Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
Over the past few days, Mom and I have settled into a new normal. She mostly sleeps. I mostly panic about my thesis. When I’m not working, we watch movies together.
Yesterday, she sat out on our tiny patio, knees touching the rotting wood railing, and pontificated about how beautiful the view was.
Our view is basically just a tiny yard covered in weeds.
Every time I look at it, I’m reminded of my failures and how behind I am on everything. I’m happy that she’s happy, though.
Bright moments come in the form of texts from Cosmos.
Cosmos:
I just went into your mom’s room on instinct, only to find an 80-year-old man having his catheter changed. I blame you for that haunting image. I was missing you and in my tired state, I forgot you weren’t there anymore.
My heart flutters, pulse picking up. He misses me. Really? Struggling to believe that, I choose to ignore that part of the message and focus on the other part.
Don’t you see things like that every day?
Cosmos:
Yeah. Not much about the human body shocks me anymore—which should tell you how horrifying this was.
I might need another image to erase it from my mind
Cheeky. But I can’t help smiling. I take a picture of the sandwich I’m eating for lunch and send it to him. He replies with a laughing emoji.
Cosmos:
Now, I’m hungry for two things
I doubt he’s thinking what I am, but I’m not sure how else to read his message, and the warmth that crawls through me at the innuendo makes me bring my water glass to my cheeks.
I stare at the image on my phone, tracing Cosmos’ face on the screen with my thumb. He’s holding up a book, open to a poem by Hafez, a Persian poet I’ve heard of, but have never read. It’s beautiful.
He just sent the picture, and while I love having a photo of him, seeing that he’s in the garden with a book of poetry has me concerned. I know he reads poetry after difficult surgeries. I’m just about to ask if he’s okay when another text comes through.
Cosmos:
No one died. In case you’re worried. I just couldn’t stop thinking about you, and thinking about you made me remember this poem.
Sometimes he seems a little too smooth to be real, too much of a romantic for me to believe what he’s saying. But his words still make me swoon.
Cosmos:
How’s the writing coming?
Slow. I’m having trouble finding the motivation to work on my thesis. The story just isn’t exciting for me.
Cosmos:
What gets you excited?
You. I bite my lip. Definitely can’t say that. Since he already knows my deep dark secret about writing a romance, I take the risk to be honest. Even if it’s not as honest as the first answer that popped into my head.
I guess the romance I’m working on.
Cosmos:
Use that as motivation for your thesis. Revise a chapter. Write a chapter. And let me know when you get to the good stuff in the romance.
What do you mean by the good stuff?
Cosmos:
I think you know.
You just want me to write something spicy so I’ll be all hot and bothered when I see you next, is that it?
I send the text without really thinking. It’s not like me at all, but it’s easier to be flirty, and feel sexy, with a screen between us.
Cosmos:
You caught me
Or maybe I just want to read how you’d write romance—a cheat sheet
There’s no way I’m letting him read this book. Just the thought feels way too vulnerable. The little bit he read already was mortifying enough.
I’m not my character. Fiction is fiction.
Cosmos:
Maybe. But all fiction comes from life.
There’s truth in his statement, but I want to push against it. If all fiction comes from life, what do these stories say about me? It’s a question I’m not sure how to answer. One I definitely don’t want Cosmos asking.
I think again about the conversation in class a few weeks ago about only writing what you know. I’m not writing what I know when I work on my romance novel. So much of it is purely imagined. And I think maybe that’s part of the fun.
Before I can think how to respond, another text comes through from Cosmos.
Cosmos:
I still can’t believe you’re writing two books at once. You’re incredible.
The praise makes me squirm with discomfort. I set the phone aside and don’t respond.
I couldn’t sleep last night. Cosmos dominated my thoughts, which drove me to get up and work on my romance novel. I finished it at two in the morning, giddy with what I’d done. It won’t win any awards, but it makes me smile, and that’s something my thesis novel never did.
The second it’s done, I want to share the accomplishment with someone—specifically Cosmos, since he’s the only one who knows I’m writing it.
I probably shouldn’t be texting him at 2am, but I know he’s on shift at the hospital until Wednesday, so I take a chance.
Doctors are up all hours of the night, right?
I finished the romance novel
Cosmos:
That’s amazing! Will you let me read it?
His response comes so quickly I almost drop my phone in surprise.
Cosmos:
Or at least, let me reenact the spicy parts with you? I hear writers do that to help with accuracy ;)
My whole body lights up like a firecracker.
There’s only one sex scene in the book, and I think I did a pretty good job keeping it tasteful and using it to develop the character arcs, but it’s still more graphic than anything I’ve ever written before.
It’s more graphic than anything I’ve ever imagined writing.
Secretly, I love it. It was my favorite scene to write.
I was writing it for myself, and I didn’t hold back.
I tried to channel my inner Kiara and my inner Aunt Joan, the two most sex-positive women I know.
They don’t know what it means to be embarrassed about sex.
Now, I channel them again.
The sex scene in the book happens on a beach… maybe our date on Wednesday should be there.
I second-guess myself as soon as I hit send. We’re an hour away from any beaches, and it’s still cold for May. We can’t spend hours in the car going to a beach just to reenact a sex scene. Especially not on a first date. What the hell was I thinking?
I consider deleting the text, but Cosmos’ already saw it. I can see the little blinking dots letting me know he’s typing a response.
Then, they vanish. There’s no response for a long time.
Embarrassment floods my body. Shame lectures me on being too much, taking things too far, not being able to read a room, even through a screen, especially through a screen.
Shit. Did I just ruin everything? It was bound to happen eventually, but I’d hoped it wouldn’t be so soon.
Setting down my phone, I go back to working on my thesis.
It’s the only way to survive the tsunami of emotions threatening to destroy me.
Unfortunately, working on my thesis involves staring at the cursed cursor and metaphorically hitting my head against my keyboard.
I still don’t know how to fix the end of this book.
Dr. Pataal doesn’t like the original ending. Frankly, neither do I.
Maybe I should just go back to sleep and hope by some miracle I’ll wake up more inspired in the morning. It could happen, right?