Page 24 of Under the Mistletoe with You

‘Is ...everything all right?’Christopher asks, tentatively.‘I promise I wasn’t trying to listen to your phone call, but the flat is so small.’Tentativeness quickly turns to babbling.‘I suppose your family and friends must be worried about you being here in bad weather?Sorry, is that too much to ask?I shouldn’t have listened.’

He splutters on, over-explaining himself for a little longer and Nash lets him because, frankly, it is funny.‘I don’t know what privacy laws are like in the States—’

‘Christopher.’

‘Yes?’

‘It’s fine.I’m not going to sue you for overhearing me on the phone.Yet.’

Christopher stiffens.

‘I’m joking.’

‘Ah.’

‘For a start, I don’t want yourtiny flat.’The last bit he says in a bad English accent, and the whole thing garners an extremely British sound from Christopher that can only be described as aharrumph.‘Just don’t make a habit of listening to my conversations.I’m pretty sure that’s against some kind of short-term let customer–proprietor rules.’

‘I think, given the situation, those are probably out the window.’

‘Only if we’re agreeing to get rid of basic courtesy,’ Nash says a little too sharply.He adds, more softly, ‘Just a tricky call with my agent.’

‘Oh,’ Christopher says slowly.

And then he doesn’t say anything else.

This immediately arouses Nash’s suspicions.Whenever he mentions that he has an agent, the next question is usually about what he does for a living that requires an agent, because that’s kind of weird and rare.Pretty much everyone knows in theory what an agent is, thanks to Estelle fromFriends.And while he doesn’t necessarilywantto have the wholeyesI’man actor yes you can watch my films onNetflixchat, it is always inevitable.From there it is eitherwow that sounds so coolordo you make any moneyor,his least favourite,can I get a picture with you,which, when you think about it, is deeply weird, because presumably that person didn’t want a photo with him before he declared he was a potentially famous person, upon which he immediately becomes an object of consumption ...or whatever.

He gets too stressed out if he thinks about the parasocial relationship aspect of fame.

But this conversation is different.Silence is unusual.And while there have been plenty of awkward pauses today, it is suspicious that the man, who initially seemed keen on prying, is now faking casualness.No follow-up question comes.

There is no doubt in Nash’s mind that this man knowsexactlywho he is and yet, for some reason, is pretending to have never seen him before in his life.

This trip is deeply cursed.

Chapter Eight

Christopher

Healmostwalked right into it.For a moment, Christopher did think he should probably come clean about knowing who Nash is, especially now they are temporarily cohabiting.

But then Nash just kept being snippy and weird after the phone call, and the admittedly rather petty part of Christopher thought, no, Nash doesn’t deserve the satisfaction of discovering he knows his extensive list of IMDb credits.

Plus, if he’s honest with himself, it’s probably too late to casually reveal it now.How would he even start that conversation?Oh hi, so remember how I have pretended to not know who you are and now you’re trapped in my house with me in the dark?Well actually I’m a huge fan.

That would go down faster than an undercooked souffle.

But Christ, he doesn’t like this pretence.Sure, he operates on a steady thrum of anxiety at the best of times, but this isn’t exactly a situation he could prepare for.His heart beats so loud that he swears Nash must be able to hear it from across the couch.

No, stop worrying, he didn’t notice.You’re making it more weird.

Clearly, Nash was expecting Christopher to fawn over him or something, because when he doesn’t respond, Nash eventually turns to look at him.

Just act normal.Just be a normal person who doesn’t know anything about movies.That seems fine.

After a while, Nash offers, ‘My agent, because I’m an actor.’

If you think about it, that’s a very weird fragment of a sentence to say after a solid beat of complete silence.