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“Easy,” Tilly said.

“Perfect,” Billy said.

“Wow,” Sophie said.

“That’s settled then,” said Billy. “The two of you can work on that together, I assume?”

And it had been so beautiful that Tilly couldn’t help but say yes.

“Sophie?” asked Billy.

Sophie hesitated, then nodded. “If Tilly will help.”

“I’ll help,” Tilly said.

“Good,” said Billy. “Right, get out of my way for ten minutes so that I can prepare the rest of the rehearsal. Off out into the entrance hall or something. Learn your words. I need a bit of time before everyone else floods in.”

Tilly grabbed her jacket and went out, thinking that she’d get some fresh air, have a look around, see if she could spot anything else while she was here. A police officer never slept, her father always said.

Not literally, of course. But a police officer was never really off duty, especially in a small town like this. She stepped out into the cool of the evening, letting the door close behind her, turning only when she heard a muffled sound.

When she looked back, Sophie was pushing the door open again and rubbing her nose. “You just closed that door on me,” she said.

“Unintentionally,” said Tilly.

“It still hurt.”

“But I didn’t mean to.”

Sophie rubbed her nose again and then sighed. She closed her eyes for a moment, appeared to come to some kind of decision, then opened them. “Can we talk for a minute?”

Tilly looked out toward the road where any number of bad parking jobs and out-of-date tax stickers and the like awaited her. A myriad of tickets to write. Then she turned back to Sophie, her dark hair loose over her shoulders, her nose still a little red, her eyes dark and serious.

“Fine,” Tilly said with a sigh. “Just for a minute.”

???

It had taken everything Sophie had to run after Tilly like that.

After a lot of thought, she’d come to the conclusion that perhaps, just perhaps, there were reasons other than her brother and father that stopped her from dating so much.

The thing was, it was easier to live her life the way it was. She might not be happy, she might not be fulfilled, but she was comfortable. There was no angst, no drama. And alright, she might blame Gio for ruining her date with Katie, but, and here was the thing, Sophie wasn’t entirely sure that she’d have called Katie for a second date as it was.

Sure, a first date, a bit of fun, something unofficial perhaps. But a second date? That would make things serious and serious was scary.

Which meant that even though Sophie was chasing after Tilly just at the moment, she wasn’t completely sure why she was doing it. It would be easier not to. It would be easier to let things go. Even if they did have to sing together.

But, and here was the thing, Tilly did deserve an explanation. She’d had her feelings hurt, and that was unacceptable, Sophie decided. That was just not okay. And then a door had hit her in the face and Sophie had had more than her feelings hurt.

She touched her nose again gently, experimentally.

“Are you going to talk, or are you just going to rub at your nose?” asked Tilly, somewhat sharply.

Sophie swallowed. “Fine. Yes. Talk. I just…” Her stomach felt weird and watery. “I just wanted to say that I didn’t mean no.”

“You didn’t mean no,” Tilly said slowly.

“Yes. Right. I mean the other day. I didn’t mean no. Except I sort of did. I mean, it’s complicated.” Shouldn’t have started this, she said to herself. She was screwing it up big time.