‘He can’t help us,’ Joe explained when Zack had disappeared back upstairs. ‘But we just wanted to say thanks for fighting our corner.’
‘He told us about you nagging him to read the manuscript.’ Kaye was being heartbreakingly brave. ‘And he said you read it too.’
‘I thought it was brilliant.’ They were such a lovely couple.
‘That means so much.’ Kaye smiled at her.
‘You mustn’t give up.’
‘We won’t. We can’t,’ said Joe. ‘We think it’s brilliant too.’
‘Plus he’s modest.’ Kaye gave him a nudge.
‘I can’t help how I feel. This is our dream. It’s been our dream for so long.’
‘It’s just that we’re starting to run out of options.’
Joe shook his head. ‘We have to keep going.’
Ellie said, ‘Look, I don’t know anything about getting films made, but do you have to do all this yourself? How about sending the script out to all the big film companies? Maybe one of them will snap it up!’
‘We’ve already tried that. Every company, every last screen agent. They all turned us down.’
‘Oh.’ OK, now she felt stupid.
‘We have enough rejection letters to paper our whole house. It’s just so frustrating.’ Kaye sounded intensely frustrated. ‘Most of them don’t even bother to look at the script. I started putting hairs between the pages so you could see if they’d been opened. And they hadn’t!’
Nice. Ellie wondered how charmed any potential producer would be by the sight of a script full of hair.
‘Not a whole head’s worth.’ Joe grinned. ‘Just one hair per script.’
‘Glad to hear it.’ He had an open, friendly face and an easy manner. Together he and Kaye made a good couple.
‘Anyway,’ said Kaye, ‘you need to be getting back to work. But we just wanted to say thank you for being so enthusiastic and for doing your best with Zack.’
‘Don’t give up,’ Ellie said as she showed them out.
‘Don’t worry.’ Joe paused on the doorstep, then raised a hand in salute. ‘We won’t.’
Chapter 23
Tony, back from three days in Wales, was watching Deal Or No Deal when Ellie arrived home from work.
‘I’ve ordered Indian.’ He waved to her from the sofa. ‘It’ll be here in twenty minutes. How was your weekend, darling?’
Ellie waited until the food had been delivered before telling him what she knew she had to tell him. Tony was flying back to LA tomorrow morning and he deserved to know the truth.
That was, if they didn’t burst from overeating before she could get the words out.
‘Did I order too much?’
‘Maybe a bit.’ Faced with a takeaway menu, Tony was famous for his inability to whittle things down. Practically every surface in the kitchen bristled with foil containers and discarded lids.
‘I can’t help it, I just hate the thought of missing out.’ He was helping himself to lamb jalfrezi, peshwari naan, saag aloo, bindi bhaji, and mushroom rice. ‘Remember the time I ordered the tandoori chicken and they thought I’d said three?’ Chuckling at the memory, Tony said, ‘Jamie never could resist a challenge, could he? Ended up eating every last one of them.’
Oh no, and now he’d brought Jamie into the conversation. Her heart sinking, Ellie put down the carton of prawn bhuna. How to say it? She took a deep breath. ‘Tony, do you think Jamie would be OK about it if I started… um, maybe seeing someone else?’
He stopped spooning mango chutney onto his lamb. There was the tiniest of pauses while he gathered himself.
‘Oh, my darling, of course he’d be OK. It’s been a year and a half. Haven’t I said this before? You should be getting out there again. Jamie would be happy for you, I know he would. And I’m happy for you too. So long as it’s someone nice, someone who deserves you.’ He looked at her sideways. ‘Is it someone nice?’
‘Yes.’ Tell him, tell him…
‘I think I know.’ Tony’s smile was compassionate. ‘Are we talking about Mr McLaren?’
What? God, what a thing to say. ‘Zack? No, it’s not Zack!’
‘Oh, sorry, my mistake. Go on then, who’s the lucky man?’
Ellie braced herself. Just tell him.
‘Unless it’s a woman,’ Tony said hastily. ‘That’s fine too. It doesn’t have to be a man.’
Ellie snorted with laughter and the tension was broken. ‘The look on your face!’
‘I know. Sorry.’ He shook his head. ‘It’s all this bloody political correctness. Of course I’d rather it was a man.’
‘Well, that’s good, because it is a man.’ For crying out loud, just spit it out… ‘It’s Todd.’
Another pause. Then Tony broke into a broad smile and said, ‘Really? Even