Chapter 7
ASHER
Nothing makes you feel more like a lonely bachelor than returning to a hotel room after a publicity stunt gone nuclear, your suit reeking of desperation and single-malt whiskey.
I fumble the keycard, miss the slot the first time, and nearly hurl it at the Four Seasons’ art deco carpet.
Inside: a familiar hush, thick with the artificial lemon scent they must blast in from air ducts reserved for the has-beens.
One wall’s plastered with posters of my face in various states of brooding, all for the film I just embarrassed myself promoting.
I imagine each one of those Ashers is cringing for me, arms folded, whispering “you dumbass” behind symmetrical teeth.
I go straight to the minibar, crack open a tiny overpriced Jameson, and drain it like NyQuil. Then I dial Craig. My index finger wavers as I tap in his number—he picks up faster if you call after midnight, but I don’t want to talk. I leave a message.
“Hey, Craig, it’s Asher. About the thing tonight. You saw? Yeah, I thought so. Look, just tell Myrna to call me, okay? I’m out. Of all of it. The stunt, the posts, the whole... shit show. It’s only going to make things worse for her, and I’m not going to be the one who burns it down. Call me.”
I hang up, but not before smashing the “End” button faster than necessary. I’m not sure if I want them to call back or to lose reception forever.
Jameson burns in my belly with a righteous ache. I swap my blazer for a t-shirt and let myself collapse backward onto the king-size. My phone buzzes, distant, but I don’t check it. The blackout curtains block all of Austin, except a neon sliver that leaks under the hem like murder-scene tape.
I should be pissed at Emma, I know. She played her part to perfection—the little gasps, the Bambi eyes, the tight-lipped smile when the interviewer nudged for details.
For a second, I thought she was about to slip—tell some bit of truth.
But she didn’t. She stayed the course. If anything, her lie was more real than my truth.
What did I expect? I signed up for this.
The TV is on, TMZ, the volume low. I watch myself on the screen: canned laughter, the host’s voice dubbing over my own, freeze-frames of my face next to Emma’s.
No one ever tells you how exhausting your own image can be.
Watching it, seeing the edits, the overlays, the way they color-correct your teeth and eyes until you look like a meme of yourself.
In the bottom corner, a little box shows “Fan Reactions.” Mostly women, some drunk, all younger than me.
One of them holds up a sign: “ASHER, MARRY ME.” I laugh, but it’s hollow.
I pop another Jameson. Glass bottles, cheap, but at least they sound honest when you tip them back.
My phone keeps vibrating. Three texts, maybe four.
I ignore them. I want to get drunk—no, I want to get anesthetized.
I want to bleach my memory of every hour up there: the way she let her hip bump against mine backstage, the little laugh at my whispered insult, the staticky brush of her palm in the green room.
How could I be so old, so jaded, and so monumentally dense?
Eventually, I lose count of the bottles.
They’re lined up on the bedside table, soldiers who died for my sins.
I twist to check my phone. The screen flickers: Two texts from Craig.
One from Myrna telling me everything is going as planned and not to fuck it up.
And one from her. I tap into Emma’s so fast, I nearly delete it.
“Hey, are you okay? I can come up if you want to—”
I fumble the reply:
“Don’t. Bad company.”
A minute later: “You’re never bad company. Let me know if you change your mind.”
I nearly ask her up. I really do. But I know what’ll happen.
She’ll knock quietly, slip inside with her hair still styled for the cameras, that expensive perfume the studio probably gave her following like a cloud.
We’ll sit awkwardly on opposite ends of the couch, and she’ll make small talk about the press tour schedule or how weird it is pretending to be a couple when we barely know each other.
I’ll offer her a drink from the minibar, and she’ll decline politely.
The silence will stretch too long. I’ll want more than I have any right to.
Then she’ll say something like, “This is only until the premiere, right?” and I’ll say, “Of course,” and after she’s gone, I’ll lie awake wondering how I managed to develop real feelings for someone who’s literally being paid to tolerate me.
I switch the channel. It’s the duplicate headlines, looping: “Rowan and Dixon, sparks at SXSW!” “Is this just for show, or are they the real deal?” There’s a clip of my hand on her back, the dress she wore—and my gaze focused on her plunging neckline.
Her deep-green eyes find mine, and a goofy smile forms on my face.
For a second, I can almost smell her, the ghost of that perfume wafting from the television.
Why would she want me? She’s on the upslope, every agent and producer in town sniffing for a chance at her trajectory.
I’m the guy who’s made the cover of US Weekly three times with the headline “DIXON DITCHES AGAIN.” Even my publicist winces when we get to the relationship section of interviews.
The role I’m supposed to be proud of—a grizzled, lovelorn detective—feels like typecasting now.
My character can’t commit to the woman he loves until she’s literally in a body bag.
By the time Emma’s gotten her first Oscar, I’ll be that guy everyone remembers as “dating half of Hollywood, committed to none.”
I want to say, “You deserve someone who won’t run.” But she already knows that.
The head rush hits me hard—the room tilts a little, and I let myself go horizontal, the sheets cool and impersonal under my skin.
I thumb open our last chat. The cursor mocks me, blinking at the void.
If I were the selfless guy she probably needs, I’d keep this professional–but I’m not. This may be the first time I’ve ever known precisely what I want in life, and I know with unsettling clarity that I want Emma Rowan.
Instead of going to bed, like I should, I type:
“Would you want to go somewhere tomorrow? Not for press. Just you and me.”
I hover, thumb trembling, then press send.
Instant regret. What if she ignores it? Worse, what if she says yes, and it’s unbearable? I stare at the phone like it’s a viper about to strike.
The reply comes before I can look away:
Absolutely. After the junket?
I type too fast:
Yeah. Pick a place. I don’t trust my taste anymore.
She sends a laughing emoji, then:
I know a spot.
I want to ask her what’s real, but I can’t. Not tonight.
I let the bottles drift from the nightstand, one by one, until the room’s littered with their brown glass carcasses.
Eventually, I pass out, horizontal, still in my jeans.
In the last moments before sleep, I see her again: not on the screen, not in the shimmer of flashbulbs, but in the dim warmth of a hotel bar, telling me the worst joke I’ve ever heard.
And for a minute, I feel twenty-one again, with my whole life ahead of me.
I wake to a pounding in my skull, the kind that makes you swear off everything.
My phone’s dead, so I plug it in and check the time on the bedside clock: 11:40AM.
Junket starts in twenty minutes. I brush my teeth wearing nothing but boxers and a towel, and my mouth tastes like death.
My blazer is wrinkled beyond rescue, but I wear it anyway.
I’m still in last night’s t-shirt, now aromatic with regret.
Downstairs, the press is already thick. The ballroom has been reconfigured into a warren of glass tables and cheap velvet ropes, each station labeled with the name of a magazine or a blog.
I see Emma immediately, her five-inch Louboutins making her tower over the press pool, draped in a midnight Valentino suit with a silk Dior blouse that probably cost more than my first car.
The studio stylists have transformed her into something untouchable.
Her hair is up—elegant and brutal. She makes it look effortless.
She laughs at something the guy from GQ says, and for a second, I’m actually annoyed.
When it’s my turn, I’m ushered to her table like an unwilling contestant on a game show. She doesn’t stand, but her eyes flick up and down as if taking inventory.
“Rough night?” she whispers, smiling wide for the camera.
“You wouldn’t believe it.”
“Oh, I would.”
I want to tell her I’m sorry. Sorry for last night, sorry for asking her out, sorry for not being able to keep it at the level she wants. But there’s a handler watching, and a camera, and three microphones, so I say, “You look like you slept.”
She says, “What’s that supposed to mean?”
I nearly laugh, but rein it in. We slip into the press routine: easy, patter-heavy, borderline flirtatious.
She talks about the chemistry between us—the word “chemistry” gets used a lot in this context, which is both funny and humiliating.
I say she’s the hardest-working costar I’ve ever had, and she blushes exactly the right amount, which I don’t know how she does on command. I wonder if she even means to.
After the sixth or seventh interview, we get five minutes off. We wander into a service hallway lined with storage crates and hotel staff. Emma leans against the wall and unbuttons the top of the suit. I avert my eyes, like that matters.
“Did you mean it?” she says, not looking at me. “About tonight?”
“Yeah. If you want.”
“I do.”
There’s a pause. She tugs the hair tie from her bun, shakes her head. “I’ll be honest, I can’t do this unless we’re at least a little bit real.”
She says it low, like a confession.
“I’m not great at real,” I say.
She smirks. “You’re better at it than you think. Besides, I don’t mean getting engaged. I just mean becoming friends.”
We stand there until someone calls us back. For a minute, neither of us moves.
Back at the table, I’m lighter. Even the questions feel less loaded, more like a game I’m in on.
I see her at the other end of the ballroom, watching me.
I make a face, and she almost cracks up.
The handlers take notes, whisper to each other behind clipboards.
I start to see the scripts, the marks where the real stuff leaks out: the sudden shift in her tone when she talks about her family, the way her foot bounces under the table until a question lands too close.
By late afternoon, my voice is sandpaper, and my head throbs, but I don’t care.
When the last interview wraps, Emma bolts toward the doors. She doesn’t wait for me. She leaves the hotel, cutting through the crowd with her head forward in almost a sprint. I lose her in the lobby, but when I step outside, she’s two paces ahead, hands in pockets, hair wild in the wind.
“Hey!” I call, jogging to catch up.
She doesn’t turn, but I can see the smile in her posture.
We walk together, neither speaking at first. A block down, she veers into an unmarked door that leads into a dark ramen bar, the kind with only five tables and no music. We order, still silent, and when the sake arrives, she pours for both of us.
“How long are we supposed to keep this up?” she says, raising her thimble cup.
“I think they’re working on a quiet break-up for a month after the premieres,” I shrug, and drink, already dreading the end of whatever this is.
Still, the words are stuck, lodged somewhere between my throat and my better judgment.
If I start, I’ll say too much, like a dam with the first crack already spreading.
But then she sets her glass down with a gentle clink against the wooden table, her fingers curled tight around it until her knuckles pale.
The amber light of the ramen bar catches in her eyes as she looks directly at me for the first time all night, her gaze steady and searching beneath those impossible lashes.
"So, I suppose we make the most out of the next four months?” she asks, her voice barely audible over the hiss of broth in the kitchen. "What do you say?”
I want to tell her yes with a capital Y, but I’m suddenly terrified of what will happen if she actually means it. I’m bad at beginnings, worse with endings. The stuff in between is where I get lost.
“I say…” I start, but my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. I could blame the sake, but it’s just me.
She cocks an eyebrow, waiting.
“—I say we order another round.”