Young Writers Society

A/N: Sorry if this part ends a bit abruptly. I didn't realise til I'd finished the chapter that it was 4 pages long, so figured best not to post the entire thing at once. Might have led to a slightly inorganic cut off though :/

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The address was for a hotel about ten minutes from my current one, so Christina had twenty minutes to quiz me about every aspect of the relationship between me and Camillo that had developed over the past couple of weeks.

“Yes, we’ve kissed,” I said, “That’s the whole bloody problem!”

She giggled and leaned her chin on her hands, kneeling at the side of my bed. “Do you think you’ll kiss again?”

I raised an eyebrow at her. “Would you kiss someone who was rebounding so bad he literally ran away from you?”

She shrugged. “I might if he was as hot as Camillo Tamer.”

She swiped on her phone a few times then flipped it round to show me a photo of Camillo staring off into the distance. I think it was for a cologne modelling campaign or something. To be fair, she had a point.

“We’ll see,” I said, “He knows what he did… and he is so cool.”

“I love his celebrations,” she said, putting her phone back in her pocket. “He’s basically an elegant version of a footballer.”

I snorted. “Elegant and football aren’t two words you hear together often… not that I’m a tennis supremacist or anything.”

“Ha-ha! Sure you’re not.” She rolled her eyes and bounced up onto the bed beside me.

I sighed and moved over so there was space for her.

“So how about you? What’s going on in your life?” I asked.

“Finally!” she shouted, then put a hand over her mouth and stifled a laugh. “That was louder than I expected. But seriously, Léo, do you realise I got here over twelve hours ago and that’s the first question you’ve asked about me?”

I felt a slight jolt, but said, “You came barging in desperate to talk about me. You were on a mission!”

“Calm down.” She laughed. “I’m just teasing you. Yeah, I’m fine. Michel’s fine. Uni’s fine. Actually yeah, to be fair my life is kinda boring compared to yours.”

“Boring, safe, nice, career not being threatened.” I shrugged. “Any works, I guess. Speaking of which, I think I should go now.”

“You want company on the way there?” she asked.

That actually made a lot of sense. If Camillo was worried about reporters taking pictures of me, might as well have my family with me to throw them off. It would also be nice to have some moral support as I walked towards my doom.

“Sounds good,” I said, “Come on.”

I got some more about Michel and both his and her exams out of her on the way to the hotel, but it really wasn’t far, so we had to say goodbye slightly earlier than I’d have liked. She gave me a hug and made me promise to call her after it was over. Then she was off, and I had a crisis to prevent.

The door was heavy – or maybe I was just too nervous for my muscles to function properly – and the lobby had a marble floor that my trainers produced a horrible squeaking sound on every time I took a step. This, of course, resulted in the receptionist looking up as I passed the desk and asking if he could help.

“I’m fine,” I said, barely even turning round. “Just visiting someone.”

The receptionist nodded and looked back at his computer. Seemingly he hadn’t recognised me, or associated me to Camillo. Maybe Camillo had quieter shoes and he hadn’t even noticed him pass by. Or maybe, if I was lucky, the receptionists had changed shift in the past twenty minutes.

My eyes focussed on the numbers as I made my way up the floors of the hotel. I wouldn’t let myself get distracted. It was like keeping my eye on the ball when I played. Stay focus, stay alert, stay calm. That was the mantra my first coach ever taught me – and of course now I was thinking about that and getting distracted.

I shook my head and realised I was only a few doors from my target. Four, six – eight! The carpet was soft, and there were vases everywhere, which allowed myself to notice now that my mission was accomplished. Seemed like quite a nice hotel. Oh God, she must be working for a serious paper to have this sort of money.

Still trying to keep attention drawn to a minimum, I lightly brushed my knuckles against the door. They must have been listening really hard to have heard that. The door was opened almost immediately by Camillo. I did my best not to rush forward into the room and slam the door behind me. I walked in at a calm, reasonable, normal pace – but my heart was racing.