Verwandte Artikel zu We Could Be Heroes

We Could Be Heroes - Softcover

Ellis, Philip

 
9780593542491: We Could Be Heroes
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0593542495 ISBN 13: 9780593542491
Verlag: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2024

Inhaltsangabe

Not all heroes wear capes. Some wear high heels and a wig.

Patrick's acting career is on the rise, and the superhero movie he's filming might put him on the map . . . if the endless reshoots ever stop. Meanwhile, Will, a secondhand bookseller and part-time drag queen, is just trying to live his best life. After a chance encounter on a particularly chaotic night, a curious friendship sparks between the two men.

At least, that’s what they tell each other. Sure, Patrick finds Will captivatingly hilarious, and Will can’t help but keep thinking about who is really behind the perfect mask Patrick shows the rest of the world, but nothing could ever really happen, right? Superheroes don’t date drag queens, after all.

When reality crashes into the fantasy world they’ve built together, Will has to make a choice between the man of his dreams and being true to himself. Can Patrick be the hero Will’s been waiting for, or will Will be the one to save Patrick after all? Uproarious and touching, We Could Be Heroes is an ode to queer joy and a romance that just might save the world.

Die Inhaltsangabe kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Philip Ellis is the author of Love and Other Scams and We Could Be Heroes and a Sex & Relationships editor at Men's Health, covering pop culture, relationships, and LGBTQ+ issues. His short fiction has been long-listed for the Commonwealth Short Story Prize. He lives in Birmingham, UK.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Chapter 1

Patrick Lake glanced sideways at his stunt double and thought, I'd do me.

OK-maybe that was an inherently weird idea to have about somebody decked out to look exactly like you. And it was surely not the kind of thing that Captain Kismet, everybody's favorite superhero, said to himself between takes. But it had been a long day.

"The trick to falling," the stuntman said, "is knowing how to land."

Corey's words, however sage, were not for Patrick's benefit: The two of them were filming behind-the-scenes content, taking turns to demonstrate the simpler stunts they had planned for Kismet 2. Footage of the pair in their matching costumes would then be cut into polished thirty-second videos and used to advertise the movie on social media later in the year, a perfectly curated glimpse behind the curtain. It was the kind of thing Patrick could usually do in his sleep. Except all he could really think about was, well . . . sleep. They were supposed to wrap on the movie a week ago, yet new script pages kept showing up outside his hotel room door like bad omens, and at this rate Patrick felt as though he would die in this grim little city.

"Birmingham?" he'd asked his manager, Simone, when she told him where reshoots would take place. "Like, Alabama?"

"No, thank god," she'd replied. "It's in England. Very cheap to film there, apparently."

"Cheap," it turned out, was the operative word. The famous auteur the studio had hired to direct the second installment of the newly rebooted Kismet franchise had burned through much of the movie's budget before half the film was even in the can, leading to his rapid firing and replacement by Lucas Grant, whose résumé largely consisted of TV commercials and a Pixar short. Grant was tasked with righting the ship and getting it to port without bankrupting the studio, which meant relocating production to an old factory town where accommodating the enormous cast and crew wouldn't cost an extra couple of million dollars.

Corey executed a perfect backflip, and Patrick applauded, mugging for the camera. "Nicely done," he said, truthfully. With his earnest eyes and back-clapping Aussie cheer, Corey was impossible to dislike, even if Patrick was occasionally thrown by their uncanny resemblance. Same sandy hair, same muscular build, even something of a likeness in the jaw. It took some getting used to. Patrick's stand-in for the first movie had been a slightly terrifying former MMA fighter in a blond wig.

"You got what you need?" Patrick asked the videographer, who gave him a thumbs-up. "Great. Nice work, Corey. Thanks, everyone!" He began walking out of the soundstage warehouse, back to his trailer. A shower and then a nap, he thought. A nap would fix everything.

"Hey, buddy," Hector Ramirez greeted him as he entered; he was doing sit-ups between the sofa and the coffee table. Patrick was almost always pleased to see his trainer, but right now he felt a lot like a kid who'd walked into class having forgotten to prepare for an impending exam.

"Hey, Hector," he replied. "Did we have another session today?" They'd seen each other that morning, when they'd hit chest and back. The first time Hector had put Patrick through one of his workouts, prior to the first Kismet movie, he'd spent the entire next day feeling like he was recovering from minor surgery. Now it was . . . well, not easy exactly, but he gained real satisfaction from pushing his body and seeing how much stronger he could make it. Not that he was in the mood for pushing right now.

"Nah." Hector completed his final rep and immediately launched into a set of air squats. "I was just around," he added, barely short of breath.

"Just around." Patrick eyed him suspiciously. "And wondering if a certain leading lady might also be . . . just around?"

Hector simply continued his rhythmic ascent and descent, gaze fixed on some spot to Patrick's left. "Who?"

Patrick snorted. There was definitely only one actor in the room. Hector was cool but lost his chill when it came to Audra Kelly, Patrick's co-star. And Patrick couldn't really blame him. Beautiful, funny, charming-recently named "Internet's Ultimate Girlfriend" by a men's magazine. Some guys really went in for that kind of thing.

"She's not here." Patrick gathered his jacket and headphones. "Just me and Corey today. I think Kismet and Sura's next scene isn't until Monday."

"I don't know what you're talking about," said Hector, who was doing a pretty shoddy job of hiding his disappointment. "But since we're here," he continued, "how about some burpees? Just for fun."


When Patrick returned to the hotel forty minutes later, limbs crackling like firewood, he was more desperate for a shower than ever.

After he'd made his way out of the elevator toward his suite, Audra spotted him and waved through her open door across the hall. Patrick leaned on the door frame and stuck his head into Audra's room. The Princess Sura to his Captain Kismet was pacing with earbuds in, talking to thin air about her beauty must-haves.

"I like to keep things simple. ChapStick, a good concealer, a tiny bit of mascara," she said, her voice low and throaty, like she smoked a pack of cigarettes a day. Which Patrick knew for a fact to be true, although the morality clause in their contracts kept it from public knowledge. Movie stars who smoked used to be cool; now they were bad for the studio's brand. Role models didn't smoke, or swear, or screw. And Patrick was nothing if not a role model.

"One hair must-have . . ." Audra paused mid-pace, appearing to give this serious consideration. "You know, I'm such a slob," she laughed. "I've been using the same drugstore shampoo since I was sixteen! Oh, and argan oil. I swear by it."

Another pause.

"My absolute pleasure." She smiled radiantly, as if the reporter were in the room with them. "Thanks so much. You have a great day now. Byeee . . ." Audra hit a button on her phone and pulled her earbuds out, sighing in exhaustion. She handed the device back to her assistant, shooed her out, and as Patrick stepped into the room to let the girl pass, Audra turned toward the bar assembled in the corner of her suite.

"That was Elle," she said, fixing herself a vodka on the rocks. "Want to hear something funny?"

"Sure," Patrick replied. Audra picked up a crystal tumbler and held it out to him with an inquisitive look. He smiled, shook his head, no thank you, and took a seat on the expansive sofa.

"I would never use argan oil on my hair." She ran her hand through her wavy blond mane. "I think it's gross. But now a whole bunch of girls are going to try it, and their hair is going to be all greasy and sticky, and they're going to say to themselves: 'Why doesn't my hair look as fabulous as Audra Kelly's?'"

"I don't get it," Patrick said.

"Oh, it's just a silly game I play with myself." Audra waved a dismissive hand and threw herself dramatically down on the couch beside him. "I mean, why would I give my actual secrets away? Until a makeup company pays me to shill for them, I'm just making up shit as I go. We can't all be the Girl Next Door."

Patrick didn't know what to say to this-but that hardly mattered. Audra was on a roll.

"And that's just women's media. A walk in the park, I tell you, compared to the creepy fuckable-little-sister act the guys expect. Never mind the fact that I have an Independent Spirit Award. The real performance of a lifetime is convincing everyone that I love pizza and beer despite looking"-she looked down at her tiny waist-"like this."

"Oh, right." Patrick nodded. "The relatable thing."

"Yep! I've gotta be one of the guys and love sports, and comic books, and video games. But not other women, apparently. The average Wonderverse moviegoer doesn't like it when girls...

„Über diesen Titel“ kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Verlag
G.P. Putnam's Sons
Erscheinungsdatum
2024
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0593542495
ISBN 13 
9780593542491
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
370
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Nicht verfügbar
Verantwortliche Person
Nicht verfügbar

Weitere beliebte Ausgaben desselben Titels

9780008539283: We Could Be Heroes: The unmissable love story: a joyous, emotional and funny split-timeline LGBTQ+ romance

Vorgestellte Ausgabe

ISBN 10:  0008539286 ISBN 13:  9780008539283
Verlag: HarperNorth, 2024
Hardcover