Chapter 48 The Afterglow
Nothing says Happy Monday like sprinting for your eight thirty train in a skirt and kitten heels.
The tiling guys my dad scheduled didn’t show up till eight fifteen.
I briefly debated using the journal to get to work, but it’d be a deplorable waste of a jump that I could utilize to get across the country.
My phone vibrates in my purse as I’m clacking my way aboard New Jersey transit. I yank it out as I flop into a window seat.
Reed: Morning beautiful
Me: Morning R. Tyler slash boyfriend =) why are you always awake?
Reed: couldn’t sleep. early run
Me: What a coincidence I just went for a little run myself. It was for the train but it still counts
Reed: time for a second morning shower?
Me: care to pop over and join me?
Reed: *googles flights*
Me: =P
Reed: don’t tempt me Renee. If I didn’t have a crazy work week ahead I would be all over that
Reed: new phone background who dis
A lock screen screenshot comes through—the picture of me in Reed’s trench and sweats from the streaking night with my pinkie in my mouth. I snort.
The WWU group chat starts to ping. I tap it open.
Babe: They’ve finally dropped the cast for Elizabeth Ross Hulu Adaptation and it’s coming out next month!
Me: Ahhhhh! What! wait why are you even excited i thought you didn’t want to read it because it’s not fantasy.
Babe: What?! Woman I read it like two weeks after you did, you wouldn’t shut up about it.
Jordyn: Um have yall looked at the cast list yet.
Babe: Only the leads! Matthew Trench is playing ryan!!! This woman I haven’t heard of before, Eliza Trainer, is playing Elizabeth!
I stare at the names, heart suddenly pounding behind my face.
Matthew Trench? As in Regent Fallow of Yorlabala?
As in the wedding I was just at?
Eliza? It can’t be Eliza as in the lady who got me water?
I frantically tap out of the chat and google the cast list. The first result is a Deadline article.
Matt Trench and unknown Eliza Trainer score leads in much Anticipated Bestseller Adaptation: Elizabeth Ross falls for Ryan
Hulu is trying a new marketing approach with this drop. Nothing for two years and then an entire promotional campaign a month before release for their new thirteen-episode limited series. We finally have the cast for our beloved post–World War I romance, Elizabeth Ross Falls for Ryan.
Drum roll please!
Elizabeth Ross, played by Eliza Trainer
Ryan Edmunson, played by Matt Trench
Vince O’Brien, played by Rome Overland
Selena Diamond, played by Brittany Richards
Raymond Smith, played by Will Murphy
My ears are ringing as I stare at that name on the cast list. Rome. The group chat continues to vibrate. I ignore it.
I need to start calling you Rome so I don’t fuck it up on the press tour.
I scroll down. There are headshots of everyone. Eliza. Matt.
And then Reed.
Reed with his mouth folded into a pout with just a hint of smirk buried behind it. The top of his auburn hair grown out longer.
I scroll down further. There’s a poster. Eliza and Matt big, back-to-back in the middle, with Reed smaller along the edges with Britt and Will. I was literally sitting at the Elizabeth Ross Falls for Ryan cast table at the wedding.
I need to breathe. Keep breathing. Breathe.
I told him not to tell me.
I told him not to tell me.
And I forgot to google it.
And I told him not to tell me.
And I don’t want to tell him about the articles I’m writing. One called “How I Thought I’d Lose the Guy in Ten Days” is supposed to go live next Sunday, and it’s straight up about him.
It would make things weird. This is a good rule. And this why all my relationships have broken piece I’ve been roped into writing for immediate release is so, so not what I want to be bringing into conversation with my shiny-new relationship with Reed. I don’t want anything to mess this up.
This casting is amazing for him. This is a big break. He is about to fucking shoot off into space. He’s playing Vince! Ryan’s roommate. He’s also a World War I vet, and he channels all his PTSD into . . . dance.
He and Elizabeth have a flirtation going, which ends up complicating things with his best friend, Ryan.
The love triangle aspect of it is heartbreaking and really well done.
They’re all just trying to help each other through hard times.
Elizabeth is trying to get back to 2019, where she belongs, and all the while she’s falling for the new people she’s connecting with in 1919.
Rome Overland. His acting name sounds like a sci-fi character. I type Rome Overland into Google and then delete it.
Honor the pact. If you want him to honor it, you have to honor it.
I tap open my thread with Reed and heart the picture of his new background. I update mine as well, opting for the book-cover picture at Santa Monica Pier. I screenshot it and send it to him.
Me: I just saw the news!! You’re fucking doing the thing. Proud of you Rome Overland.
I switch my phone to “Do Not Disturb” and drop it in my purse.
My first two hours in the office are spent recording Love Today with my producer, who runs our socials. The second we’re done, I’m up out of my chair, storming toward Ted’s office.
His door’s open, so I stride right in and slam it shut behind me. Ted’s sitting at his desk, in a white button-up and a skinny light-blue tie, click-clacking away at his desktop. He glances up calmly, blond curls grown out and askew.
I shove my hands onto my hips. “How dare you go to Maya behind my back and pitch a piece?”
He shrugs. “You should be thanking me. She loved it!”
“Yeah, and now I get no say in whether or not we move forward with it!”
“I want to make things better between us, Rick.”
“Going behind my back is not the way to make things better between us, Ted.”
“Going in front of your back, you would never take the time to listen to my side of the story.”
I throw my hands up in the air. “Because I don’t want to fucking hear it!”
“Well, we’re in this now, and Maya thinks it’s going to be great.”
“Yeah, fantastic, I’m already working three jobs plus wedding planning for my mother. Let’s add a week of interviews with eight dudes I dated briefly and my latest ex.”
Ted turns back to his computer. “She wants a draft by next Monday morning, so we should get moving as soon as possible.” His voice is laced with an infuriating air of enthusiasm. “We should start with our interview. When are you free? Got time during lunch?”
“No. I have to make ten calls, rescheduling shit for my mom’s wedding .
. . but she wants the interviews to be in person, so we should start organizing today.
” I press my lips together and close my eyes for a moment, groaning internally.
“Okay, I can do after work. You can come over at seven. We’ll schedule out the rest of the week, and we can do our interview. ”
Ted looks up. “Where do you live now?”
“Same building. I’ll text you the address.”
Ted claps his hands. “Okay, great!”
“Okay, great!” I plaster on a fake smile before throwing up the finger and walking out of his office.
I hate that I’m cleaning my apartment for a meeting with Ted. I’m putting out crackers and Costco spinach artichoke dip as a polite snack for Ted.
I’ve typed up my reasons for why we broke up in my Word document.
Ted
- Thought I was a freak for hosting a witch book club?
- Couldn’t be with someone so fucked up they didn’t even talk to their parents
- Too much of a hassle to love
- Teenage level emotional intelligence
- Wanted kids
- Just cute and never hot
He knocks at 7:10 p.m. Ted is always late.
I usher him in and show him to the kitchen table. He eats a cracker as I plop down next to my laptop. Ted sits across from me and pulls out his computer. I put our portable podcast mic on the table and press record.
“Okay, let’s get this over with.”
Ted rolls his eyes. “Okay,” he says in a stupid sarcastic cartoon voice. “‘Why do you think we broke up,’ I think is a good place to start.”
I rebut him with an eye roll of my own. “Well, initially I felt like it came entirely out of the blue. You had this weird tone change one morning. You were talking about having kids, even though I had told you I’m not sure I’m interested in that, and suddenly you wanted four.
And then you spewed a whole slew of shit about me being unlovable because of exhibit (a) my relationship with my parents, (b) my book club, and (c) the fact that I’m ‘too much.’ I think you also threw in a jab about me spending an excessive amount of time working and not enough time giving you both attention and sex.
” I spin my Word document around and let him read it.
Ted heaves a sigh. “Okay, I have three things written down.” He opens his laptop. “The first and biggest one was I felt like you didn’t like me—”
I scoff. “I was dating you.”
“Yeah, but you’d prioritize so many things ahead of me that I started to look for an excuse to end things because it felt like you were just too busy to end things with me.”
“How did I not like you?” I demand.
“Well, you would never initiate sex—”
“I barely enjoyed our sex.”
Hurt flashes across his face. “What?”
“Our sex was all for you! You never tried to make sure I was enjoying it. Or ask questions, or learn anything about me. What incentive was there to initiate?”
“You never mentioned that.”
“Honestly, looking back,” I say coolly, “I can’t believe I didn’t break up with you before you broke up with me. Maybe because we worked together, I wanted to keep trying. It seemed like it could be easy. Should be easy? Or convenient. But it wasn’t. We’re really different.”
He lowers his brow. “So are you admitting right now that I was right and you didn’t actually even like me?”
“I wanted to like you more than I actually did. But that doesn’t excuse all the terrible shit you said to me.”
He throws a hand out and lets it fall. “I’m sorry about all that shit.”
It takes everything in me not to roll my entire body in response.
“I was insecure about my place in the company,” he says.
“You had a real job at The Minute, and I was working on freelance pieces and—I don’t know.
I was feeling emasculated. And in my defense, you clearly had this weird, heavy relationship with your parents, and you never told me anything about it.
Like not one detail other than ‘it’s complicated,’ and then I’m supposed to understand why you ignore one of them constantly and only periodically talk to the other? ”
“You wouldn’t understand. You have a perfect family life.”
“You didn’t even try me, Rikki. I threw all that shit at you to break this off because resentment was building, and I was stupid and didn’t know what else to do!
After five months I kind of still barely knew you.
Like . . . I couldn’t believe you would kick me out on weekends when you had your meetings with your precious WWU. ”
I gawk at him. “You didn’t live with me, Ted. I was allowed to kick you out.”
“Yeah, but you didn’t ever let me meet your friends except for Jordyn, and that’s just because you lived with her.
And even then, we never all hung out. I never got to meet your witch friends.
I never really got to know Jordyn and Micah.
You can’t do that when you want to actually be someone’s partner. ”
“You didn’t actually want to be my partner!”
He slams a hand down on the tabletop. “Yes, I did, Rikki!”
I scoot back an inch. One of the things I was initially attracted to about Ted was how calm he always was. Level. He never really got mad. It felt safe at the time.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to yell. I—I tried my best, and obviously that wasn’t good enough.
I didn’t know how to communicate with you.
I was stupid, but you barely wanted to be with me and strung me along for months like a toy boyfriend who you’d take out of the box from time to time when you felt like it for specific dates and activities. ”
A sarcastic huff escapes my lips. “O-kay, Ted.” I turn off the recorder and exhale. “That should be enough. Let’s start going through these dudes I briefly went out with and get them on our schedule.”
One at a time I open the contact files in my phone for the Hinge men I dated earlier this year and punch the call button.
When they pick up, I put on my best corporate girlie voice and propose an anonymous in-person interview for The Minute’s Love Today.
I tell them the topic is an exposé on why we stopped dating.
Around this point Ted interjects, informing them that he, too, is someone I stopped dating, and he will be joining us as a neutralizing party to help the interview along.
Eventually we figure out a day that works for the majority of them (a couple couldn’t make it, or didn’t pick up) and schedule the lot who are available back-to-back for this coming Sunday at my apartment.
September 7. Interview Schedule
9:00 a.m.—interview with Bruce
10:00 a.m.—interview with Sal
11:00 a.m.—interview with Ed
12:00 p.m.—lunch break
1:00 p.m.—interview with Cedric
2:00 p.m.—interview with Rob
3:00 p.m.—interview with Neil
4:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.—draft the article
I text the WWU and let them know we’re going to have to reschedule this Sunday’s meeting so I can write the first draft with Ted.
It’s going to be a long fucking day.
It’s 8:40 p.m. when I finally hop onto my bed and reopen my earlier message thread with Reed.
Me [8:46 a.m.]: Proud of you Rome Overland.
Reed [9:00 a.m.]: thank you <3 it was torturous keeping it from you this weekend.
I smile at his response before shooting off a new text.
Me: any chance you’re near a bed?
Reed: Two minutes