Chapter 5
Katie
We worked remotely for a week, collaborating on a Google Doc like we were hell-bent on pushing suggestion mode to its limits.
Like we were genuinely curious how many times a single sentence could be struck through, commented on, and recast before causing
the entire three-thousand-word block of text to go up in flames.
I cycled twice a day, ate peanut butter for every meal, sexted this guy I was seeing for the bare minimum of four minutes
each night, and cried myself to sleep. And then, on the first Monday in June, I got an email from Selma.
This outline is unacceptable, Katie. The reason I hired you as my intern in college, the reason I trusted you to start writing
for Meredith as soon as you graduated, was because you’ve always been an absolute dream to work with. I don’t know what’s
going on between you and Tyler—I noticed from his paperwork you’re both from the same town—but whatever it is, set it aside.
Get him up to speed and then get writing. I want a publishable manuscript, and I don’t want to discuss this arrangement with
either of you ever again.
And that, I suppose, was the start of it all. That was when Tyler McNally and I finally began to write a love story.