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“You’re fired?”
“Haha, very funny,” he says. “What if?”
“As in, what if I get so sick of your shit, I fire you? Huh, not that sad, actually.”
“As in, what if she’s the love of your life and you just let her slip away and end up growing old alone?”
“I’m sure you’ll still be squatting in my house when I’m ninety.”
“Sad.”
“Yeah, it is. Goodbye.”
“Bye bro. Think about it. It’s not too late.”
“It’s not going to happen.” I hang up on him before he can say anything else. A second later, my phone buzzes and I see a text from him.
Gershwyn
What if?
He follows that with a gif of a toddler who looks like he’s about to cry.
That’s the son you’ll never have because you’re being a stubborn idiot.
Me
You just made my point for me, so thank you.
I stare at our exchange for a second, then shake my head. I don’t have to ask ‘what if’ because I already know. She and I are not meant to be, but only because she can do much, much better.
Instagram Reel: Hollywood Dish with Ferris Biltmore
The video starts with Ferris sitting outside at a coffee shop sipping a large drink in a to-go cup. When he lowers the cup, his upper lip has a frothy mustache. “Hello, beotches, I’ve been up all night to get you intel on what happened with our sexy sex god, Hudson, and his date who I’m dubbing Miss Match, as in she’s a total mismatch for a man that fine. Hence the Americano with a double espresso shot topped with an espresso foam. I’ve been sucking these babies back all day and I have no intention to stop now, so if you want to buy me a coffee for all the sacrifices I make on your behalf, hit the button below. Pulease and thank you.”
He has another sip, then says, “It took me until nearly six this morning, but I finally heard back from my landlord’s nephew’s girlfriend whose brother is a limo driver. No, not the limo from the now-infamous video of Hudson and Miss Match fleeing the opera at half-time. But someone who knows someone at that company and who managed to get a peek at the records for the night. Apparently, Hudson the Hottie dropped her off at home, and left immediately. And get this, it turns out Miss Match still lives with her parents!” Ferris bursts out laughing. “Even though, all signs point to the fact that she’s 35-years-old. OLD, people! Far too old for Hudson, who should be just about ready to settle down with some 24-year-old temptress who can make lots of perfect babies without worrying about her aging eggs. I’m too tired and wired to do a bunch of segments but because you bitches are so desperate, I’m going to do one, but it’ll be a good one.”
The words: Run, Hudson, Run! appear on the screen.
“Run, Hudson, run like hell! You have got to get away from this walking disaster. This, this queen of the geeks. This!” The words disappear only to be replaced by the photo of Allie after her Sour Puss shot. “Look, I don’t know what came over you last night. I don’t know if she went all Cosby on your ass and you didn’t know what you were doing, or maybe you were swept up in a whole Pretty Woman at the opera thing, or if this was some sort of Make-a-Wish thing, only for terminally pathetic women, but Hudson, honey, this has to stop. Now. Before she kills your reputation completely and you never get to pork another supermodel again in your life. Think it through, Hudson, and run. Seriously. Run like hell.”
The Next Day
Well, this blows. Allie has completely gone into professional astrophysicist-mode. She can barely look at me, and when she does, the pain in her eyes is a clear indicator that she spent way too many hours reading all the shitty things people said about her on the internet. She’s given Frank a quarter of a million recording snippets to analyze and the two of us have been sitting next to each other for the last hour as she goes over the highlights in her Astronomy 101 textbook for me. It’s awkward and uncomfortable and hard as hell to be so close to her without getting to touch her. I’ve been doing my best to focus on what she’s saying because I know it’s important and I owe it to her, but I just can’t concentrate. Not with this whole shitstorm happening.
The rest of the people on her team aren’t exactly helping either. There’s been a lot of winking and giggling and ‘Hey, you two certainly seemed to be having a good time on Saturday,’ and honestly, each comment makes me feel a little smaller. Not because I don’t want people to know I’m attracted to her, but because this whole thing blew up in her face before we could even figure out what was going on between us. And I wound up doing the last thing I meant to do—hurting her.
“Are you sure you don’t want to write some of this down?” she asks.
“No, keep going and I’ll read through it on my own later, and take notes then,” I answer. “I don’t want to waste your time.”
“Okay, well, I get the feeling you’re having trouble concentrating. Do you need a break?” She finally looks at me, her beautiful brown eyes killing me.
“I think we need to talk about what happened,” I say. “I have a terrible feeling you went down the rabbit hole after I dropped you off.”
Shrugging, she looks back down at the book. “I couldn’t care less what a bunch of idiots hiding behind their keyboards have to say about me. What I do care about is my project and getting you ready for your movie. And I’m going to lose an entire day going up to Black Creek on Thursday, so let’s stay focused on the matter at hand, okay?”
Ugh. Being in a vehicle alone together for a total of ten hours is going to suck hard if I can’t fix this. “Allie?—”
