“We’re fully booked for the late showing,” Harry said as we, yet again, cleaned up the popcorn. “So I guess we’ll just need you on the bar, to help out with food and stuff.”
“I can’t believe this stupid movie is so popular,” I grumbled. The complainy lady in E3 had left the most mess – it was like she’d been in a fistfight with her popcorn.
“What’s your issue with romance films?” he asked, just as LouLou slid in on an extra Hoover, crying, “I’m here to helllllllp.
“Yes, Audrey,” she said, plugging it in at the wall. “What’s your problem with The Mr Dicky Curtisfield?”
I crossed my arms. “It’s simple. Women in most romance movies aren’t real.”
Harry cut off his Hoover and sat down on a chair, putting his legs on the seat. “Tell me, Audrey. How are they not real?”
I blew my hair up and thought back to all the films I’d watched with Mum and Dad on our family film nights. “Well, they never have any real insecurities, just like – cute ones! Like, ‘Oh, I’m really neat and tidy’, or ‘I’m mildly clumsy’. Where are the woman saying, ‘Why the hell haven’t you replied to my messages after shagging me?’ or ‘Do you mind if we take things slow because I was raped in college?’”
LouLou pointed at me. “This is true.”
“Plus” – I was still warming up – “they’re always crazy perfect skinny, even though they’re supposedly always munching down burgers and chocolate. That’s not real. You can’t have thighs that don’t rub at the top but also looooove hot dogs and beer. Those two things don’t coexist. You have to do squats every single moment of your life and only have one slither of cake, like, once a year, and probably eat it whilst still doing squats.”
Harry’s smile was so wide. He waved his arm like he was conducting me. “Go on.”
“Well” – I sat down next to him – “they always look amazing in the morning. They never have stinky breath or hair all over the place, or boogers in their eyes. And they sleep in, like, tiny pyjama short things instead of an ugly oversized T-shirt with jammy bottoms. I mean, AREN’T THEY COLD? Also” – I began to list them off on my fingers – “they never pick fights with the guy’s friends about the fact they’re sexist slobs. They never fart, let alone fanny fart, or get their period and accidentally bleed reddy-brown splodges onto their jeans. Their fringes are always impeccable. They’re always one of the guys somehow, and like sport and drinking beer or watching action movies, because that’s so real. They never nag the guy about watching football all the time, or say ‘Let’s watch Love, Rosie because it’s my turn to choose’. They’re never stroppy and they’re never difficult and they’re never needy and they’re never bloated and they never wear mismatching underwear and they never have cellulite and they never ask to have sex with the lights off because they hate their stomachs. And even if they ARE stroppy and difficult, it’s always something that’s MENDED by the end of the film because some guy with perfectly-sculpted arms kisses them in the rain.”
“I like you,” LouLou said, chewing on her lip stud. “You’re allowed to stay.”
“Thanks… Umm, can you tell I’m dealing with a lot of anger in my life right now?”
Harry jumped up and grabbed my hand, pulling it upwards. “This is perfect!” he announced. “You HAVE to be my zombie bride. Can you channel all your hate for the human universe into filming? Tonight? Let’s do it tonight.”
I grinned, annoyed at myself for enjoying the feel of his hand in mine. Deliberately dropping it as a result. “That depends. Can your zombie bride decide that the zombie apocalypse actually SAVED her from a horrid life where she’d be chained to the kitchen sink all day?”
Harry’s eyes widened. “A zombie bride who is HAPPY about being a zombie as it saved her from domesticity?”
I nodded. “Yes!”
“Perfect! Yes, this is PERFECT!”
LouLou put her hand up. “Hang on, can zombies have that level of cognitive ability?”
“Shh,” Harry said. “Stop ruining it. Let me think… I mean, the thing with zombies is, there’s no definite rule on what a zombie is—”
“Annnnd half the internet wants to kill you right now,” LouLou interrupted.
“But there’s not!” Harry said. “Maybe if we tweak how the virus works in the script, so zombies still want to eat brains but also remember their past lives and stuff…?”
I was smiling so wide now. “And my zombie bride wants to use her zombieness to eat the brains of Bad Men?”
Harry grabbed me again. “This is awesome! I wish you’d hurry up and get over the fact that I will end up kissing you, because I totally want to kiss you right now.”
“Harry, stop threatening to kiss the new girl,” LouLou said.
“She doesn’t mind.”
“Umm, yes, I do!” I said, though my cheeks ached from smiling. I could feel the zombie bride in me already, her energy twitching up my arms, her thoughts clouding my brain. I closed my eyes and FLASH I was there, on the morning of her wedding, putting the dress on, feeling so much dread and then a crash from the window and fear and blood and gore and then…strength and relief… This was my part. The zombie bride was my part. I could taste her blood on my tongue. God, I’d missed this feeling. I’d forgotten how much I loved this feeling, like the character is crawling under my skin, becoming part of me. “I’ll do it,” I said. “Filming, I mean. If you let me play the zombie bride like this?”
Harry pulled me into a hug and lifted me off my feet. It should have been shocking, how familiar he was considering this was only our second day knowing each other. But seeing how he was with the customers and my friends, I knew it wasn’t me. This was just who he was.
“It’s going to be amazing!” he said, eventually putting me down. “Right, I’ll message everyone else and let them know. The rain’s stopped and everything. It’s a sign! We’ll film an attack scene tonight so there isn’t much script to change. I’ve already told Rosie you’d do it.”
“Harry! I hadn’t said yes yet.”
He stuck out his tongue. “I know you better than you know yourself, Audrey.”
And I was about to open my mouth to protest when the confused head of an elderly man popped around the door and said, “Umm, excuse me? There’s a queue at the bar and no one there to run it.”