Chapter 3 We Can Still Be Friends #2
She has several, but she picks her favorite and hits Send before she can wonder why the hell she’s texting Theo Sharpe in the middle of the day like they’re … well … not practically strangers. Theo responds immediately with a picture of a black cat.
Adorable.
This demon is mine.
His name is Toothless.
As in Toothless from “How to Train Your Dragon”?
Indeed.
Sage blinks.
That is … unexpected.
Obviously, she doesn’t know Theo, but you see enough shirtless pictures of someone, and you start to sort of feel like you do. It’s parasocial behavior, and typically Sage hates that, but …
There’s just nothing about Theo that screams “DreamWorks.”
Or cats.
Then again, she bristles when people try to pigeonhole her with her own career, as if every writer is the same.
Yes, she has a bookshelf teaming with enough books that she’s not sure it’s structurally sound, and yes, she loves leather-bound journals and finding the perfect pen, and yes, she’s living out an entirely different story in her head 80 percent of the time, flipping through dialogue in her brain while holding a conversation in real life, but that last part has more to do with her ADHD than it does with her job.
Even still …
Surprised to find out you’re a cat guy.
Because I’m …
How do you Americans put it?
‘A total golden retriever’?
‘So babygirl’?
Sage chokes on a laugh, and the owner of the bodega leans over the counter to check on her. Or maybe he wants her to leave if she isn’t going to buy anything. Either way, she waves him off and steps out of the store.
You are utterly ridiculous.
She doesn’t even realize she’s smiling until her cheeks start to hurt a few blocks later.
Noah
Oct 12 3:27 PM
Noah
Good luck at the dinner tonight!!
Thank you!
I feel like I’m going to puke
Noah
Just don’t do it at the table.
It’s 9 PM and Sage is no longer smiling. Not in a real way, at least.
She imagines if someone were to snap a picture of her face right now, her mouth would resemble the type of forced grin that’s become a fixture of her FaceTime calls with her parents.
So really, it’s more of a grimace.
It’s just … Sage has been through her fair share of breakups. She’s done the dumping, but she’s also been dumped enough to recognize the signs. To know you can see the it’s not you, it’s me, before you ever hear it.
With Charlotte, Sage saw it in her smile: It went from loose and easy to firm and pinched, like the time she’d mistaken Sage’s oat milk latte for her bitter black coffee and tried not to spit it out.
With her high school boyfriend, it was in the way his gaze darted across her face without ever meeting her eyes, as if he couldn’t bear to look at her.
Basically, Sage knows when to brace for impact.
And right now, she’s gripping her fork like it’s the only thing she has to protect her from the blow she knows is coming her way. Because Jaylen Hammel, production manager at one of the biggest studios in film and television, is being nice.
Too nice.
It’s not that Jaylen has ever been rude, but he’s always had a type of sternness about him that reminds Sage of Anna.
He’s direct, and sometimes curt, and complimentary only when it’s absolutely necessary.
It’s one of the reasons Sage likes him so much.
She’d heard it was typical for Hollywood types to butter up writers while they keep a carrot dangling just out of reach.
With Jaylen, she didn’t have to worry about that.
But tonight, he’s been doling out compliments like candy on Halloween, and his voice keeps going up at the end of his sentences in a way that’s not nerves but something worse—something Sage hasn’t put a name to yet.
All she knows is it’s not good, and she’s 93 percent certain she’s about to get the it’s not you, it’s me speech in the middle of this high-end restaurant decked out with stiff leather chairs and low tables and glittering chandeliers.
Sure enough, Jaylen leans back in his seat as a server clears their dishes, swirls his glass of red wine, and inhales deeply before hitting them with a pointed “So.”
From the corner of her eye, Sage sees Anna still, her wineglass pressed against her lips.
They’ve managed to skirt around the actual purpose of their dinner for, well, all of dinner.
Anna had told her to expect that—something about power plays and schmoozing and Hollywood.
But Sage can’t help but feel it’s just another bad sign of what’s to come.
“Before I get into all of the nuances here, let me say this,” Jaylen continues, his eyes—deep and brown and entirely too earnest—locking on Sage.
“Your book is spectacular. And I have no doubt this series is only going to continue to explode when the next installment releases. Seriously, it’s going to be the next Hunger Games. ”
Translation: It’s not you.
Sage swallows, a thank-you buried somewhere in the scratchiness of her throat, but Anna … Anna is being a particular type of stubborn shit when she says, “So what you’re saying is you want to option it, then?”
Jaylen sighs, a frown marring his brow as he takes a long sip of his wine. “Unfortunately, no. We’re not going to be able to move forward with the option.”
The why is on the tip of Sage’s tongue, but she keeps her jaw clamped shut, the nail of her forefinger digging into the side of her thumb.
“It’s just not in the cards for us right now.”
She blinks, her mind turning over Jaylen’s nonexplanation as if she can find some hidden meaning in it. She thought the studio having an actor in mind was promising. She thought it had meant good things. Why the sudden change?
“So … at a different time, then?” she asks, brow furrowing as she looks to Anna. Her agent’s lips are pursed, eyes glinting behind her glasses.
God, she flew all this way, and for what?
“The studio considers this a full pass,” Jaylen explains in a way that clearly says, My hands are tied. And there it is—the ending blow that’s supposed to make Sage not feel like a failure.
It’s me.
She clocks it at the same time she finally identifies the emotion that keeps making Jaylen’s sentences peak and valley.
It’s not nerves.
It’s pity.
And that … that just makes it all so much worse.
“This seems like quite an abrupt change.” Anna doesn’t bother to mask her judgment, but her voice is entirely calm. Sage risks cutting her a glance, but the only visible sign of her agent’s frustration is in the way she’s gripping her wineglass but not drinking from it.
“Trust me, I don’t enjoy this any more than you do,” Jaylen assures her.
Some of that usual confidence is back in his tone, and it only grows as he adds, “But you’re an incredibly talented writer, Sage.
We definitely want to keep in touch and know what you have cooking outside of the Nights universe. ”
For a moment, Sage thinks she might not be able to swallow the uncomfortable laugh bubbling up in the back of her throat. She’s itching to move, to channel some of this disappointment into something that’s not her sitting here with a placid look of acceptance fixed on her face.
She can’t tell if Jaylen’s reassurances are genuine—if he really wants to read anything else she creates, or if he’s trying to soften the blow and get out of here before Anna picks apart his zero-context rejection with a fine-tooth comb.
She supposes it doesn’t really matter. She has nothing to put forward anyway.
It’s not like she’s had any space to think outside of promoting Nights and working on the sequel everyone is breathing down her neck for, but her brain refuses to shake loose.
She desperately wants to look to Anna and make her speak for her, no better than a lost child seeking their mother. But she manages to keep her eyes fixed on Jaylen as she says, “Thank you. I would love that.”
She’s never thanked someone for being dumped before. It feels gross.
“Well, Jaylen,” Anna sighs, finally taking another sip of her wine. “All I can say is … you’ll regret this.”
There’s no heat behind her words. In fact, it almost sounds like a pithy joke.
It’s light and airy and Jaylen is grinning in a relieved sort of way and saying something about how he looks forward to exactly that.
But Sage knows Anna well enough to know the small look her agent spares her is where the truth lies.
They will regret this. But right now, Sage can’t bring herself to match Anna’s confidence. That competitive edge that typically stirs in her gut is nowhere to be found.
They’ll regret this.
They’ll regret this.
She repeats it silently like some sort of mantra. Maybe if she says it enough, she’ll believe it.