Chapter Two #2
After the summer in Napa, I got a remote job as a software engineer, which allowed me to work from anywhere, and I moved right back to LA.
My family couldn’t understand why I left Napa again, but no one tried to stop me.
I should have stayed, and I would’ve been there when Nonno died.
But everything happens for a reason, and he was my biggest supporter and urged me to go back to LA for my great love.
Now, I have his watch he brought over from Italy, and every time I wear it, I feel like he’s watching over me.
He would have told me to piss or get off the pot with Appa, and maybe I needed to hear that.
Moving back to LA was awkward. The dust had settled from my roommate’s death, but it still clung to me. I felt like people whispered about me in public, even if that was irrational of me to think that.
His sister didn’t have that big of a reach, not like Appa does now.
I watched @Appleygirl grow from a thousand followers to a million over time, and she became America’s sweetheart of the social media world.
Sure, Appa changed her username as she grew on social media to @AppaPie, but I kept up with her journey through it all.
Her content shifted from group pictures with friends to more curated lifestyle posts and videos, but I never minded what she posted.
As long as she seemed happy and healthy, that’s all I cared about.
And judging from her videos where she speaks, she lost or curbed her Southern accent, but I bet it’s still there deep down.
Finishing my morning routine of working out, showering, shaving, and brewing stovetop coffee, like a good Italian, I sit at my desk with my teeny ceramic mug and my gallon water bottle. Some might call my existence lonely, but I have Rook as an outlet of sorts.
Technically, Rook is just a persona, and I don’t know how I came up with him now.
Posting videos of myself under a pseudonym was addictive.
Subconsciously, I might have created him for her.
To anyone else, he’s a fantasy for those looking for one.
His—our—video tonight will make some middle-aged wives shift in their chairs and clench their thighs.
Perhaps they would even sneak into the bathroom to watch.
And that was the addiction.
But not Appa. She could have any man and must have one behind the scenes. My hands curl into fists, and my knuckles pop at the idea of another man…
My computer pings, notifying me that my first meeting has started. I clear my throat and turn my microphone on. “Hey, Robby here. Good morning,” I say and mute myself.
I’ve always hated my loud, Italian-sounding voice. I sound too much like my dad, and I try to lower my voice in my Rook videos when I speak in them to disguise it.
No one else has turned their camera on, thank God, so I allow myself a peek at Appa’s profile.
She added to her story for the first time today.
It’s just a picture of her tiny hand holding a melting iced coffee in front of a vast window in the sun, captioned: ‘Good morning’.
If I were her boyfriend, she’d be drinking espresso straight up and never go back to what I’m assuming is store-bought iced coffee.
“Robby?” a voice on the call asks.
I hold down the spacebar to unmute myself. “Yeah, I see it’s looping. Easy fix. I’ll get on it after we hang up,” I answer.
A few hours later, I check Appa’s profile again.
More stories. In one of them, she’s dressed in a bright-colored matching activewear set—biker shorts with too short an inseam and a sports bra.
My heartbeat hammers in my ears, and I nearly blow a load in my pants seeing her like that.
Knowing thousands of people could see this photo makes my jaw clench.
If she were mine, only I would get to see her dressed like that.
Workout, Appa?
I smirk to myself.
The workout I’d give her.
? ? ?
At five, I log off for the day, jot a couple of notes down for tomorrow, and stand from my desk.
I have leftover Sunday gravy from the weekend, so I opt for that.
My grandparents came here from Italy when my grandmother was pregnant with my dad, who is now the oldest of five.
They saw crowded, mafia-laced New York and took a train to California instead.
They named my dad Robert, thinking he should have an American-sounding name.
I was named Robert Junior after him and nicknamed RJ my whole life, but once I got to college, I became Robby.
I grin at the red wine bottle as I pop the cork out with a loud pop.
It’s from the vineyard Nonno started in Napa that my dad and his three brothers still run.
My aunt, the only daughter of the five, moved to San Diego for love, and she’s always inviting me down for weekends, which I take her up on when I tire of LA.
Ever since high school, I have had a glass of red wine with dinner for the antioxidants and other health benefits Nonna claims red wine has.
She’s probably right since she’s well into her eighties and still strong and feisty as hell, and I’m grateful to still have her in my late twenties.
Every time I go home, she asks me why I’m not married with kids like most of my many cousins, and all I can do is laugh.
My mom was always there to reassure me she was ten years older than I am now when I showed up.
My phone dings and lights up on the counter, likely from the recent Rook video that just posted at five. I pick it up to see what thirst comments await me, unlocking the screen with my thumbprint. A verified creator liked the video, @AppaPie.
The grip on my wineglass loosens, making the thin glass connect with the tile floor of my kitchen with a clink.
I look down at the shattered glass mixed with the spilled wine pooled at my feet.
Splashes of red stain my sweatpants, but I click the profile and see that it really is her…
liking a Rook video before dealing with the mess.
Risking cuts from the glass is worth refreshing my page and tapping her username.
Holy fuck. Does she follow Rook?
My breath stops as I tap into the tab to see who she follows, and she doesn’t.
But she must enjoy watching videos of men if the algorithm pushed my latest video to her feed.
My dick reacts in my sweatpants the same way it did all those years ago at the party, but I ignore it for now.
She liked a video where the caption said something like: ‘What would you do if I snuck in at two a.m.?’
Does Appa want to find out?
I set my phone down on the stone countertop.
No, that’s insane, Robby.
Her finger must’ve slipped while she was swiping through videos. It’s a coincidence; nothing more. No need to spiral. But that’s a joke.
I’m absolutely going to overthink this.
After cleaning up the wine and glass, I sit at my personal computer in my bedroom with my overheated leftovers in a plastic Tupperware container, and what do you know?
Start spiraling and digging into her history with my profile.
Has she liked any of my other posts? Something to tell me it’s not a fluke?
I search my followers’ names for anything remotely related to apples.
Honeycrisp, Gala, Granny Smith, Apple…
Until I see it.
@Appleygirl.
It’s clearly a burner account with an old, grainy picture of her as the profile image, no followers, and only ten followed accounts—all thirst trappers, which makes my fingers drum on my desk. I shouldn’t be jealous, but the familiar pang in my core stings. I have to look on the bright side.
That could mean she’s single.
If she’s not and following ten men, including Rook, who flex their abs for followers, her guy isn’t doing it right. I would every night if I had the damn privilege.
I know she changed her username a while back, but it looks like she couldn’t let Appleygirl go.
I pull up my social media profile on my laptop, and the keyboard clacks as I hit control-F to search for her username in the comments section and likes on my videos.
It turns out she has liked almost every single video, with comments sprinkled in sporadically.
@Appleygirl: Imagine posting this and expecting me to act normal.
@Appleygirl: Respectfully, come rearrange my guts.
Don’t tempt me with a good time, Appa.
@Appleygirl: Why is my phone overheating?
@Appleygirl: Six-pack? It’s a brewery.
@Appleygirl: Do you even own shirts?
@Appleygirl: Help, my legs opened, and I can’t shut them.
She’s going to give me a damn heart attack.
@Appleygirl: Is this video three hours long for anyone else?
@Appleygirl: Want to wear my legs like a scarf?
Cue the ‘yes, I do’ guy meme.
I laugh at her comments until my cheeks and the sides of my torso ache. There are so many to go through, spanning over years since the early days of Rook’s account. She must have followed after Rook went viral because I would have noticed her username when my account was quieter.
For years she’s wanted me too.
I sit back in my chair, making it creak, filling the silence of my house with my movement. It scratches at me that she’s been here this whole time. If I weren’t so opposed to looking at comments, I would have noticed. We could have been together by now!
Fucking fuck.
I run my hand over my face. There’s no way she knows I’m the one in the videos. My nipple piercings and scar make me unmissable, but I had neither at the time of the party and was clothed, anyway. The thought that constantly loops in my head plays again…
If I could redo that night, I would have been an asshole—taken a girl home who didn’t know what she was in for. Claimed her and never let go. I would have made sure she forgot how to breathe without me, and that air alone was never enough.