Page 116 of Wish You Were Her

She smiled out at the audience. “I hope you all enjoy the movie. I worked really hard in it, we all did. They’ve all done such an amazing job. You’ll see it on the screen, you don’t need us to spell it out for you. Wish I could stay but I have somewhere I need to be.”

Ignoring gasps of protest and loud commentary from the audience, she neatly jumped down from the platform and moved to the cinema aisle. Jonah met her there, after pushing by people’s legs. He grasped her face with his hands and stared down at her in complete awe.

“It was you? All along, it was you?”

“I wish I were her, too,” she told him, completely indifferent to all of their onlookers, some of whom were taking pictures—even when the cinema ushers demanded that they stop. “That girl on the screen, that’s where she lives. She’s not real. I only get to borrow her sometimes. I can’t be her all of the time, Jonah, I hope you know that.”

“I know,” he told her. “You’re you. The one who picks out tomatoes and has to have the last word with me no matter what. That’s the you I want.”

He kissed her and smatterings of applause burst out across the vast room, with one older woman loudly asking, “Is this part of the movie?”

Chapter Thirty-Two

The two of them fled the auditorium, hand in hand, and burst out into the long cinema corridor, leading to smaller screens and the lobby that would open out into the jaws of the press and the fans. The walls were adorned with movie posters, scribbled on by actors who had suffered similar screenings.

“It was you,” Jonah said, catching his breath as he stared down into Allegra’s beautifully made-up face.

“Yes,” she replied, her euphoria diluting a little as she studied his reaction. “I’m sorry. I thought it was Simon at first. Until that night—”

“At Pete and Alice’s cafe. With the rose andMiddlemarch?”

“Yes.”

She watched him replay their entire summer. “You thought it wasSimonwriting to you?”

“He used a few of your expressions. I caught him at the computer right after an email arrived. The Oscar Wilde book was at his house.” Allegra could hear herself making excuses, so she cut off her own words and took a breath. “I think, in the beginning… we were so mad at each other. I didn’t consider it could be you, because—”

“Because I was such a dick.”

“Well—”

“No, I was. Especially during our first meeting.”

Allegra couldn’t bear the touch of resignation that had materialized in him. His body language was slightly stiffer and his focus had shifted.

“I’m sorry I’m not Simon,” he finally said. “Or someone like Simon.”

Allegra draped her arms around his neck and smiled as his cheeks turned just the lightest shade of pink. She pressed up against him and put her lips against his jawline.

“I don’t want someone like Simon. The Simon I thought I knew wasn’t even real, anyhow.”

She felt him swallow and his arms laced around her hips, pulling her closer.

“Simon makes people’s mothers laugh,” he said. “He buys the right gifts for the dinner host. He likes being on social media. He is, and always has been, the more obvious choice between the two of us. He wears lots of faces. I’m not surprised you wanted Dear Friend to be him.”

“I didn’t want that, I just believed it. I want you. Since the moment I saw you up that stupid ladder, being such a prick.”

She felt him laugh.

“We’re so similar,” she added quietly. Thoughtfully. “I’ve never felt that before. I’ve never been around someone who feels and sees things almost exactly like I do. And I love you, Jonah. So please stop talking.”

His mouth came down on hers and everything else went away. Being with him was like playing music or falling into a really great scene. It banished all of the immaterial. It made all of the good things in life come sharply into focus.

He deepened the kiss and then let out a groan when she responded with as much fervor. He pulled away to say, “Weneed to get out of here. I can’t do the things I want to do with loads of photographers lurking around.”

She smiled against his mouth. “If you don’t mind sneaking out the back way, we can go to my place.”

“Oh, great,” he said teasingly. “We can roll around on the floor with no rugs and no furniture.”