Page 68 of Pretend You Love Me

I push through the door with my hip, a movement I’ve perfected over two years of entering rooms while attached to small humans, and step into the café. The air smells like the particular warm chaos that Luca seems to generate wherever he goes. The lights are dimmer than usual, the overhead fluorescents switched off in favour of the smaller lamps that line the bookshelves, creating pools of warm light that make the place feel like somewhere between a library and a kind of sleepover.

Harper is at the corner table with her laptop open and a coffee going cold beside her, her reading glasses pushed into her hair and an expression that suggests she’s been staring at the same sentence for at least twenty minutes. She looks up when the bell rings, already reaching for her coffee without looking, and does a small double-take when she sees us.

“You’re here,” she says, which seems both obvious and slightly loaded. “Good. I mean, great. That’s… perfect timing.”

“That’s literally what we agreed on,” I tell her. “Eleven o’clock. That’s the time. That’s what we said.”

“Right,” she says, and takes a sip of her cold coffee without seeming to notice the temperature. “Well. Perfect that you’re on time then.”

On the counter, Liv is sitting cross-legged with her tablet balanced on her knees, one hand moving across the screen with quick, gestures. She’s wearing all black, as always, but has added what appears to be a necklace made of tiny plastic dinosaurs, which dangles just above her collarbone when she leans forward to adjust something. Without looking up, she says, “Your café has a menu that looks like it was designed by someone having a stroke. I’ve been staring at it for ten minutes and I still can’t tell if the oat milk costs extra.”

“And you say you are my friend,” I say. “Friends are supportive and non-judgmental about the menu.”

“Which makes you confused about the true basis of a deep friendship,” she says, still not looking up. “It’s almost expected for me to judge everything.”

“That’s not how friendships work,” I tell her.

“That’s exactly how they work,” she counters. “It’s practically in the constitution.”

“The constitution of what country?”

“The constitution of good taste,” she says, and finally looks up. “Which you are currently violating with that playlist as well. Did you put it together while having a seizure? Because that’s the only explanation for the transition from ‘90s pop to acoustic folk to whatever that whale noise situation was.”

Clara is at the round table near the window with a pastry and the calm, composed energy of a woman who has survived worse than this. She’s wearing a soft blue blazer and carrying a mug that reads “OBJECTION!” in what appears to be Comic Sans, a gift from Leo that she treats with the careful dignity reserved for things given by small children. She raises one hand in greeting when I come in, the gesture containing as much enthusiasm as Clara ever shows for anything, which is to say, a very small, measured amount that communicates warmth without compromising her overall sense of professional competence.

“Elsie,” she says. “You’re right on time.”

“That’s literally the second time someone’s said that,” I tell her. “Why does everyone keep saying that like it’s surprising?”

She takes a small bite of her pastry. “No reason,” she says, in a tone that suggests maybe seven reasons, all of which she has decided not to share.

I’m about to ask what is happening when Noah appears from the back room, carrying what appears to be a stack of folded tablecloths and looking uncharacteristically… something. Not quite nervous or excited, more like a man who has too much energy and not enough outlets for it. He spots us immediately, his face doing that thing it does when he first sees me, the softening around the eyes that still makes my chest feel tight.

“There you are,” he says, already crossing to us. “I was just... helping Luca with the… the thing.”

“The thing?” I repeat.

“The table setup,” he says, with the caution of someone who is absolutely making this up as he goes. “For the… meeting.”

“What meeting?” I ask. “The unofficial society one?”

“That’s the one,” he says, and then, before I can press the point, he’s already reaching for Milo. “Hey, buddy. Want to help me put these on the tables? It’s a very important job for someone who knows about important jobs.”

Milo, never one to turn down an opportunity to be involved, immediately launches himself toward Noah with the enthusiasm of someone who has been personally selected for a mission of great significance. “Help!” he announces, already grabbing for the tablecloths. “I help!”

“Perfect,” Noah says, already adjusting to accommodate Milo’s weight. “We’ll be the tablecloth team. The best team.”

They disappear into the back room, Milo already explaining something about “good job” and “big help” in the particular cadence he uses when he’s extremely pleased with himself, and I’m left standing in the middle of the café with Maisie on my hip and the distinct impression that I’ve walked into something I wasn’t briefed on.

“Okay,” I say to the room at large. “What is happening right now? Because everyone is being very… strange, and I can’t tell if it’s a good strange or a we-should-probably-leave strange.”

“It’s a meeting strange,” Harper says, already closing her laptop. “For the… Rewrite Club. That Luca started. For people who are… rewriting things.”

“The Rewrite Club?” I ask.

“That’s what we’re calling it,” Liv says, without looking up from her tablet. “It’s either that or ‘Elsie’s Friends Who Are Definitely Not Planning Anything,’ and Luca said that was too on the nose.”

“I’m officially concerned,” I tell her.