all the world's a stage

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“For that,” Izzy declared. “She is a bitch. I hope her choux pastries never rise again for the rest of her whole life.”

Satisfied with the baking curse she’d put on Chelsey, Izzy focused all her attention on Perry, looking for any sign that he was more put out than he was letting on. When she heard the sound of him giggling though, light and airy, she commended herself for doing something right that night, even if it hadn’t been picking out the right girl for her friend to romance. She wasn’t deterred, however! There were plenty of people out there, far smarter than Chelsey had proved she wasn’t. If Izzy did her research correctly, then she’d find the right guy or gal for the man across from her in no time. And she just knew they’d fall head over heels for him. Who wouldn’t, with an adorable laugh like that?

Gazing fondly at him, her smile faded when Perry admitted he was embarrassed. Izzy wanted to steal Chelsey’s rolling pin and use it against her as a weapon.

“You have nothing to be embarrassed about,” she said, her grip on Perry’s hand tightening. “I’m so serious, it’s Chelsey’s loss. And I hope she has a horrible night. I hope, like, rats get into her flour supply, and she drops every egg she picks up from now on and something awful happens to her cookie cutters and they all get bent out of shape.”

Her thumb idly stroked Perry’s knuckles, back and forth as she tried to get a proper read on him. She was glad he’d at least been honest about his embarrassment, as much as she wanted to fix it for him. Having a friend be sad in her presence was unfamiliar territory for Izzy, even if that was egotistical to say. She’d just never been able to not cheer someone up.

As soon as his eyes caught hers, she held his gaze for a moment, her own expression softer than she realised.

Then, his words caught up to her and she narrowed her eyes. With her free hand, she pointed an accusing finger in his direction.

“Perry the Platypus Parker,” she scolded. “I did not just hear you call yourself a loser. Or nearly call yourself a loser.” She shook her head quickly. “Whatever. I know the self-deprecation was there and we’ve talked about this, haven’t we?

She leaned further across the table and pushed a hand through Perry’s hair so she could brush his hair out of his eyes and properly look at him, face to face.

“Tonight isn’t a reflection on you, I promise,” she said, more confident about that than anything else right now. She wanted to press upon her own insistence, but then Mika showed up with their drinks on a tray and Izzy reclined in her seat, accepting her berry spritz with a smile while Perry’s cider was placed in front of him.

As Mika left, Izzy stirred the pink liquid in her glass with her straw.

“Wait,” she said suddenly, eyes flicking up to Perry. “I have an idea. You don’t have to. You can go home if you want and I won’t force you to spend any more time with me after this drink, but…”

She trailed off, her smile turning devilish as she wiggled her eyebrows suggestively.

“What if her cookie cutters get so bent out of shape that she becomes a visionary in the field? What if she invents a brand new shape, or a cookie that resembles the Taj Mahal and she becomes so dreadfully famous that we both eat our words – and her cookies! – in years to come?” Prospero laughed, wanting it to be clear to Izzy that he would be just fine. Yes, it was humiliating, and yes, he thought she’d only jumped in to save his skin out of pity, but it wasn’t the end of the world. He wouldn’t be admitting it any time soon, but he really didn’t want to go on a date with anybody anyway. Not if that person wasn’t the pretty blonde sitting across from him now. 

His heart stuttered in his chest as Izzy swiped her thumb along his knuckles. There was no use to pretend he was unaffected, as he’d no doubt turned a frightful shade of pink already. Instead, he merely cleared his throat and zeroed in on the earlier part of her sentence. 

“Perry the Platypus Parker... Is that the name you gave Chelsea for me? Because it might explain why she didn’t show up,” he laughed, smiling fondly back at her. It was easy to get down on himself when things like this happened time and time again, but what use was it to drag Izzy down with him? It wasn’t her fault he was so dreadfully unappealing! 

For what felt like the eleventy trillionth time tonight, Prospero’s heart was beating in overtime, cheeks flushed and eyes wide as Izzy’s hands found their way to his hair. She was always so casual with her affection, so easy and giving in the way that she chose to love and share it. Perry wasn’t opposed to a good cuddle, but it still came as a shock from the most beautiful woman he’d ever laid eyes on. 

Luckily for the both of them, his drink was set down in front of him, and Izzy was well on her way to a brand new thought. Just like that, she’d turned her attention to a new endeavour, always on the go and ready to blow his mind with whatever extraordinary thought her beautiful mind could conjure up next. 

He peered at her curiously as her took a sip of his cider, eager to hear what she had to say. That was, of course, until the spark in her eyes turned mischievous. Suddenly, he thought he might be regretting ever leaving his apartment. 

“You’re not forcing me to spend time with you, Iz. I love spending time with you, even if I am a little frightened to hear what you’re about to say,” he laughed, sheepish. 

Oh, he was good. She sent him a quick wink of approval, a smile lighting up her face. That was absolutely going to sell it, especially now that he’d committed to a soft, appreciative look, like any good boyfriend would wear. She hadn’t realised how much of a good actor Perry was. Perhaps he’d taken a leaf or two out of his sister’s book; the Parkers were a bottomless well of good looks and talent.

When Perry announced that he had, in fact, ordered a drink, Izzy decided that now was the time to look at Justin expectantly. She looked up at the older man who seemed to be suitably mollified by her arrival, and the way she was already digging into the complimentary bread, tearing the crumbs between her fingers and stuffing a scrap in her mouth. It was still oven-warm and super soft, the kind of bread that was begging for some salted-butter to be spread across it. Maybe she could ask Justin nicely to fetch them some, but right now she wanted to prioritise Perry’s drink.

“Ooh, the cider. Good choice!” she commended him, leaning over the table and craning her neck to see what option he’d gone for. She barely managed to avoid bashing their foreheads together and eventually leaned back, swapping a conspiratorial smile with Mika as she left to get their drink orders.

Eventually, Justin deigned to leave as well, muttering something about being ‘sorry for the confusion’ as he went.

As soon as they were alone, Izzy turned her bright smile on Perry.

“Sorry, what?” she asked, a laugh chasing her words. She ducked her head to catch his eye. “You can’t actually believe I don’t think this is a perfect way to spend my night.”

And she meant it! Just because the dice had been rolled out in ways neither of them had expected, Izzy didn’t think that the night was now unsalvageable. She wanted to do whatever she could to override the bad memories of the evening for Perry, rewrite his mortification into a more positive emotion. 

“If anything, I should be apologising to you for setting you up with a flake like Chelsey.” She held a hand up, waving it a little dismissively. “Fear not though! I’ve already called her a bitch in my head. And now out loud. But whatever, she should be punching the air right now because she doesn’t know what she’s missing.”

She reached over and gave Perry’s hand a quick squeeze, her expression gentling just a little.

“Are you okay? I mean, really?”

Perry remembered when he’d been 22 and had just undergone a serious heartbreak, his body racked with tears as he’d hyperventilated alone in his bedroom, feeling as though the whole world was crashing down around him. His mum had crawled into the bed beside him and pulled his head into her lap just the same as she would when he was a child, and his dad had pulled his feet up into his. After the two of them had let him cry it out, they’d talked him through it all, before singing to him. Yep! They’d bloody sang to him. Prospero had ended the afternoon in such a fit of giggles, a grown man wriggling around in his parent’s arms as he begged them to stop, insisting that he didn’t need to hear another rendition of Rebecca Black’s Friday – they'd been certain that their squawking cover of an already terrible song might remind him that he should’ve been spending his weekend out having fun with his friends, as opposed to at home moping. 

Sufficed to say, his parents were the absolute best, and he saw so much of their love and enthusiasm in Izzy. Maybe that was why he liked her so much. Whenever Perry felt homesick – which was most of the time – he found that ache in his chest always seemed to drift away with Izzy nearby, as though she’d somehow carved a hole into the fabric of reality and smuggled a piece of London back to New York just for him. She made him feel like he wasn’t alone at all. 

“Izzy!” He gasped, laughter catching in his throat as he shook his head fondly. “She’s not a bitch! And now you’ve made me say bitch! Twice!” 

Perry found himself giggling uncontrollably, the ache in his tummy suddenly welcome, his muscles spasming from all the laughing he was doing as opposed to all his sulking. He had no idea how she managed to do that, but Izzy always knew the best way to cheer him up. His cheeks burned as she reached across and gave his hand a squeeze, and he couldn’t help but think he was better off now than he would have been had Chelsey actually shown up. Not that she didn’t sound lovely, of course! Chelsey sounded like a total hoot, from what Izzy had told him! But he’d only really agreed to the date because, well, he’d wanted to impress Izzy. Which, upon reflection, he didn’t think was an appropriate reason to go out on a date with another woman. If anything, it was a little insulting to poor Chelsey. 

“A little embarrassed,” Perry nodded, opting for honesty. He shrugged, letting his thumb tenderly stroke along her knuckles. “I shouldn’t be surprised, really! I’m not exactly the dating sort, but. Hey-ho! I hope Chelsey’s having a nice night, in any case.” 

Despite Izzy’s final assessment of his no-show, he still didn’t wish harm upon the girl. It wouldn’t be very gentlemanly of him to say anything unkind, and if she had shown up then he wouldn’t have found himself holding hands with Izzy instead, would he? Maybe she’d done him a favour, when you really thought about it! 

“Thanks for saving me from looking like a total loser, though,” he told her, his gaze meeting hers, blue eyes piercing back into her own hazel eyes. 

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“I’m in disguise,” she said, gesturing to her face as if that wasn’t already obvious.

She watched Ross raise an eyebrow. 

“In a fucking Marvel movie? You look dumb,” he told her, before huffing out a laugh to soften his words. 

Maybe she did look a little dumb, but she couldn’t strut into the restaurant in her usual bright dresses and cowboy boots. That wouldn’t be subtle and she needed to be subtle right now, else her cover be blown. 

“Who are you hiding from anyway?” Ross asked, stuffing a dish towel into a crystal glass to clean it. As soon as Izzy leaned an elbow on the bar top, he tugged it out to playfully whip it at her and she grinned. She’d known Ross for years, having stumbled upon this little restaurant a while ago at one of Auggie’s recommendations. Well, he hadn’t exactly recommended it as such. In fact, he’d labelled it as Luc’s competition and Izzy, despite her proclamations about what a loyal friend she was, couldn’t help but investigate their menu. It was more than a little decent, but after two courses she’d found herself drifting from the main dining area and sitting at the bar and unloading her life story on Ross, who’d been younger then but just as sarcastic in a way that Izzy had appreciated immediately. He was a good egg, and never minded when she stopped by to order the cheapest drink on the menu and just shoot the shit with him to help his shift go by quicker. 

For once though, Izzy wasn’t here to entertain Ross.

“My friend has a date. I came here to see how it’s going,” she stage-whispered, peering over the top of her sunglasses to see if she could spot Perry.

“Please tell me it’s not the sad looking guy on table 4 getting stood up,” Ross piped up.

Izzy whipped her head around to stare at him, aghast. At her questioning look, Ross nodded in the direction of the window and Izzy followed. As soon as her eyes landed on a dejected looking Prospero Parker, Izzy thought her heart might break.

There he sat, completely alone, no Chelsea in sight. The brunette in question had seemed perfectly lovely when Izzy had befriended her at the choux pastry tutorial she’d signed up for. She had quickly looked past the immediate red flag of Chelsea preferring baking to cooking in favour of finding out if she was single and then setting her up on a date with Perry. Perry, who was the most angelic being on earth. And who had, evidently, been stood up by Chelsea. Now, Izzy wasn’t in the business of calling women bitches - but she had less reservations about bakers. So, really, Chelsea was a bitch.

“Oh my god, there’s no way this is happening,” she said, covering her mouth. 

“It’s happening,” came a familiar voice.

Izzy lifted her head to see Mika, the pretty looking waitress whose thighs Izzy had once found her head between at the restaurant’s Christmas party she’d somehow been invited to. No other regulars had been there but she supposed you did reap a few benefits when you were friends with the whole kitchen staff on Facebook after drunkenly adding them all one night.

“He got stood up?” Izzy asked, face creasing in worry.

Mika gave her a nod, shooting Perry a sympathetic look from afar.

“And now Justin is going to tell him to leave. This is the worst,” she said, before trailing after Justin. The new shift manager on a power trip. Izzy had yet to charm him and had only heard bad things about him from Ross and Mika.

Izzy’s heart thudded in her chest as she watched Justin make his way over to her friend. The minute she saw Perry’s cheeks flush deep crimson as he sheepishly grabbed his phone and stood up, she leaped from the barstool. Quickly, she tore her cap and sunglasses off, tossing them in Ross’ direction.

“Look after these for me!” she said, before expertly dodging around patrons and waiters as she made her way across the restaurant to Perry’s table. 

“Sorry I’m late!” she cried, reaching Perry’s side and barely hesitating before she slipped a hand to the back of his neck, going up on her tiptoes to smack a kiss against his cheek. She rocked back on her heels, giving him a wide smile.

“You wouldn’t believe the fight that was on the subway. Totally delayed me and I had no signal to text you. It was crazy!” She turned to Justin, widening her eyes to accentuate how bad it had been. “Limbs were getting torn off. Blood everywhere. There was just a whole leg on the platform at one point with no body attached to it.”

A squawking sound came from Mika, who covered her mouth and quickly turned it into a cough. Izzy immediately fought to hide a grin of her own as she loudly dragged a chair out and winked at Perry, flapping her hand urgently at him to get him to sit back down.

“Anyway,  I’m here now! And I’ll have the berry spritz please, Justin,” she said, a sick sense of satisfaction curling in her gut at the look on his face. She turned back to Perry. “What are you having, babe?”

Before he could fully make it out of his seat, Perry froze, feeling a soft hand slide along his skin, clutching the back of his neck. Had it been a perfect stranger, he would have blushed something rotten, turning an embarrassing shade of pink – or Cherry Blossom, as Chess had once kindly informed him – but there was no voice more familiar to him than the one that greeted him now, not even his own. Humiliating as it was, he’d know Izzy anywhere, and the warmth of her voice floated through the air, landing square in his chest as his body decided to react to her kiss in a way that was far worse than the alternative; By turning him a perfect shade of magenta. 

“Oh! You don’t have to...” he trailed off, shaking his head dumbly as he stared across at her. He’d been about to tell her that she didn’t have to put on a show for him, fearing her pity might actually be worse than being stood up completely, but the words were soon lost in his throat. Izzy was here and she wanted to help. How kind could one person be to want to spare him the embarrassment of being removed from the restaurant? 

Involuntarily, he allowed his body to slowly lower itself back down into his seat as he took her in. As always, Izzy looked gorgeous. He couldn’t remember a time when she didn’t. In fact, he was quite certain she was incapable of looking anything short of ethereal. His heart stuttered in his chest, still feeling the phantom brush of her lips on his cheek, and he allowed himself a moment’s reprieve to let his brain catch up with the events of the last forty seconds. It was very on brand for Izzy to curate a story so dramatic that nobody could possibly believe it, but to tell it so convincingly and with so much flair that nobody would challenge it either. She oozed charisma in ways that Prospero could only dream of, the sort of girl that he could imagine on Matty’s arm if his brother wasn’t already so smitten with another. Girls like Izzy didn’t like guys like Prospero, and yet she’d openly offered up her friendship to him free of charge, no reservations and no returns. She seemed, for whatever reason, to genuinely like being his pal. 

“You look beautiful,” Perry told her stupidly, before ducking his head nervously. 

The words had slipped out of him without much thought, and it was only after he’d landed the compliment on her that he realised she’d been asking him a question. He busied himself, his finger tracing along the drink’s menu that he’d practically memorised in the last hour, pretending to peruse their fine selection of drinks. 

“I actually just ordered a drink,” Perry recalled with a jolt, gaze lifting as he glanced over her shoulder and at his pretty waitress instead. Her eyes widened as she glanced at her manager, reminding Perry that his drink had never been on its way, on account of the manager’s desire to have him gone. 

Clearing his throat, he awkwardly tapped the line on the menu that bore his requested cider, deciding that he was far better off saying nothing at all. The waitress gave him a warm smile before turning her attention back to Izzy, with whom she shared a conspiratorial wink that Perry didn’t quite understand, before disappearing to go and fetch their drinks. Anxiety whirred in his mind as he wondered if there was something he was missing, and if this was some sort of practical joke that he’d found himself at the centre of. It would be just like Prospero Parker to be the butt of somebody else’s joke. 

But, no. He didn’t think Izzy had it in her to do something like that, not the sweet, sunshiney girl that he’d gotten to know so well over the passing months. She was much too lovely for that, and he internally scolded himself for even letting his mind wander there. 

“You really don’t have to do this, Izzy,” he told her with a grateful smile once they were alone. “I’d feel ten times worse if I knew I’d wasted a perfectly good night for you by making you spend it with me.” 

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