does too, but I don’t know if I can,’ he added.

The conference hotel appeared in our eyeline then. It was almost time for Jake to face his readers. I had no idea how this was going to go.

‘Everyone knows you did say those things about romance,’ I reminded him. ‘So, if you want to save your career, you need to acknowledge it, to say something to help readers believe that you don’t look down on them for enjoying your books.’

‘I do want to save it.’

‘Just for the money?’ I asked, really hoping that wasn’t the case.

‘No. For the reasons you said you enjoyed reading them. I like making people happy, I like giving them hope, I like that reading my books might make them feel better about life and love, that they can escape it all in one of my stories…’ He trailed off as we reached the door of the hotel.

I smiled. ‘I like that you like that. You’ve been more honest with me today then you ever have; why not continue with that?’ I asked as we walked inside the hotel together.

Jake didn’t answer and I had no idea if I had convinced him.

15

Jake’s reader session was taking place in a meeting room. One of the conference administrators welcomed Jake and me into the large space, which was set up with two chairs behind a table, a poster behind with a picture of Jake and his books. The plan was for Jake to read from his last published book then meet readers.

The last time Jake had done an event like this, there had been over a hundred people who had turned up but, after the panel incident, and the fact social media and the conference were abuzz with Jake admitting that the article about him had been true all along, neither of us were sure what the turnout would be.

The admin person left us alone in the room, the only sound coming from the air conditioning as we sat behind the desk to wait for readers to come in. I could smell Jake’s spicy aftershave, and it was a little bit distracting.

‘What’s the time?’ Jake asked, thankfully shaking me out of my trance.

‘Fifteen minutes until it’s supposed to start,’ I replied after checking my phone to find no reply from Hayley yet. I had no doubt she was still furious with us both. It felt like my future in publishing hung in the balance, along with Jake’s career. But I felt powerless. Jake was unsure about whether he wanted to tell the truth about why he said what he had about romance books, and I certainly couldn’t force him to. I was annoyed but when I glanced across at Jake, his worried look told me he did really care. It was so confusing.

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