Page 22 of How To Tackle A Crush
“You handled that well.”
“Which part?”
He smiles slightly. “The proofreader.”
So he noticed too.
“What about her?” I ask, keeping my tone neutral.
“She asked an odd question,” he says.
I nod back but my attention is already drifting again.
Back to the empty chair in the last row.
Funny.
Out of a room full of journalists, the one who wasn’t trying to impress me is the one I’m desperate to speak to again.
Chapter 5
Ava
By the next morningthe press conference should already feel distant.
Instead, it follows me.
Not in an obvious way. Not like nerves or embarrassment. More like a question I did not realise I had asked myself.
I replay small details while I wait for the kettle to boil. The way he paused before answering. The way he didn’t seem interested in winning the room. The way he had looked directly at people instead of past them.
The way he had looked at me.
I am not used to being noticed on purpose.
That thought sits with me longer than I would like.
By the time I reach the newsroom the usual noise has returned. Not fully. Some desks are still empty. But enough people are back that the place feels alive again rather than like a crime scene involving chicken.
Chloe is at her desk, wrapped in a cardigan and drinking something herbal. She looks tired but determined, like someone who has decided survival counts as productivity.
“…and I’m telling you,” she is saying as I arrive, “from now on I only trust men who stay when you look like a Victorian ghost.”
AJ looks up from his toast. “That’s quite a specific dating criterion.”
“I lookedawful,” Chloe continues. “No make-up. Hair like I’d been electrocuted. I told him not to come over and he turned up anyway with a blanket and remote control batteries because mine had died.”
AJ pauses. “He brought batteries?”
“Batteries,” she repeats. “Who thinks of batteries?”
“Marriage material,” AJ says.
“Marriage material,” Chloe agrees.
She notices me then and her face brightens slightly.
“You survived football.”
