Page 24 of Love in Focus

Now, as I’m dancing in the middle of the dance floor with my friends, I realize that what James said was a “normal transition” isn’t normal at all. At least, it wasn’t for me. The heart-pumping music… flashing strobe lights… I still love all these things now, as much as I did in my early twenties.Thisis who I am. Not board games and escape rooms.

I resent James. But if I’m being honest, I resent my past self, too. Why didn’t I speak up for myself more? Why did I let a man dictate what I should or shouldn’t do? He stillrandomly decided he didn’t love me anymore and replaced me with a Victoria’s Secret model look-alike.

Never again, I think.Fuck men!

We’re now all bouncing to a more recent EDM song with a hammering beat. The music crescendos, and the DJ throws up his arms. Smoke blows up into the air, and I’m momentarily blinded by lasers as confetti rains down from the ceiling.

Kiara and Val cheer, and I scream, for the first time in ages, with unreserved delight.

On Monday morning, Evelyn asks me to come into her office.

“We’ve managed to secure two couples for the first set of interviews,” she says when I walk in. “With Christmas coming up in a couple weeks, it’d be great if you and Celeste could interview them and submit everything by the next Monday, before the holiday. Things will get undoubtedly tricky to schedule around Christmas, but like I mentioned in my emails, we should be fine as long as we finish all the interviews by mid-January so we can take the rest of the time to edit and transmit for the print edition. Also…”

I tense up. “Also?”

Evelyn glances around and lowers her voice. “It’s not one hundred percent confirmed yet, but Citrine is talking aboutmaking ‘Modern Love in Focus’ the cover story for the February issue. They just want to see a draft or two from you and Celeste before they make the final decision.”

My skin buzzes with excitement. My first cover story after seven years of working for the magazine. This is huge.

Back when James and I lived together, we had a stack of printedHorizonissues with his cover stories—because luxury real estate, his focus, apparently brought in more print sales. Meanwhile, most of my work has appeared in the digital edition only, since the magazine only prints stories that the higher-ups believe will be the most profitable.

“By the way,” Evelyn continues. “Speaking of Celeste, you’ve met up with her already, right? Just to make sure you two are on the same page?”

Oh, we’ve met up all right.

“Yes,” I say. That’s the most I can say without giving away anything in my voice.

“And it wasn’t too… awkward?”

I grit my teeth and give Evelyn a forced smile.

“Ah.” She raises her eyebrows at me. “Well. Thank you for being willing to work with her. I’ll email you all the details shortly so you can set things up for the first two interviews.”

“Got it, thanks, Evelyn.”

Back at my desk, I read over her email with all the logistics. Most of it is straightforward, and the hardest part is going to be conveying all this information to Celeste.

I start composing a new email message.

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Subject: First Set of Interviews

Hi, Celeste. Sorry again about what happened over the weekend. We got our first set of interviews…

I stop. I’m being too casual. Since I don’t know how private our work emails are, I can’t risk sounding so suspicious.

I delete everything and try again.

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Subject: First Set of Interviews

Hi, Celeste. We got our first set of interview assignments. See the below forwarded message from Evelyn for more info. Are you available to do the first set of interviews this week?

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