Chapter 2
On Sunday, Olivia faithfully made her way to Willow Grove to visit Grandma Ruby. Anger from her fight with Chuck from the day before still swam in her blood like angry piranha. Spending Saturday cleansing her apartment of all his belongings had helped take the edge off, but the sting lingered.
At least she had severed the tie. Goodbye, Chuck.
The Willow Grove care facility nestled at the base of the Hollywood Hills in an as-advertised copse of willow trees. Olivia paid their eye-wateringly steep premium because Grandma Ruby deserved the best care. She had, after all, stepped in when Olivia’s parents lost themselves to the wiles of fame.
Olivia had never known either of them. Rebecca Martin and Bradley Harris had died in a car accident when they were run off the road by a frenzied mob of paparazzi on their way home from a party. She had only been a year old and at home with a babysitter. The only memories she had of them came from two sources: her mother’s old films and the vicious tabloid coverage of her parents’ affair that had resulted in her birth.
See, her father, a successful Hollywood talent manager, had been married when she was born—but not to her mother. To a very famous actress. It was a scandal of such epic proportion that Grandma Ruby stepped in after their deaths to shield Olivia from the spotlight and raise her as her own.
That was why Olivia had no qualms about forking out money to allow her grandmother a comfortable life after the sacrifices she’d made. It was as if Ruby had reached the finish line with her own daughter and circled back to the start for another lap with her granddaughter. The sense of familial duty wasn’t something Olivia could have swayed one way or the other as a child, but her gratitude that her grandmother hadn’t shipped her off to an orphanage was immeasurable.
The problem now was that money could, unfortunately, be measured, and Olivia was running out of it. Her mother’s estate had lasted most of her life. She’d used good portions of it to pay for college and graduate school and then her grandmother’s care when she needed more support than Olivia could offer with a full-time career. But the funds were drying up.
Some Sundays Olivia visited later in the day and had dinner with her grandmother, but she knew that midmorning she’d find her in the community room with her best friend Violet.
She parked and crossed the parking lot to the entrance. Willow Grove boasted a sparkling fountain and neat palms lining the main stucco building. Residents were housed in quaint cottages with around-the-clock access to whatever care they needed. The nursing staff were angelic in their patience and kindness. They knew everyone by name.
She walked up the front steps and entered the tiled reception area smooth with airy, arched walkways and serene oil paintings.
“Good morning, Ms. Martin,” the woman behind the reception desk greeted her. She automatically pushed a clipboard in her direction.
“Hi, Caroline,” Olivia said with a soft smile. “How is she today?”
“Oh, she’s lovely. She’s in the community room with Violet.”
“I figured,” Olivia said, and returned the clipboard after signing in.
Caroline replaced it on her desk. “She’ll be happy to see you,” she said, in what Olivia knew was an effort to soften what she said next. “Dr. Park wants to speak with you when you have a moment.”
Olivia gave her a dutiful smile, knowing that Dr. Marilyn Park, Willow Grove’s director, wanted to talk to her about money. “Of course.”
She’d hoped she could slip into the community room and enjoy her visit undetected, but she should have known better. She took care not to have any financial conversations within earshot of her grandmother so as not to worry her, and as soon as she turned the corner in the right direction, there was Dr. Park stepping out of her office as if she’d been waiting.
“Olivia!” she called with a pleasant smile. A striking woman with jet black hair neatly pulled back but still falling past her shoulders, Dr. Marilyn Park wore a smart pantsuit under her white coat. She clicked toward Olivia in her shiny heels and met her gaze with her sharp, dark eyes. She was easily twenty years older than Olivia and intimidating in a shrewdly intelligent way while at the same time exuding the comfort of a lifelong caregiver. “How are you?” she asked.
Olivia gripped the strap of the purse she’d slung over her shoulder. She’d brought a bigger bag to carry in the box of raspberry tart cookies from Grandma Ruby’s favorite bakery. “I’m good, thanks. And thanks again for letting me take Violet out to dinner with us the other night. I know my grandma really appreciated it.” Dr. Park likely saw through Olivia’s attempt to butter her up with praise, but she politely smiled, nonetheless.
“Of course. A little out and about is good for everyone once in a while.” She let a silence pass as if in hope Olivia would fill it with a promise to pay her bills on time.
“We had a great time,” she said instead, which wasn’t entirely true since she’d spent a chunk of that time annoyed with Chuck and plotting their impending breakup. She shook the thought and tried to make an escape. “It was nice to see you, Dr. Park.” She moved to step around her, but Dr. Park took a mirroring step and blocked her path.
“Olivia, Accounting tells me you’re over two months behind on payment. Now, we love Ruby and want to do everything we can to help continue her time here, but we’re reaching the point where we can’t extend without payment anymore. Our facility is in high demand. I hate to deny space to those in need.”
You mean other paying customers , Olivia thought. Willow Grove might have been filled with compassionate caregivers, but it was a business at its core. A sudden vision of finding another, inferior care home or, worst case, squishing Grandma Ruby into her tiny apartment with her swam through Olivia’s mind.
“I understand, Dr. Park. And I’m sorry. I’m doing everything I can.”
She nodded like she didn’t fully believe her. Sympathy folded her dark brow. “Like I said, we’d hate to lose Ruby, but we can suggest alternatives for care if it would help.”
Olivia clenched her jaw in fear. Dr. Park was saying everything short of Pay or get out . She steeled herself with a confidence she didn’t have. “That won’t be necessary. I’ll catch up on payment soon. Please excuse me.” She successfully stepped around her this time and continued down the hall.
She had no idea where she would get the money to continue paying for Willow Grove, but she’d figure it out. She had to figure it out. For Grandma Ruby.
Quiet sounds of chatter welcomed her closer to the community room. The sunny oval space offered a view of a courtyard with benches and a koi pond. Inside, a TV was mounted on one wall with a couch and two armchairs below it. Behind the setup were clusters of tables and chairs for gathering to chat or play a card game. Sunday was the busiest day for families visiting. Groups of similar-looking people collected around their respective elders. Great-grandchildren bobbled about. Olivia spotted her own elder sitting on the couch beneath the TV. Violet sat beside her sipping tea and chatting as if they were the only two people in the world.
Olivia joined them with a smile. “Hi, Grandma,” she said with a gentle hand on her shoulder. She felt her sharp bones beneath her sweater.
Ruby turned and her face lit up like the Fourth of July. “Oh, my darling girl!” Ruby pushed herself up from the couch, the knitted blanket on her lap falling to the floor, and folded Olivia into a soft hug.
As was custom, Olivia held her breath while they embraced because hugging her now eighty-five-year-old grandmother felt like hugging a glass doll.
Ruby pulled back and held a smooth palm to Olivia’s cheek. She gazed at her with watery blue eyes and a smile soft with crinkles. “I know it’s only been two days, but I’m happy to see you again, dear.”
“I’m happy to see you too, Grandma. Hi, Violet.”
“Hello, honey,” the friendly woman on the couch said. Violet wore a lavender sweater and had her wispy white hair still curled from the party. It looked like little clouds resting on her dark skin. She leaned forward to set her teacup on the coffee table.
“I brought you some treats,” Olivia said, and pulled the box of cookies out of her bag.
Ruby gasped and reached for it as she sat back down. “Oh, my favorite! Vi, these are my favorite.”
“I know, dear,” Violet lovingly said.
Violet was just as healthy as Ruby, Olivia knew from being friendly with her son, who she sometimes ran into on visits. Randall was old enough to be Olivia’s father given the generation gap between most of Willow Grove’s residents and herself. She was one of the few adult grandchildren in charge of a family member. Most caregivers footing the bill were married, middle-aged people also balancing mortgages and college tuitions, not freshly thirtysomethings barely making rent and breaking up with their boyfriends.
The thought that she was in a financially disadvantaged category gave her an ounce of comfort about being behind on payments.
“Well, if you play your cards right, I might share,” Ruby said, and pulled at the box’s lid. Her knobby hands laced with purple veins struggled to get a grip.
Olivia gently took it from her and broke the seal to pop it open.
“Thank you, sweetheart,” Ruby said, and squeezed her arm. She pulled out a golden cookie with a gooey raspberry center peeking through the cutout top and took a bite. “ Oh , my absolute favorite .”
Sounds of her grandmother’s happiness filled Olivia’s heart with a warmth unlike anything else.
“Do you want one?” Ruby offered the box.
“Only if you’re willing to part with one.”
“For you, of course,” Ruby said with a smile. Tiny crumbs dotted her lip. Olivia reached out to wipe a smudge of raspberry from the corner of her mouth. She took a cookie from the box and bit it. They were indeed delicious.
“So, how’s your beau?” Ruby asked. “I was so sorry he couldn’t make it to dinner on Friday.”
Olivia reflexively rolled her eyes. She swallowed the expletive trying to slip out of her mouth. “He’s sorry too. And we broke up.”
Ruby gasped and Violet clucked her tongue.
She’d brought Chuck along on a few visits, and he’d been the talk of the town for days after, she’d been told. A minor celebrity with a killer smile who reminded the men of their youth and the women of feelings they hadn’t had for years, sure, Olivia could see it. She knew both her grandmother and Violet had a crush on him.
Too bad he’d stomped on her last nerve.
“That’s a shame,” Violet said at the same time Ruby gasped again. Her inhale was so sharp, a beat of panic struck Olivia’s heart like a drum.
“What is it?” she asked.
Ruby had sucked in a cookie crumb and began coughing. She held a hand to her mouth, eyes watering, and pointed at the TV. “It’s my Rebecca!”
Olivia flinched at the sound of her mother’s name. She and Violet turned to the giant flat-screen, and Olivia’s mouth fell open.
She expected to see one of her mom’s old movies playing on TV, but instead, she saw herself. And Chuck. Both of them half dressed and shouting at each other on the sidewalk.
“What the…?” She trailed off in shock.
Someone had caught them on camera from across the street. They stomped and flailed their arms, clearly arguing. She could not believe her eyes. There was Chuck looking like a six-pack snack in his jeans and nothing else, and there she was in her cutoffs, his shirt, and looking like…her mother. Her dark hair tumbled down her back, loose and still mussed from the scene on the kitchen floor. Her legs were bare and bronzed in her shorts. She could not fault her grandmother’s confusion.
Olivia dove on the remote and turned up the volume.
“You couldn’t pay me to get back together with you!” she heard herself shout.
And then she pulled off her shirt and threw it at Chuck.
Her whole body flushed with embarrassment. She had the urge to change the channel or at least jump up and stand in front of the TV to block her grandmother’s view, but she was too shocked to do either.
“Honey, that’s not Rebecca,” Violet said, her own mouth hanging open. “That’s…Olivia? Where’s your shirt?”
“Oh my god,” Olivia said, and threw her hand to her face. She went to change the channel, but Violet held out an arm to stop her.
The video froze, and the view zoomed out to a studio scene. It was one of those mindless TV shows where they played clips of videos from the internet and a comedian host made jokes about them. The host stood on a small stage beside the image from the street projected on a green screen. His lips bent into an open-mouthed grin. “If they get any royalties off this video that’s blowing up the internet, she won’t have to worry about getting paid for anything ever again.”
A cold sweat broke out over Olivia’s body at the words blowing up the internet at the same time Grandma Ruby gasped.
“Olivia, why are you on TV?”
Olivia grumbled, frustrated for multiple reasons. “I have no idea. I don’t even know how they got this!” The video played again, and the urge to hide hit her like a lightning bolt. “I have to go.”
She didn’t want to leave, but she needed to get to the bottom of whatever had landed her half naked on TV. She had a sneaking suspicion it somehow had to do with a certain ex-boyfriend, and Willow Grove was not an ideal location for a shouting match over the phone with Chuck Walsh.
“You just got here!” Ruby protested.
Olivia stood and kissed her cheek. “I know, and I’m sorry. I’ll visit again soon.”
Violet gave her a sympathetic look and then reached for Ruby’s hand. “Ruby, how about we go for a walk, hmm? Get some fresh air?”
Olivia only hoped she still had a friend like Violet when she was their age.
She stepped back into the hall and caught a glimpse of Dr. Park having a conversation with a nurse outside her office. Olivia couldn’t shake the feeling it was on purpose and they intended to keep an eye on her. She thought she heard her call her name as she hurried toward the exit, and she chose to ignore it. Her concern over the video was rattling her brain too loudly to think of anything else anyway.
···
Olivia drove home, and before she got the chance to call Chuck, someone called her.
“Hello?” She answered the unknown number as she unlocked her apartment door and stepped inside. The small space still smelled like the coffee she’d made before she left to see her grandmother. She dropped her keys in a dish by the door and kicked off her shoes.
“Ms. Martin?” the man on the phone asked.
“Yes?”
“Hi. My name is Parker Stone, and I’m the executive producer on Name Your Price .”
“The TV show?” she blurted in surprise.
“Yes. I’m calling to—”
“How did you get this number?” Olivia cut him off, still stunned and with her mind jumping to catastrophic conclusions over how far the video of her and Chuck had spread if an executive producer was calling her. She walked farther into her apartment and pulled the shades on the windows in her living room, suddenly feeling the need to hide.
“Mr. Walsh gave us your contact information.”
Olivia stopped yanking her curtain halfway and rolled her eyes so hard, she thought she might pull a muscle. “Of course he did.”
“What’s that?”
“I said, of course he did . And how did you track him down, put out an ad for most insufferable actor in Hollywood?”
She thought she heard him stifle a laugh.
He came back with the sound of a hidden smile in his voice. “No. We actually found him through his agent once the video of the two of you went viral. He graciously shared your contact information with us.”
Olivia felt betrayed and wanted to punch a pillow. She walked into her bedroom and sat on the foot of her bed with a huff. “ Gracious is too generous. I’m sure there was an ulterior motive, which I have to assume is why you are calling me. So, what do you want?”
He softly chuckled. “I appreciate your candor, Ms. Martin. Mr. Walsh mentioned we might encounter it when reaching out to you.”
“Yes, I’m sure that was the exact description he used. So, what is it?”
He cleared his throat and came back sounding rather serious. “The clip of the two of you online has reached massive viewership in record time and is still growing. We see it as an opportunity. We’d like to meet with you to discuss doing a segment on our show. We are prepared to make an attractive offer.”
Olivia’s blood cooled as she let his words sink in. She had zero desire to be on TV; her mother’s charisma and penchant for fame did not live in her veins. But she couldn’t ignore her money issue. She needed more cash than she had, and a brief stint on TV might be worth it.
“How attractive?” she asked.
“That’s what we’d like to discuss with you. In person. Tomorrow.”
She popped up from her bed, annoyed he was being vague and that she’d considered taking the bait. “Why can’t you tell me now? I’ve seen your show, you know. You guys offer money to people to do awful things like work at a sewage plant for a month or live in a cabin with no phone or TV. My situation is a little different.”
She wandered into her kitchen and opened the pantry. This conversation—her whole morning, actually—was making her want to stress-eat. She found a hidden box of strawberry Pop-Tarts she’d missed in her sweep of Chuck’s junk, his one guilty pleasure, and tore open a wrapper.
“We understand, Ms. Martin. And that’s why we are prepared to make a substantial offer. We want to film a segment like we’ve never done before, and we think you and Mr. Walsh are the perfect opportunity.”
“Hmm. Well, the only problem there is that we can’t stand each other. If you want to film people fighting, there are about a hundred franchises that beat you to the punch.”
He went quiet again and came back with the sound of another sly smile in his voice. “Sure, but none of those shows had the perfect setup fall into their laps like we have here.”
The Pop-Tart had gone stale. She threw it in the trash.
“What does that mean?”
“It means that we want to give you an opportunity.”
“To do what?”
“What you said on the street yesterday.”
She burst out laughing. “You must be out of your mind. Like I said, no price high enough.”
“With all due respect, Ms. Martin, Mr. Walsh said no price high enough. You said a million dollars.”
Olivia stopped laughing. The weight of what he said slammed into her like a wrecking ball and left her breathless. “Are you serious?”
“Yes. If you come to the studio office tomorrow, we can discuss in more detail. I’ll have my team email you the meeting information. I hope to see you there.” He hung up and left her blinking at her phone in shock.
He couldn’t be serious. No way. Right?
Her head was spinning, and the stale Pop-Tart had dried out her mouth. She opened the fridge and found a hard seltzer, telling herself Sunday morning booze was permissible since on any given Sunday after a visit with Grandma Ruby, there was a chance she’d be out brunching and three mimosas deep with her best friend Mansi anyway.
Calling her best friend suddenly seemed like the best idea since Mansi never failed to talk sense into her and she was a lawyer who could probably explain her rights regarding everything that had just happened.
She took her seltzer to her couch and put her phone on speaker.
“Hey,” Mansi answered, out of breath and surely on her Peloton.
“Hi. So, you know that show Name Your Price ?” she said with no further preamble.
“The one where they pay people to do shitty things? Yeah,” Mansi said, her breath tight. How she could bike and talk at the same time, Olivia didn’t know. She imagined her in her home gym in her Westwood high-rise. Mansi made gobs of cash in the corporate law sphere and was one of the most intelligent people Olivia had ever met. “Also, what’s with that clip of you and Chuck online?”
Olivia sat up and sloshed her seltzer. “You’ve seen it?”
“Yeah. It’s all over the web. I assumed you knew.”
Olivia thumbed her phone to find that the clip was indeed trending. “Oh god.”
“What’s the matter? You guys look hot.”
That fact was, admittedly, hard to deny. But that didn’t mean Olivia wanted hundreds of thousands of people gawking at her in her underwear.
“Thank you, but regardless, I don’t know who posted it, and Name Your Price just called me about being on their show. So, can I sue someone or something?”
The whir of Mansi’s bike slowed in the background. She took a deep breath, and her words began coming in a more fluid stream instead of staccato bursts. “Maybe. What happened?”
Olivia sighed out a big breath, exhausted by it all. “Long story, but Chuck and I broke up yesterday morning and that argument was the culmination of it. I guess someone caught it on camera from across the street. Now it’s online, and the executive producer of Name Your Price just called and offered me a million dollars, I think, to come on the show. They want to meet tomorrow.”
The whirring stopped altogether. She heard a thump like Mansi had hopped off her bike. “Um, what ?”
“It can’t be real, right? I mean, it sounds ridiculous.”
“Wait, wait, hold on. First, you broke up with Chuck?”
“Yes.”
“That’s big news.”
Olivia silently agreed. It was big news. And despite her having shouted it to the masses in the video, Mansi knew her well enough to confirm because her dating history with Chuck had been erratic.
“Are you okay?” Mansi asked.
Olivia paused, tripped up by her friend taking a moment to ask because she realized that she hadn’t taken a moment yet herself to think about it. The truth was, she’d been avoiding thinking too deeply about it for the knowledge that doing so would put a needling anxiety in her gut. Her hardwired fear of being alone would reach up and grip her around the throat if she wasn’t careful. So instead, she thought about how angry she’d been on Saturday morning and how angry she was now that their fight had been broadcast all over the internet.
“I’m fine,” she told Mansi.
Mansi was quiet for long enough that Olivia wondered what she was thinking. There was a strong possibility that she didn’t believe her, but she didn’t press. “Okay,” she eventually said. “And second, the EP called you?”
“Yes. Like five minutes ago.”
“What did you say?”
“He didn’t give me much chance to say anything. He said they’d email me the meeting invite and then hung up on me.”
“Um…”
Mansi was never at a loss. Olivia relied on her keen mind to guide her through the more confusing aspects of life. Her silence left her floundering.
“Well, do you want to do it?” she finally said.
“Do what?”
“Be on their show.”
“God no! I don’t even know what they want us to do, but I can’t imagine it’s worth it.”
Mansi was quiet again for a few beats. Olivia could almost feel the cogs of her brain working.
“Liv, that’s a lot of money, and I know you could use it.”
A lot of money. What an understatement. She could forgive Mansi, though. She lived in a world of obscene wealth and dealt with clients who made a million dollars a month.
“Of course I could, but I don’t believe this offer is real, and even if it is, the stipulation involves Chuck, and we both know that’s a bad idea.”
Mansi did not immediately agree that it was a bad idea. “Maybe you should hear them out? I mean, it can’t be that bad. It’s not like they can force you to get married or anything.”
A dark laugh burst from Olivia’s lips. “ Definitely no price high enough for that.”
Mansi responded with a decisive tone in her voice. “I think you should hear them out.”
Olivia was normally one to take her best friend’s advice—that was why she’d called, after all—so she let herself consider it.
Regardless of what the show wanted her to do, a payday like that would change everything. She suddenly saw her money problems disappear. Grandma Ruby could stay at Willow Grove for years on that budget. She could move into a bigger apartment. Get the mysterious whistling sound her car made fixed. The possibilities stretched far.
“Hmm,” she said, noncommittal.
“You’d want to take a close look at whatever contract they throw at you to know exactly what you’re getting into, but I’d say you should consider it,” Mansi said.
Olivia mulled it over, chewing her lip. She sipped her seltzer. “Will you come with me? To the meeting tomorrow?”
“As your lawyer or your friend?” Olivia heard the smile in her voice.
“Both?”
“Yeah, sure. Send me the info when you have it.”
“You’re the best, Mansi. Thank you.”
“Of course. Now, tell me about your breakup.”
Olivia flopped back on the couch and spent the next half hour dissecting the end of her relationship.
When she sat up, she noticed that Chelsea, Chuck’s younger sister, had sent her a message.
What is this video of you and Chuck?
A pang of guilt hit her right in the heart. With no siblings of her own, she’d grown fond of Chelsea, an artsy college kid ten years younger than her who routinely changed her hair color and walked around with smudges of paint on her forearms. She lived at home in Ohio with their parents during the summer but spent the rest of the year in L.A., where she went to school. Olivia hadn’t seen her since the farewell dinner they’d had back in the spring at the end of her sophomore year at UCLA. She and Chelsea had gorged on heaps of pasta, and Chuck had a single giant meatball at a classy Italian place in Brentwood that night. Chelsea worshipped her older brother, which meant she had spent enough time around him and Olivia to know that their relationship was volatile at best.
Exactly what it looks like. We broke up.
For real? She included a crying cat face emoji.
Olivia hated to break her heart, but there was no sense in lying to her.
Yes. Sorry, Chels. Xo
She waited for a response, and when she didn’t get one, she decided to brave finding the viral clip online. Given the spread, she had her choice of major social media accounts to view from. She picked one on Instagram and through one squinted eye watched herself peel off her shirt and throw it at Chuck.
“Don’t read the comments. Don’t read the comments. Don’t read the comments,” she muttered as she navigated to the comments.
An abundance of fire emojis, heart eyes, and sweating faces filled the comment section, along with a few fruits and vegetables that had been repurposed into innuendos.
Hot.
I’d get with him for $1
You’d have to pay me NOT to get with him.
That’s @ChuckWalsh. Dude’s an a-hole.
Umm, how about some love for the hottie in the cutoffs?
They owe it to the world to make beautiful babies.
Isn’t she, like, some dead movie star’s kid?
Someone tell @AstridLarsson_Official that the love child that killed her marriage is rampaging in L.A.
The last comment made her regret looking. She closed the app and took a deep breath. The spotlight, any form of it, was not something she wanted. She’d had qualms over dating a celebrity for that exact reason, but Chuck had nullified those qualms the first time he’d looked at her and pulled her in so deep that she couldn’t bring herself to worry about him being semifamous. But spotlight by proxy aside, the main reason she didn’t want to be in the public’s eye was that she knew it would rekindle interest in her parents. She did not need to be the reason complete strangers started slandering them online again some thirty years later. She especially did not need Astrid Larsson to be made aware of her modern existence. She’d gone her whole life without ever crossing paths with the woman her parents had wronged, and she wasn’t about to start now.
This had TERRIBLE IDEA written across it in bold shouty caps.
But.
Liv, that’s a lot of money. She heard Mansi’s words again and could not deny them. With a sigh, she decided to get a better idea of what she might be getting herself into with Name Your Price . She’d seen the show a few times but only in passing and had never really paid close attention. On her phone, she navigated her way to the show’s website and clicked the video link to a clip from a recent episode.
The show’s host, TJ Price, a tall, confident man who fit the Game Show Host mold so well that Olivia could see the veneers in his mouth, narrated the overview. This episode followed a woman from Manhattan who’d agreed to work on a farm in rural Idaho for six weeks. Olivia had to admit, seeing her swap stilettos for Muck boots was rather entertaining.
She clicked to another episode preview and saw a businessman trade in his suit and tie for a trash collector jumpsuit.
A third preview strayed from the society-type-getting-their-hands-dirty theme and followed a young man so painfully shy that he couldn’t even look at the camera on his journey to auditioning for a part in a live musical.
In all cases, TJ met with them on occasion for interviews to check in on how they were surviving their newfound misery. Each contestant had a significant chunk of money on the line if they lasted in their new environment, didn’t quit their job, and made it through a live show. The whole trajectory of their experience was condensed into a single hour-long episode.
Olivia considered and realized that not everything the contestants were challenged to do was objectively terrible, though most of it was, but the point was that it was terrible to them and that was what made it entertaining to watch.
The list of things involving Chuck that were terrible to her was not short, and before she even started making it in her head, wondering what the show might want to put them through, she got a text from a number that she should have blocked.
Hey. I know you’re mad at me, but please show up tomorrow.
She read Chuck’s message and didn’t respond. He was right: she was mad at him. And she planned to show up tomorrow, but leaving him wondering if she would gave her enough satisfaction to peacefully enjoy the rest of her Sunday.