Marissa
When Sunday night rolls around, I’m curled up in my bed with the only reliable loves of my life—fictional men—when my phone buzzes on my night table. Setting my book down, I swipe away the third-act-breakup tears and reach for my phone.
“Hey,” I manage through a watery hiccup.
“What’s wrong?” Pooja’s voice is laced with concern. “Did something happen?”
“Everything’s fine. I’m just reading,” I sniffle.
“It’s the book I was telling you about, with the ghostwriter who has fallen in love with an actual ghost. They can’t be together and it’s devastating.
And, like, I know they’re going to end up together.
I know the end is going to be happy. But god, what does it say about me right now that I can’t handle a rom-com without having a mental crisis? Am I actually not okay?”
Pooja snorts. “You’re fine. But consider switching to horror.
I just acquired the rights to a book about a commune of misbehaved girls who learn witchcraft and form their own coven to fight the patriarchy.
There’s one scene where they confront an incel in his mother’s basement and devour his still-beating heart. ”
“Gross. I’ll stick to my romance novels, thank you very much,” I tell her. “I like love stories. Even the gushy ones.”
I can hear Pooja rolling her eyes. “It’s wild to me that after burning through a roster of unfaithful men, you still believe in love. They should do a case study on you.”
The thing about knowing your best friend since childhood is that they are well-versed in your life story—and that includes your sordid romantic history.
Pooja knows enough about mine to write a book of her own.
Which she’d probably enjoy, since we have always shared a love of reading.
We became instant best friends on the set of Little LLC after discovering our mutual passion for it.
She preferred her Goosebumps books to my choice of Nancy Drew, but sitting together and reading between takes became our ritual.
Our friendship blossomed from there; her house was the first one I drove to when I got my driver’s license, and mine was the first number she programmed when she got a cell phone.
Even though we stayed close, our careers went in different directions after the show wrapped.
She left acting behind and had a normal teenage experience.
Entertainment was still a passion—she loved stories and wanted to keep working in the industry, but behind the camera instead.
After announcing her grand plan to become the first non-doctor in the family, she went to college to study film and then, at her parents’ insistence, attended law school.
She practiced entertainment law for a few years before joining her current production company, where she happily reads mountains of books in the service of scouting intellectual property for adaptation.
I envy her career: I can’t think of too many things that sound better than reading books and making authors’ dreams come true for a living.
Even if we still prefer different genres.
I sit up straighter. It’s still weird to be in this room, cuddled up in my grandmother’s queen-sized bed. I’m used to spending summer nights down the hall, squished into the bottom bunk.
“So, what’s up?” I ask. “I certainly hope you’re not calling with updates about the R&R engagement tour. Because if so, I’d like to unsubscribe.”
“Hmm,” Pooja murmurs. “Guess you have managed to escape the celebrity news cycle from your post in the Dirty Dancing bungalow.”
“That was the Catskills, not the Poconos, and it’s amazing what you can ignore when you remove social media from your phone.”
“What a life you lead,” Pooja muses. “Positively majestic. Like you’re in the age of Nokia.”
“I take it I’m missing something deeply unimportant then?”
“Meh, just the usual. The press just about shit themselves when R&R walked the red carpet together on Friday night,” she says.
“They’re so excited to have new photos so they can print them side by side with the old ones.
Then they can ask themselves, ‘How does she manage to keep from aging?!’ in seventy-two-point type.
As if we don’t know the answer is unicorn blood and a plastic surgeon in Dubai. ”
“Be nice.”
“I still can’t believe he proposed to her with that ugly-ass ring,” she continues, ignoring me. “What’s with the clunky brass setting? She’s an actress, not Mary, Queen of Scots.”
“It’s vintage,” I remind her gently, although a petty part of my brain agrees. What is the benefit of being an ambassador for Tiffany & Co. if you don’t get a gorgeous diamond out of it?
Pooja snorts. “Enough about them. How are things going in Not-the-Catskills? Are the kids adjusting?”
I sigh. “I guess as well as can be expected? They’re all squared away for camp tomorrow. I’ve got them both enrolled for the first four weeks of the summer.”
I was a bit nervous about finding summer activities for my kids right before the start of the season.
But it turns out that the Poconos is a hotbed of summer camps, and spots seem to open quickly when you’re a celebrity.
It’s a privilege I’m usually reluctant to rely on, but desperate times and all that.
I’ve signed Isla up for a dual performing-and-visual-arts camp.
For Levi, I found a program called Camp Minotaur, which supports neurodiverse children through arts and social play.
The campers are led by a team of therapists, so I know he’ll be well cared for.
But I just can’t quite get my stomach on board.
I always end up feeling just as stressed about starting something new as he does.
“Sounds like you’ll have the house to yourself. Which means it’s the perfect time to review the new scripts I’ve just emailed you.”
I let out a beleaguered groan. “Pooja, I’ve told you, I’m not ready to go back to work. And even if I was, now is not the right time. There’s too much going on with my kids. I need to focus on getting them settled for the summer, and after that, adjusted to the idea of a stepmother.”
I recoil slightly at the taste of the word as it leaves my mouth. Stepmother. Even though I no longer want to do life with Rocky, I can’t help but resent the idea of him injecting someone else into my kids’ orbit. Of our lives being shared with an interloper.
As for my career, it’s not like there’s any fiscal urgency pushing me back to work.
I still get royalties from the Felicia Fox franchise, plus a small cut of licensed merchandising.
Rocky pays alimony and it’s enough to comfortably take care of the kids.
Would I love a little more financial independence?
Of course. But I’d also like a One Direction reunion, and you can’t always get what you want.
“You always do this.” Pooja’s impatient tone snaps me back to attention.
“Always do what?”
“Put yourself last. Use everyone around you as an excuse for why you have to put your career on the back burner.”
“I’m not putting myself last,” I mumble. “And I’m not putting my career on the back burner. I just have different priorities right now. That’s what you do when you’re a mother.”
I regret the words the minute they leave my mouth, wish that I had the power to swallow them back down.
Pooja was diagnosed with PCOS at nineteen.
When her doctor told her that she might never be able to have kids, I saw a tiny fire die within her.
It wasn’t that the idea of parenthood was at the top of our priority list back then.
But the idea that it might not ever happen was devastating.
I’ve always wondered if it’s the reason she avoids getting too serious with anyone.
To avoid having to navigate the difficult topic.
Either way, I feel like shoving my foot down my throat.
She’s quiet on the other end of the line and I pivot quickly to a different topic. Something that I know will redirect her attention.
“Anyway, things are going to be pretty busy here with my hot carpenter.”
She snorts. “Another HGTV marathon? I know you love project inspo, but do you not remember what happened that time you binged Love It or List It and decided you could hang wallpaper by yourself?”
“Not a TV show. I’m talking about the real-life man I’ve hired to help fix up the lake house. He was here yesterday afternoon, helping me expel our cabinet moths. And let’s just say he’s … not bad to look at.”
There’s the understatement of the century.
Jesse’s image has been tattooed across my brain for the past forty-eight hours.
It springs to my mind’s eye again now, conjuring the memory of strong arms and broad shoulders as he bent to gather his supplies.
The ripple of muscle flexing beneath his T-shirt as he fished around the bucket.
A dull thud through the receiver snaps me back to reality.
“Pooja? Are you okay?”
“Sorry,” she says breathily. “I thought you said you will be spending time with an attractive man and was so shocked that I walked into the doorframe.”
“Hardy har har.”
“Seriously, though. I need more information.”
I settle back against the pillows and stare up at the ceiling. There’s a jagged hairline crack running through the center of it. Another testament to the fact that this place is in desperate need of attention. I add it to the running mental list of issues I need to bring up to the team.
“The house is old, and it’s been sitting vacant for a while,” I tell her.
“It needs a lot more TLC than I anticipated. I knew the floors needed to be refinished, so I hired a team to take care of it before we got here. I thought they’d be done before we arrived on Friday afternoon, but the project got delayed.
One thing led to another, and they convinced me to do a little bit of extra work around the house.
Which makes sense. That will make it easier if I decide to put it on the market after the summer. ”
“Who is they, exactly?”