Page 41 of Snowed In with You

‘Do you think him being here is big news in the Netherlands?’ asked Lucy. ‘Like, does him being stuck on a Swiss mountain create some kind of constitutional crisis?’

‘I imagine his fandom are going out of their mind at the lack of content,’ said Nate. ‘Weird to think this whole situation might be news, and we have no idea. The local paper could be interviewing your family right now.’

‘That would be awkward,’ said Lucy with a grimace, wondering how long it would take for one of her parents to mention Leo, then feeling bad about having bitter thoughts when Leo would have given anything to be having this adventure right now. ‘Where are your family?’

‘Oh, here and there,’ said Nate vaguely. ‘Most of them in France, obviously. I don’t see much of them.’

‘But your dad’s British, right?’

‘Mmm,’ said Nate vaguely. ‘But we’re not close. It’s complicated.’

‘Like your love life, right?’

He looked up at her, his brow furrowed. ‘What does that mean?’

‘Oh,’ said Lucy. ‘I asked you yesterday if you were in a relationship, and you said it was complicated.’

‘Right,’ said Nate. ‘We should probably get up. Gunther has plans for us.’

Lucy nodded, adding the deflection to her file on Nate marked Sasha. ‘But before we get up, we need to talk about your singing last night.’

Even in the gloom of the loft, Lucy could see Nate blush. ‘No,’ he said, shaking his head vehemently. ‘I’m still cringing.’

‘Why are you cringing? It was amazing.’

‘You would say that,’ he said, laughing awkwardly. ‘We have to share a bedroom.’

‘No, really, Nate,’ said Lucy, her hand twitching to reach over and touch his arm, then deciding against it. ‘It was extraordinary. You have an incredible talent.’

‘Well, it’s nice of you to say so,’ he mumbled, picking at the fabric of the duvet. ‘I write songs too.’

‘Really?’

‘Yeah. I’ve got notebooks full of them. They’re probably not very good. I should get you to edit them for me.’

‘I doubt I could do them justice. Which one is your favourite?’

Nate thought about it for a moment. ‘There’s this one I’ve been playing around with for ages, called “Vois Grand”. It’s a thing my grandma used to say a lot.’

‘Big voice?’

‘No,’ laughed Nate. ‘Vois with an S. It’s like dream big, that kind of thing. The song is in English, but I gave it a French title in her honour.’

‘That’s lovely,’ said Lucy. The only grandparents she’d known had died in their seventies, when she and Leo had still been quite small, but an inspirational granny sounded nice.

‘But there’s not much I can do with it if I have to be fifty levels of pissed to get on stage and sing it.’

‘Never bothered Liam Gallagher,’ said Lucy with a shrug.

‘Also it was an audience of seven people. And I was still terrified.’

‘I was the eighth, and you didn’t look terrified to me.’

‘You turned up during my last song. I spent the first few shitting my pants.’

Lucy laughed, knowing that at some point they would have to go and join the others, but not wanting to break this spell. ‘You need to put those pants back on today, just FYI.’

‘I’m still wearing them,’ said Nate with a grin. ‘Never took them off.’