༊*·˚*ೃ༄

you can taste now!

"it's just—" she coughed. "—very salty."

of course after hearing that, timothée apologized profusely, before a thought popped into his head.

"you said it was... salty?"

"a bit excessive on the salt, yes."

"so you can taste now!" he yelped, doing a little celebratory dance.

ੈ✩‧˚ *ೃ༄ ੈ✩‧˚ *ೃ༄ ੈ✩‧˚ *ೃ༄

unfortunately for haley, timothée wouldn't pop open any champagne.

"we'll save that for when you're at a hundred percent," he told her.

haley managed to convince him to bring food up for himself and keep her company, so he sat on the floor on the farthest side of the room making sure to keep his distance. it felt like there was a physical and emotional barrier between them as they tried to converse.

"what've you been doing while you were up here the whole time?" timothée asked, playing around with his chili.

"i've gotta be honest with you, but i haven't seen the second season of euphoria yet, so i managed to binge it all a couple nights ago." haley disclosed. "and also, i actually started reading books again."

"that's great!" he said. "what're the titles?"

"well, i just reread this one book called 'the invisible life of addie larue' since i'm casted in its film adaptation." timothée sat up.

"you're gonna be in it?"

"i'm gonna be addie, yep."

he settled back, leaning on the wall. "i think i auditioned for that movie a couple months back."

"really?" she looked impressed. "they'd be silly to turn you down."

"do you know when filming is?" he asked her.

"early september, wrapping up in december, i think."

"i'm not sure if i'd even get the part though, 'cause it might overlap with dune filming."

"oh, right!" haley exclaimed. "i actually started dune: messiah recently, though i'm not liking irulan very much. do you know who denis is gonna cast?" she asked slyly.

"this is top secret, alright? but i trust you, so here it is: anya taylor-joy."

"aw, i just love anya! i was an extra in split, you know the one with james mcavoy? she was so nice to all of us, i'm telling you right now. she messages me sometimes, too."

"she seems really nice. she has a regal, bene gesserit look to her. rora was actually considered, but i think anya's the final choice."

"did you audition as luc? for the invisible life," haley added.

"the devil. yup." one of the love interests, more like.

"addie doesn't have that much scenes with him, so maybe you could catch up at the end of production," she mused. "though it'll be stopped short because the press tour for 'the story of a pretty woman' starts in the venice film festival in september."

"oh, right!" timothée remembered that haley had a movie release later that year.

"what's your press route?"

"well, we'll start at venice, then head to paris where we'll go to that talk show you always visit? i think daya and tom went there to promote no way home, too. lily, joe and greta are gonna be there, and i know my french is rusty, but at least i'll understand it unlike greta or joe."

"and then where's your next stop?" timothée grinned, speaking in french. "to help you practice," he said, in english this time.

haley scrunched her face, thinking. "we go london after," she tried, as he nodded encouragingly. "we'll go on norton, head to los angeles. we have kimmel, fallon and colbert line up for talk show. then the big premiere after, with red carpet and everything, but we also have video interviews from hotels?"

"kinda like what you and zendaya did for dune." she said, in english. "i can understand french, but my grammar's horrible i bet."

"a bit more practice and you'll be fine," he assured her. "you've got a big year ahead of you, huh?"

"tell me about it. i'm gonna be releasing my debut album in june, too."

"i'll look forward to it," he said, wondering if she wrote any songs about him.

haley thought he was thinking the same thing, and decided to go with the honest route. "listen, i'm telling you now that there are." she said, answering the unsaid question in his eyes. "but i've written these over the course of almost four years, so not everything is about you." she explained.

he nodded, bracing for june, and wondering what the public response would be like. would he get death threats?

timothée knew that the public didn't know they dated, it was more of a 2017 tomdaya situation where everyone shipped them, but they barely had any content to base their hunches on.

then again, the same case happened for joshua bassett and look what happened to the poor guy.

"are they bad?" he asked, trying to keep the tone light.

"no, no!" haley shook her head immediately. "i swear they're not, if there's any songs blasting someone... it's not you."

that was a sigh of relief for him, and knowing that, they went on talking as if nothing happened, and ended up watching young royals throughout the night.

two chapters in two days?? lmao i can't believe myself

don't forget to vote+comment! and if you have read the prologue of

this book anytime before jan 6, 2022, i encourage u to

because i updated it recently with some important details that'll

have context later on.

I MISS YOU, I'M SORRY