The Real Deal by Caitlin Devlin EPUB & PDF – eBook Details Online
- Status: Available for Free Download
- Author: Caitlin Devlin
- Language: English
- Genre: Contemporary Literary Fiction
- Format: PDF / EPUB
- Size: 2 MB
- Price: Free
Reunion special
Everyone always wants to know what I’m doing now. The nicer voices say
it like that – ‘What is Belle from The Real Deal doing now?’ in loopy font,
sometimes over an out-of-date photo of me shyly waving. The other voices
ask it differently. ‘What happened to Belle from The Real Deal?’ There’s
always a photo of me on these ones. I am always crying.
Whoever asks it, however it is phrased, the answer is always the same.
Nothing. I am doing nothing now. Nothing happened to me. They conclude
it sadly, or gleefully, and then they ask you to subscribe.
‘You don’t understand the appetite for it,’ Rupert says on the phone. ‘I
mean, Belle, you do this, and who knows? All the world needs is a little
reminder of you.’
‘Is that what you told Donna the first time around?’
He laughs. Rupert has always been remarkably good at laughing
through his discomfort. ‘Yes, more or less.’
‘Well then.’
‘Well, it was true, wasn’t it? We put her back on the map.’ A pause.
‘It’s hardly our fault she sort of . . . dropped off it again.’
I want to ask if this is the kind of sensitivity I can expect throughout
the experience, but I already know the answer. Besides, Jane is already
watching me closely from the kitchen table, Biology homework forgotten
and a cheese sandwich held halfway to her mouth. I stick my tongue out at
her and she reciprocates, but she still looks concerned. A small piece of
grated cheese falls onto the front of her PE top.
‘I just don’t really want to drag it all up,’ I say into the phone,
gesturing to Jane to brush off the front of her top. She looks down,
surprised. Her messiness definitely comes from Cameron’s side. Mum and I
were always neat to a fault.
‘That’s understandable,’ says Rupert, and his voice dips lower, into the
register he uses to show faux concern. It’s so familiar that if Jane hadn’t
been watching, I might have shivered. ‘But we can proceed gently.’
‘So we don’t have to talk about it.’
Another pause. ‘Belle, I’m going to be straight with you,’ says Rupert.
‘We can’t do this special and not talk about it. But we can be delicate.’
‘Do I have to talk about it?’
‘We can negotiate on that. We have to cover it, certainly, but that could
be done with witnesses and news stories. No one has to ask you about it
directly, if that’s what it takes.’ He waits. ‘Belle? How does that sound?’
‘What’s the money like?’
He laughs. ‘That’s what I always liked about you. You’re all business.’
‘Well?’ I know the number I’m expecting him to say. It’s double.
‘That’s what the other girls are getting, at least,’ he says. ‘But I won’t
bullshit you. We’d pay what we needed to. You’re our most valuable player.
And like I said, this is going to be huge.’ He quietens. ‘Belle, I was so sorry
to hear about Sofie.’
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