When the cinema grew quiet between morning sessions, she crouched beneath the counter and typed ‘Chloe Frost’ accompanied by ‘London’ and ‘journalist’ into the Google search bar. The first two results pulled up Chloe’s LinkedIn and Facebook accounts, and the third directed Evie to the IMDB page for A Touch of Frost. Evie scrolled past these, not daring to stop and look at the LinkedIn account in case it told Chloe who’d been looking. A little lower down, Evie was directed to Chloe’s most recent article for The Guardian titled ‘A Cult Called Zumba’. Evie ran her eyes down the length of the piece. She tapped through to more of Chloe’s articles, most of which covered restaurant openings, exhibitions and groovy pop-up events.

As she read piece after piece, getting a feel for the writing, she wondered what it had been like between them, when Hugo and Chloe were the ones collaborating creatively. She wondered how they worked together; whether it consumed their dinner talk, or whether they would write together in bed. Evie was surprised to feel a little threatened by the fact that Chloe had also worked with Hugo. She had always felt that the special bond she and Hugo shared through their writing had given them a unique edge to their relationship.

She wished she could send the articles to Ben and get his take on them. But their friendship was still strained. They had recorded last week’s podcast interview together, with a film critic who shot his review videos while taking bubble baths, but apart from that their social interactions had become almost non-existent. Evie didn’t want to bother him more than necessary since he had told her, in no uncertain terms, to back the fuck off.

‘Wouldn’t mind a hand over here,’ Josie called out from where she stood before a long, impatient line of customers.

Evie apologised and leaped up to support her.

‘Even when you’re here, you’re barely here! What’s got you so distracted today?’ Josie asked.

‘Just missing Hugo. He’s away again.’ And she meant it, but not in the way Josie interpreted it. She missed the old, uncomplicated, ever-present Hugo who wrote her romantic notes and stayed up late sharing secrets with her beneath the safety of their duvet. Would things ever be so pure and simple again?

‘Ah well, can’t be easy, putting up with all that glitz and glamour.’

‘Yeah, so much glitz, so much glamour.’ Evie thought about the scene she’d just edited for Hugo while he was busy working the red carpet at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books. Not that she needed accolades or for anyone to roll out the red carpet for her. She was a writer through and through after all, and happy to create from behind the scenes.