Star Struck (6 page)

‘Smoking is bad for you.'

I got an arch look for that. ‘Right. I'll bear it in mind. So, you up for it?'

How come I could contemplate going to a strange man's hotel room without a qualm when the mere thought of walking downstairs into a group of people who were fans of the same programme that I revered made the Valium work overtime? I turned the question over in my head. But the thought of spending the rest of the day alone in a room had nothing to recommend it. And there was something ineptly appealing about this shaggy-haired stranger.

‘Okay. But I'll have to be quick, in case Felix comes back and misses me.'

Another head-jerk. ‘Is he likely to? I mean, I don't know what you two are to each other, but he did imply you weren't lovers, and when I saw him earlier he looked like a man on a mission.'

‘He's my friend.'

‘Just “a friend”?'

‘Oh, yes. That's as close as it's wise to get to a man who thinks monogamy is something you make tables out of.'

For that I got a proper grin. ‘Great line. Might nick that one. Anyway, you coming, 'cos I'm about to gnaw off the last of my fingernails.'

I pulled the door closed behind me and followed his barefoot and pyjama'd shape up past two doors, to the room I'd seen his girlfriend erupt from.

He swiped his key-card. ‘You've not got your key?'

‘Think Felix took it. He wouldn't want to disturb me by knocking to come in and, anyway, where on
earth
would I ever want to go?'

‘He's in for a shock then.' He held the door wide. ‘It's a bit messy, but you don't look like you'd mind that,' he said, standing aside to let me pass. ‘Liss has done her usual trick of making the place look like she's exploded in it. Came in to talk work, next thing I know she's using my shower 'cos
hers
isn't working properly or something. It's eighty degrees out there in the daytime and she wants a hot shower? I told her to go down and ask housekeeping to fix the one in her room, but apparently it's just easier for her to come prancing over here to use mine. And why couldn't she take the clothes away afterwards, or at least carry them downstairs with her – some kind of hold-all might be in order, but that's a bit too much like forward planning for Lissa – what is it with you women and clothes that you have to change every five minutes? Always with the showering and the changing … I'm talking too much, aren't I?'

‘A bit.'

‘Sorry.' An unabashed grin. ‘Spent too long at the keyboard again, always makes me a bit … I forget real people need gaps to reply.'

‘Real people?'

A one-shoulder shrug. ‘I'm a writer. Which, weirdly, doesn't make for great communication skills. Obviously. Words on paper, yep, that's my forte, I can do that, no problems, oh God, shut up Jack.'

Gosh. I'm here with one of the writers.
Even the Valium couldn't quite stop my eyes widening with a flash of hero-worship, quickly stilled in the face of those tatty pyjamas and unbrushed hair.

The room smelled of her perfume. Sweet and pink, like overblown roses. The bed was rumpled and I had to work hard not to imagine this dark man and his preciously blonde Lissa busy rumpling it. ‘Won't your girlfriend mind you having me in here?'

The click and flare of a lighter. ‘I'm not intending to have you.'

A horribly disfiguring blush rose up my cheeks and neck. I knew from experience that this would make my scar stand out even more, a jagged white against the dull red skin. Fortunately he wasn't looking at me, but was desperately trying to get a bent remnant of cigarette into conjunction with the flame of the lighter, sucking at it until it squeaked.

‘Besides, Lissa isn't my girlfriend. She
was
, once upon a time, and that's not any kind of fairy-tale you'd want to hear. But, yeah, I guess you're right, she probably wouldn't like it all that much, so, would you mind standing out in the corridor?'

I balanced awkwardly on one leg, not sure whether he was being serious or not. ‘It's just, you know, I don't want to upset anyone.'

‘Lissa is a big girl. She can cope with a few upsets.' He smiled, and it was a nice smile, a proper smile. His eyes creased under the weight of it and it took away some of that look he wore that said the world had disappointed him in some way. ‘Stop worrying. Hey, what about a drink?' He crouched down to look under the bed and I tried really hard not to stare at his pyjama bottoms, which were baggy and striped and almost cartoonishly loose, held up with a piece of frayed cord. ‘I'm not supposed to smoke in here, but sometimes … ah. White do you?'

‘Do I what?'

He straightened up and I had to drag my eyes from their natural resting place which happened to be directly level with his flappy crotch. ‘Would you like a glass of white wine?'

‘It's a bit early.'

‘Convention, remember? They'll all be on the Southern Comfort downstairs and no-one will be sober until Monday. What are we now, Thursday? Can you really stand the idea of being the only person sober for five days? Might as well join them.' A pause and his eyes looked inward for a moment, fingertips flicked in a kind of low-level mini shrug. ‘At least …' He spun away, leaving a smoke trail like a low-flying aircraft and now I was free to stare at his back view, a crumpled picture of Mighty Boosh and a sagging pair of pyjama bottoms which managed not to make his backside look wrinkly and enormous by some fluke of tailoring. The T-shirt did nothing to cover his scarred arm but he didn't seem to care. ‘Right. Not especially well-chilled, but still better than downstairs' Tequila Slammers.' He leaned forward, glass in hand. ‘Oh. My name's Jack, by the way. And you're …?'

‘Skye. Skye Threppel.'

‘Well, Skye. Here's to hiding from the world.' Jack picked up another glass from next to the laptop and raised it, seeming to toast the screensaver picture of purple-heathered moorland, as though he was blocking out the Nevada desert with a picture of home. Then he plonked himself on the floor, knees drawn up. The only chair in the room was in front of the laptop and covered in papers, so for want of anywhere else available, I sat on the bed.

‘Are you? Hiding from the world?' I asked, jiggling my wine between my fingers.

‘Ah, now there's the question.'

‘I know. That's why my voice did that going up at the end thing,' I replied a little sharply. I was nervous and being nervous made me edgy these days, and defensive. ‘Maybe I should write the conversation down for you.' Jack seemed nice, a little tense perhaps, but the raw feeling of connection that we'd shared earlier had ebbed and I was concerned that maybe I'd imagined it. I couldn't always trust the way I felt, when those feelings were built on memories or associations I could no longer recall. It was as though my body reacted in certain situations without my mind having any kind of control and I was very conscious that this made me easy to take advantage of.

He made an appeasing gesture, holding his hands out and spilling some of his drink on the T-shirt. ‘Point to you. I'm struggling with the lack of dramatic convention.' He sipped and looked at me over the rim of the glass.

I felt the blush start again and the edgy sensation that my nerves had all been driven to the surface.

‘Maybe I should go. Rather than sit here and force you to make conversation.'

‘Maybe.' Jack rested his glass on his knees and looked up at me. It might have been my imagination but I was fairly certain that what was in his glass wasn't wine. It was too clear, too transparent. ‘But I'd quite like it if you didn't.'

Despite the Valium I could feel my skin growing clammy and my hands had moistened as though beads of blood were seeping through the palms. ‘I ought …' My voice sounded croaky and about a hundred years old. I cleared my throat but it didn't help, just made the air thicken around me so that I had to concentrate on breathing.

‘What is it you're frightened of, Skye? You look terrified right now, and no-one's ever found me that scary before – arrogant and self-righteous, yes, scary, no.' His head tilted to one side. ‘Panic attacks worse when there're lots of people about, yes? And yet being alone, closed in, scares you, too. Am I getting warm?'

Suddenly uneasy at the intensity with which he was looking at me, I drained my glass in one gulp. ‘I'm not scared. It's stress related. I get … when I'm a bit … when things are
different
, when I don't know what's going to happen next, sometimes I get panicky. But it's not that, I'm just worried that Felix will wonder where I am.'

Jack stood up and refilled my glass. ‘Do you want me to leave the door open? Will that help?' He was looking at me with an expression that seemed partly compassion and partly curiosity and I hated myself suddenly, which surprised me. Hated this pathetic, helpless Skye with her inabilities and her carefully modified behaviour. He tilted his head to one side, stubbing out his nearly completely smoked cigarette without taking his eyes off me. ‘You might feel better if you know you can run whenever you want. A bit more in control of the situation. And if Felix comes back, you'll be able to hear him.'

I gave a short, tight nod and he snicked the door off its latch, propping it open with a lone trainer. ‘Thank you.' I could feel my airways relaxing. ‘It isn't you, I'm sorry, they think it's something to do with the accident, the head injury, it's been over a year-and-a-half and I still can't …'

‘Oh, and there was me feeling special.' Jack grinned and his face was suddenly attractive. ‘Okay then, let's talk neutral subjects, shall we? So, what's so great about
Fallen Skies
?'

I wanted to sound erudite and literary, as though I analysed the metaphorical allegories of today's political situation and enjoyed the complex interplay of meta-media. ‘I like all of it,' was what I found my mouth going ahead with. ‘Really.'

Jack nodded over his glass. ‘Gethryn. Am I right?'

My blush answered for me.

‘Is that why you came? Chance to meet him?'

This time I just shrugged and managed to mutter, ‘I like the storylines too.'

‘Glad to hear it.' He sounded a bit terse, and I didn't miss the sidelong glance at the open laptop, now displaying a screensaver picture of random swirls of colour. ‘Glad we're doing something right.'

‘Sorry, yes, you said you're one of the writers, didn't you? Because, what I meant to say was, you know, it's the scripting, isn't it, that makes the whole show. And the character arcs, and the way that the Shadow War has implications for all the planets across the galaxy.'

‘Too late, Skye, far too late. But, nice recovery.' Jack stood up to top up my glass. ‘Don't worry about fancying Gethryn, you're not the only one.'

‘I didn't mean …'

But he cut me off by turning away. ‘Doesn't matter.'

I drained my second glass of wine out of embarrassment. Jack was rummaging through the pockets of a jacket hanging on the back of a chair, triumphantly pulling forth an unopened packet of cigarettes and dragging off the cellophane like an addict. When he finally turned back to me he was blowing smoke like a dragon and the air had turned chilly. ‘Do you want another?' He gestured towards my glass. ‘Or had you better be going?'

Feeling dismissed I went to stand up, at which point two things happened. Drunkenness fell, breaking over my head like an enormous egg, and I lurched, staggered and grabbed out for any solid object, the nearest of which happened to be Jack. My wavering hand secured a fistful of his T-shirt, pulling him with me as I toppled back onto the bed.

And there was the sound of someone pushing the door open from outside.

‘Oh, bloody hell.' Jack managed not to suffocate me by propping himself clear of my prone body, which caused the T-shirt to stretch obscenely. ‘This is really
not
my day.'

And into the room, bouncing on the balls of her feet, walked the skinny girl in the pink jeans. ‘Oh, right,' she drawled, seeing us in our state of near-collapse on the bed. ‘I know the Nevada call-girls ain't up to much but, brother, you should ask for your money back.'

‘Hey, Liss.' Jack walked backwards, dragging his shirt off over his head and leaving me with two handfuls of fabric. ‘This is Skye. I think she's had a bit too much to drink.'

‘Great. If she throws up on me, I shall
so
sue her ass.'

‘She's not well, Lissa. Help me.'

I tried to look up into their faces but everything spun, then jumped, as though milliseconds were being cut out of the morning. ‘Did you … spike my drink?'

Lissa gave a hollow little laugh. ‘Lady, look at him. He doesn't need to spike drinks to get laid.'

‘Shut
up
.' Jack walked around the bed, looking down on me, nervously fiddling with a leather necklace around his throat. It hung black and stark against his bare skin. ‘She's only had two glasses; it's more than just the alcohol.' His face unfocused then pirouetted around the top of his body. ‘Shall I get your friend?'