Page 20 of The Love Haters

“You don’t have to win a gold medal at the Olympics,” Beanie said. “You just need to master the dog paddle.”

It was, actually, kind of a good point.

Beanie, in fact, had lots of points that were good.

It was the most annoying—and secretly helpful—thing about her. She was the queen of self-help books. Pick any bookstore, I swear, and go to the self-help section—and Beanie had read them all. Read them, highlighted them, copied quotes onto little three-by-five cards. She had memorized Brené Brown’s entire body of work. She could recite Maya Angelou’s words of wisdom like they were Shakespeare’s. And after Lucas got famous, she’d forced me to read her favorite book by love gurus John and Julie Gottman—whose work overflowed with relationship advice gold.

None of which I could remember right now.

Except for this: strong relationships had to create aculture of appreciation.

A whole book, and that was all I’d retained: People in good relationships had to appreciate each other—say thank you, give compliments, notice what their partner was getting right—in ways that created a cushion of warmth and kindness that eased everything else.

Brilliant! Right? Super helpful! Or, at least, it would have been if Lucas had read the book. Or evennot been checking his TikTok DMswhile I was telling him about it.

I guess, even then, we were past the point where self-help could be helpful.

But the truth was, as much as I made fun of Beanie… she got more than a few things right.

“I haven’t even told you the worst part,” I said then, not sure I wanted to say it out loud.

Beanie picked up the phone to make eye contact. “What’s the worst part?”

“When Cole was running down the equipment list,” I said, “he said he was shipping the lightest camera to Key West for me.”

Beanie frowned. “Thelightestcamera?”

I nodded. “Because every single thing that goes onto a helicopter has to be weighed.”

Beanie tilted her head. “Why?”

“Because if helicopters try to carry too much weight, they will sink out of the sky.”

“So they have to—what? Tally up the weight of everything on board?”

“Exactly,” I said. “Equipment. Fuel. Rescue victims.”

But Beanie wasn’t getting it. “Why is this the worst part?”

“Because,” I said slowly, knowing it would be real after I said it out loud, “Iam one of the things that will be on board.”

Beanie’s eyes got wide as the statement hit. “You have to weigh yourself?”

I nodded and closed my eyes. “And then I have to announce the number to the pilot. In front of the whole crew. So he can add it to the total.”

“That can’t be right!” Beanie protested on my behalf. “We’re not living in a nightmare!”

“I am, apparently,” I said.

“There has to be a way around it.”

“I’m telling you,” I said, “I googled it. This is how it’s done. They have a preflight check before every mission, and any unspecified weight has to be… specified.”

Beanie winced. Then she said, “Okay.” Then, apparently unable to come up with anything else, she said the thing she always said when a problem was unsolvable. “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”

I closed my eyes. “I think it might actually kill me.”

Beanie sighed in solidarity. “That might actually be for the best.”

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