Chapter 2 Now
Now
“Welcome back, Ms. Green. You’re good to go upstairs. Have a great day!”
I smile at the receptionist of my coworking space and make my way to the elevators.
The lobby hums with quiet conversation and the soft tapping of keyboards.
Sunlight streams through the floor-to-ceiling windows and catches on the leafy plants perched on every available surface.
I find a desk in a quiet corner, sit, and start unpacking my bag.
For my birthday last year, Grace and Savannah got me an L.L.
Bean Boat and Tote embroidered with author era in script across the front.
It’s been one of my most prized possessions, but now it’s just another reminder of what I’ve lost. Still, my laptop and drafting notebook need to be carried somehow, so I schlep it around as the necessary and functional evil that it is.
Today I’m meeting with my literary agent, Tess, to talk about my next project.
When I sold my debut, I signed a two-book deal with McAlpine—a small publishing house in New York City best known for their romance novels.
Now, both of those are out in the world, and the terrifying truth is that I’ve got nothing for my next option.
No messy draft. No outline. Not even a blank Word doc taunting me from my desktop.
Writing the first two books had come so easily to me.
One was a story that’s lived in me since college, and the other was told to me at bedtime growing up.
This next one has to come from me alone, and I have no idea where to start.
Because instead of writing, I’ve been doing a whole lot of… not writing.
Even before the breakup, I wasn’t writing as much as I should have been. I’d sit down at my desk, open my laptop with the best of intentions, and end up deep in someone else’s life twenty minutes later. A cover reveal. An engagement post. A pregnancy announcement.
I’d scroll until my chest felt tight, then flip to Goodreads, half dreading whatever rating waited for me at the top.
And some days, I’d scroll through my own Instagram—photos of book promotions, weekend getaways, smiling selfies with Cole—trying to convince myself I was doing okay.
Or at least that other people thought I was doing okay.
But even then, even at my most filtered and put together, I still felt like I was falling behind.
Cole used to say I obsessed over other people’s timelines, measured myself by how I didn’t stack up—how I wasn’t the next to get engaged, the next to buy a house, the next to sell a book or travel abroad—and he wasn’t wrong.
But it’s hard not to notice when everyone around you seems to be moving forward and with such surety while you’re just staying still.
When I really want to feel behind, I search for my sister Elizabeth’s profile.
Her Instagram grid is practically a tidy life checklist: white coat ceremony, engagement shoot in a lavender field, honeymoon photos in St. Lucia, a one-year anniversary post with a long caption about partnership and patience.
Even her dog is photogenic. There’s not a single bad angle in sight.
Zero stagnation, just forward momentum and perfection. It royally pisses me off.
Like most Southern women, Elizabeth is effortlessly polished, the type of person who never seems to have a hair out of place—literally.
She has dark locks that somehow never frizz, fair skin that never breaks out, and sharp blue eyes that have always made me hate mine.
Next to her, my brown eyes feel dull, and my presence is just a little less remarkable.
It’s already hard enough not to compare yourself to others, but it’s worse when you’ve been doing it your entire life.
Elizabeth was the one who never had to be reminded to do her homework, who breezed through AP classes while I barely survived algebra.
The one who won homecoming court, got voted “Most Likely to Succeed,” and sent out color-coded wedding itineraries, while I was twenty-three and trying to assemble IKEA furniture without having a breakdown.
She never got in trouble, never made reckless decisions, never once veered off the path of predictability, and even though she never rubbed it in or made me feel less than on purpose, that didn’t make it any easier following in the footsteps I was never meant to fill.
As I tap through Instagram stories and scroll my Explore page, it feels like every author is announcing a new book deal or teasing their next project—sometimes before their current one is even out.
Some of them are releasing a book a year and churning out content like muscle memory, but I’m just not like that.
It’s not that I don’t want to write. I do; I just don’t know what to say. And the longer I sit in that uncertainty, the more convinced I become that maybe I only had two books in me. Maybe I’ve already told all the stories I was meant to tell.
Financial stress lingers in the background, of course.
Advances don’t last forever, and royalties are still months away (that’s assuming they even come at all), but it’s not really about the money, at least not yet.
It’s the creative nothingness and the fear that it might last longer than I can afford to wait that leaves me jerking up from sleep in the middle of the night, sweat-soaked and anxious, panicking over what comes next.
Before the meeting, I head into the bathroom to freshen up and remind myself of the affirmations I’ve been practicing with my therapist. Because yes, I do affirmations now.
Staring at my reflection in the mirror, I barely recognize the brown-haired, red-eyed woman standing before me.
As I’ve gotten older, a few lines have found a permanent home on my face.
Not the kind of wrinkles you get from laughter but the type when you scrunch your forehead too often.
I’m no longer the youthful, free-spirited twenty-two-year-old I was the last time I was single.
Now, I’m inching closer to thirty and don’t have the slightest idea of how to date. God, I don’t even want to fucking date.
Snap out of it, Ainsley.
“I am confident in who I am. I am happy with where I’m at in my life. I embrace change and look forward to good things ahead. I am deserving of love. Every day, I’m becoming a better version of myself.”
If only I believed even one of those things.
Back at the desk, I log on to Zoom a few minutes early and pick at the skin around my thumbs to curb my anxiety.
I stare at the blank screen and take a breath like it might change something.
I should just tell her that I don’t know if I can write another love story, but saying it out loud would make it feel real, and I don’t think I’m ready to admit that to myself yet. And especially not to Tess.
Tess was the first person in the industry to believe in my career as a writer.
While our relationship is mainly professional, she feels like a friend in the same way Ross does.
We don’t talk about our personal lives, not really, but she’s still one of the few people who really knows me, because she’s the first to read my innermost thoughts and call it art.
“Morning, Ainsley!” Tess starts. Her voice is as crisp and clear as if she were sitting across from me instead of hundreds of miles up the East Coast. “It’s been a while. How are you doing? I’m excited to chat more about book three!”
“Me too!” I say. “So tell me, how does this work? I know it’ll be different than last time around, which makes me a little nervous.”
“Don’t be nervous! It’s pretty straightforward. Once you’ve got a concept, start outlining. When it feels strong, send it my way, and we’ll workshop it a bit before we submit it to McAlpine as your option.”
“And if they don’t want it?”
Tess hesitates, her smile softening as if she’s weighing how honest to be. She tips her head slightly, a crease forming between her brows before she answers.
“Then we go wide. But honestly, I feel good about our chances. Sales have been steady, and your editor loves you. Just focus on writing the best version of whatever feels honest to you right now. There’s no hard deadline.
We’re technically on your timeline, but I’d love to have something to work with in the next couple months if that feels doable. ”
It’s clear she’s trying to give me space without letting the space stretch too far. This is the moment when I should tell her. Just say it out loud: I don’t think I believe in love right now, and I don’t know how to write about it when I don’t. But I don’t.
Instead, I hover around it.
“Do you ever have authors who write romance but then go into a completely different genre?” I ask. “Like, what if I’m not in that headspace anymore?”
Tess pauses before responding. “It happens. But remember that you don’t have to be in the middle of a love story to write one. You just need a way in. And I know McAlpine is eager to see more sweeping romances from you. You’ve got this!”
I nod again. “Got it.”
“Here if you need anything,” she adds, and just like that, she disappears from the screen. The Zoom window closes, and I’m left staring at my own reflection again. I reach for my phone and FaceTime Ross.
“Didn’t I just see you?” he answers. He’s got oversize Oliver Peoples sunglasses on, which I only know because he loves to call them his “Peeps,” and I can hear the New York streets buzzing around him.
“I know, I know,” I say quickly. “I’m sorry to bother you in the middle of a workday, but I’m freaking out. What if I can’t do it? What if I can’t write book three? Not only is my career riding on this, but think about how stupid I’d look after the soapbox moment I had at the signing!”