4. THE ONE WHERE HE SHARES HIS LOCATION
CHAPTER FOUR
THE ONE WHERE HE SHARES HIS LOCATION
Comment: Anyone see @WestParkerComedy’s show tonight in Boston? That girl was HOT!!!!!
Comment reply: Someone bring me back to this when we find out who she is!
“I need a fucking drink.”
I drag Frankie by the crook of her elbow into a dive bar a few blocks away from the comedy club.
She hasn’t shut up about how much fun she had and how it was so cool to experience the personal banter with West.
“Right, Jo?” she asks.
“What?” I snap back as we slide into stools at the bar top.
“Wasn’t the banter fun?”
Oh, that was a question.
“No, Frankie. I didn’t find it fun.” The bartender comes over after I answer her, and we order our drinks. A seltzer for Frankie and a tequila soda for me.
“You’re so uptight. When did you get unfun?” Frankie crosses her arms and pouts. She always makes up words, and I’ve stopped correcting her.
“I’m not uptight!” I say over the loud music.
My alter ego is a masked heroine with an affinity for dark magic and fulfilling your deepest desires known for her sex appeal and book recommendations that never miss.
That’s fun… And not uptight at all!
“Yes, you are.” Sometimes I think Frankie is the one with a connection to dark magic because she can read me and the thoughts inside my head better than anyone.
“Why is it such a big deal that the hot comedian you’ll probably never see again was flirting with you?
” The bartender takes Frankie’s card and starts a tab.
She takes a sip of her drink, clearly waiting for me to say something.
“I—” I stop, grabbing my glass and squeezing the lime inside. “Because,” is what I settle on before taking two long gulps of my drink.
“You’re uptight and don’t know how to have fun anymore,” she states matter-of-factly. “Hex doesn’t count, and you know it.”
Frankie is the closest thing I’ll ever have to a sister. I moved in with her when my Grams passed the summer before our senior year, and we lived together until I moved in with Dylan during grad school—minus our freshman years where we were forced to live on our separate college campuses.
My mom left when I was nine, and I have no idea who my dad is… I don’t think my mom did either.
I’m used to her bluntness, and she’s used to my closed-off, slightly rude tendencies.
“Hex is the problem, Frankie, because now that hot comedian I’ll never see again knows who I am.
” I enunciate the last four words with a bitter edge.
I don’t even try not to sound upset. It’s hard not to worry about my identity being leaked when I’m about to be back on the market for a new job.
“What if he says something? Or someone there knows me?”
What would happen if my next employer went looking and saw pictures of their candidate with her hands tied behind her back and a smutty stalker romance as the focal point?
Masked or not, my skin is covered with easily recognizable ink, and if someone were to say something… I shudder at the thought, taking another long sip of my cocktail, begging for the booze to kick in and numb my nerves.
Frankie looks at me like I’m being ridiculous. “It was a show with like fifty people, max, and you can just tell him to keep his sexy little mouth shut. I bet he’d love that.” She brushes off my worries like I’m overreacting. “Plus, when was the last time you let a hot stranger give you an orgasm?”
Frankie doesn't care if people can hear her or how loud she’s being.
The two men beside us turn away when I shoot them a look I’m wishing was accompanied with some Hex-like magic. “West doesn’t give I-know-where-the-clit-is energy,” I say, not too sure I believe myself.
Frankie guffaws. “You’ve got to be kidding me!” She continues to stare while I pull my phone out. “I bet he could find your clit and give you an orgasm or two.”
My phone was on Do Not Disturb for the show, and when I open my notifications, I have a missed text from Annie:
Annie Dorset
Hi, Jo! I emailed over the severance package from Kevin. If you can look at it this weekend and get it signed and returned to me by Monday morning, I’d appreciate it. Have a great weekend!
Fuck my life—they’re working swiftly to erase me from their list of problems.
Frankie continues to talk about how I need to get laid when the next notification from one of my socials catches my attention.
Direct Message from West Parker.
“What the…” I click on it, no longer listening to a word Frankie says.
@WestParkerComedy
231-555-0913
There’s nothing but his number.
“What?” Frankie asks, leaning in to look over the top of my phone screen. I don’t need to look at her to know she’s smiling like an idiot. “Oops.”
I click on his profile.
150,000 followers. Not bad, which is probably how he’s selling out most of his shows… But my brain doesn’t focus on the follower count for long. No, it clocks in on the color of the button on his page.
I’m one of his followers.
I shoot my eyes to Frankie. “I might have snuck your phone out of your bag and followed him back while you two were ogling at each other.”
“We were not ogling!” I interject.
She ignores me, continuing with her train of thought. “You’ve had the same phone password since we were sixteen.”
I go to put my phone on the counter but think better of it, snatching it against my chest. “You’re rising to Hilda-level meddling right now, Sullivan.” I use her last name so she knows I’m serious.
Frankie has never once a day in her life thought I was scary. She rolls her eyes and calls the bartender over for a couple shots. “You should text him.”
“No.” I immediately shut the idea down.
Frankie slides me a shot of my favorite tequila. I lift it, resting my elbow on the counter, waiting for her to argue.
I know she will. She always does.
“Neither of us have anywhere to be in the morning. Let’s party like we did when we were in college.” Frankie wiggles her eyebrows and slams her shot.
I follow, closing my eyes as I tip my head back… and that’s all the time Frankie needs to snatch my phone out of my hand and hop off the stool.
By the time I jump up, it’s too late.
I see the blue bubble pop up.
Me
Hey Hotshot
“Franceska Louise,” I mimic her mother.
“I just know he has hot friends.” She hands the phone back to me. “Ones who will buy us drinks and tell us they’d die for us.” Frankie sits back down and leans in to ask the passing bartender for our tab.
Delivered turns to Read at 11:13 p.m. and then three little dots pop up at the bottom of our texts.
231-555-0913
231-555-0913 started sharing location with you. Would you like to share yours?
Let me buy you a drink
Well, there’s Frankie’s free drink…
I stare at the phone, unsure what to do next. It’s been so long since anyone has shown interest in me. Me. Jo.
Not Hex.
And listen, I’m not one of those girls who thinks it’s because they’re not good looking. I have my flaws but thinking I’m unattractive isn’t one of them.
No one has shown interest because I haven’t let them—I haven’t put myself out there since Dylan, choosing to sink all my time into the new job I’d taken instead of putting myself out there to have my heart ripped from my chest again.
I’m the elder emo covered in tattoos. My left arm is a full book-themed sleeve, and my right is covered with patch style artwork from a female artist here in Boston.
My right leg is mostly full with only a few places left to fill in, and I’ve already started working on most of my left leg.
I keep my hair it’s natural dark color, but right now I have bleach blonde pieces framing my face in loose waves.
I’m wearing silver rings on almost every finger with a few of my favorite dainty bracelets and necklaces stacked in delicate layers.
My nose is pierced in two places on the right side with hoops I never take out, and I have a small septum ring flipped up and hidden for the sake of tonight’s outfit.
I turned an oversized band T-shirt into a dress, threw on a pair of fishnets, tall socks, and finished with my favorite, well-worn black Doc Martens.
I know my style attracts a certain type of person.
West Parker isn’t that type of person.
I feel Frankie pause beside me, throwing her purse over her shoulder.
“You’re not the only one who needs this.
” The sadness in her voice breaks whatever bit of annoyance I might have been holding onto.
I look down at her, still taller than my barely five-foot best friend, even in her go-gos.
Her hazel eyes are dark in the bar’s lighting, missing the glow I’m used to seeing in them. “I’m a little lost right now too.”
Frankie is a musician with a record deal who recently came off her latest tour to a relationship that’s going nowhere and a label who’s ready to overhaul her entire image to fit the ever-changing music industry.
Her last tour didn’t sell the way it should have—to no fault of Frankie’s! I will die on that hill.
Her team is failing her.
Frankie needs a distraction probably more than I do.
“We can find ourselves on Monday.” I didn’t realize my phone was still lit up in my hand until I hit West’s location and let Maps lead us in the direction of our well-deserved distraction.