Page 30 of Slow Burn Summer

No one except Liv called her “Katie,” and rarely now they were all grown up.

“Will you take my coffee lid off too? I’m terrified of damaging my nails,” Kate said, holding them out in front of her. Liv’s nail technician friend had based the arty design on the book cover to ensure her publication-day hands were on point for photos.

“Cinnamon roll as big as my head.” She pulled it from the bag and held it up beside her face for comparison.

Liv snapped a photo. “First one for your publication-day reel,” she said, breaking the outside edge from one of the pastries.

“Is this going to be an everyday thing now I’m a published author?” Kate said, nodding toward the breakfast.

“Only if you’re paying,” Liv said. “I had to take a small mortgage out for these. Nish would have a heart attack, he keeps sending me fake-away take-away posts so the kids won’t want to order food.”

“I won’t breathe a word,” Kate said. “God, they’re good, though. I feel as if I’m in Paris.”

“You might be, when the book goes big! Imagine, a world tour. Can I come? You absolutely cannot do New York without me.”

“I think you might be getting just a tiny bit ahead of yourself,” Kate laughed, distracted as more messages flew in on her mobile. “Oh, Liv, look,” she whispered, putting her coffee down. “H has just emailed. I’m scared to open it.”

“Well, they better not rain on your parade, not today of all days,” Liv said. “Want me to check it first?”

Kate shook her head. “I’ll do it.”

Dear Kate,

Publication day at last, enjoy every moment. I’m sorry not to have replied sooner.

To answer your question regarding publication-day rituals, the truth is I always left those plans to someone else. I was lucky enough to live with a born planner, everything an opportunity for a party or a surprise dinner.

I’d suggest setting your expectations low, that way you can’t be disappointed. It can feel something of an anticlimax after all of the build-up and anticipation, even more so when you’ve seen the process through from blank page to publication.

I have come to think of it as release day rather than publication day. The book is released from you, a flock of birds taking flight and settling on shelves and bedside tables, migrating across oceans to places youmay never visit in person. But a piece of you has—your book has been to beach bars in Bali and hospital wards in Germany, kept insomniacs company in L.A.

So that’s what publication/release day means to me. A toast, and a wish for a safe journey for all of those migrating birds.

Thank you for being the release vessel for those birds, Kate.

I’m sure you’re aware I never intended this book for publication. I turned to writing as somewhere to channel love that suddenly had nowhere to go. I don’t expect that makes much sense, but it was my escape from utter desolation.

It’s taken a fair amount of detachment to come to terms with the idea of publication, but in the end I think the person who inspired the story would get a kick out of seeing it out there in the world. They were fearless, undaunted by anything, curious and kind, mercury in human form.

Thank you for being the book’s guardian angel.

Enjoy today,

H x

Kate finished reading it aloud and then sat for a quiet moment at her small dining table.

“Definitely a guy,” Liv said.

“It could still be a woman,” Kate said. “But yeah, I think it’s a guy too. A very lonely, heartbroken one.”

Liv nodded, sipping her coffee. “At least you don’t have to worry that you’ve pissed him off now,” she said.

“True,” Kate said. It was a relief to hear from H, but heart-aching to hear about his reasons for writing the story.

“I like what he said about being the book’s guardian angel,” she said.

Try as she might, she hadn’t been able to fully shake her lingering sense of unease. On the one hand, it was a fairly straightforward job—she’d been offered the position as a working actor with the terms and conditions clearly laid out. Charlie and Prue had explained the behind-the-scenes mechanics of the publishing industry, how pulling the right levers at the right time would get this once-in-a-generation love story into readers’ hands. But it was only now, reading H’s side of things, that she truly relaxed. The guardian angel of the book. She could work with that.

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