Leaps and landings

59

"You're only telling me about this now!?" Celeste exclaimed at Jess, who had just mentioned in passing that Noah, the new editor he was hiring for Truncheon, had invited him to a New Years Party at Terminal 5.

"I figured we'd just stay home," Jess explained his simple thought process.

"Yeah, but it's probably a good place to meet contacts, right? He invited you personally, you said. That means that he's serious - he wants you to meet some people. If he just had spare tickets he would've just sent them to the office or something," Celeste explained her much more experienced point of view in these things. As she'd understood Noah was not just some average junior editor, he came with a contact network of his own and had been one of the big fish of this world back in Germany.

"Yeah, he did. But I don't want to spend my free evening mingling, I want to spend it with you," Jess clarified intensely, not really getting why she was getting so worked up about this.

"You're adorable! I'd be coming with you, silly," Celeste said, playfully scolding him.

"Are you really sure you'd be up for that?"Jess worried, his tone calming momentarily.

"I'll take a nap before, I'll be fine," she replied. As long as she was able to, she was gladly his wing-woman on these business ventures.

Jess drank the rest of his coffee in one sip, knowing he needed to get ready for work soon.

"Do you have the invite?" Celeste asked, trying to think practically, as she sat at the dinner table eating her smoothie bowl.

"I should have it somewhere," Jess pondered, "I'll find it by tomorrow," he added.

"Jess, if we're going to go, I'm going to need it now. Dresscode, RSVP request and so on...," Celeste demanded, holding out her palm demonstratively.

"Fine, I'll go look," Jess said with a sigh and headed towards the foyer to go through his laptop satchel.

"April said she was coming on the 4th, right?" Celeste asked in passing, making a note in her calendar that was still surprisingly busy considering she was supposed to be taking things easier from now on.

"Yeah," Jess called from the foyer, adding, "found it!"

Jess returned, handing her the invite, having not even taken it out of the envelope it came with.

"You should be really glad you showed me this today, not tomorrow, and I'm beginning to regret I suggested we'd go - it's a costume party," Celeste sighed.

"So we don't go," Jess replied, feeling like that was the easy fix.

"No-no, I think I can think of something," she replied, showing him the invite, her through process already flipping through the contents of her wardrobe and Jess'. Sure, she wasn't going to fit into most of it, but the 20s theme might be solvable fairly easily if she got a little crafty. It wasn't what she did best, but surely she could think of something. "You got any suspenders? Bow-tie?" she asked, knowing Jess did have some vests that might do the trick. As a bonus he always did look very handsome in his suit vests.

"I should have a bow-tie," Jess replied, sighing at the prospect of an elaborate event, that he doubted he was going to enjoy much. Sure, it was probably a notch down from the HPG gala, no press, and actually perhaps a few interesting people, but he still expected it to be work, and he was probably going to have to sustain from drinking to be able to drive there, not wanting to have to worry how to get Celeste back home late at night.

"You do?" she replied surprisedly. It didn't seem like his kind of thing.

"Yeah, went to a wedding a few years ago," he replied, briefly.