Page 77 of The Likelihood Of You

To be honest, being bed-bound wasn’t all that bad, especially when I got to be bed-bound in Jacob’s bed. It meant I could cough my lungs up and devour all the chicken soup that Julie and Fiona sent us home with, whilst gazing down at the buzzing city through the windows. And because the city had truly waved goodbye to fall and welcomed in the winter, I now get to witness my first N.Y.C snowfall from thewarmth of the heated blanket underneath me, with a hot water bottle clutched to my chest, the duvet moulded around my body, and the man who had just walked back into the room with two steamy cups of hot chocolate.

Ned Flanders style.

“I’m surprised you actually own a blowtorch to do the toasted marshmallow thing,” I confessed, scooting up so Jacob could slide his body up against my back, the position we’d adopted since this morning.

“I just hide it when you’re here. I don’t think I can trust you yet with anything that has the potential to burn down my apartment.” A laugh rushed through his nose, as I elbowed his steel chest softly.

“Has anyone ever told you that you’re really funny?” I asked, my stuffy head falling back onto his shoulder.

“Yeah, loads of people.”

“They lied.”

Waves of his hot breath tickled the side of my face as he laughed, my shoulders shaking from his chuckles. “Tosser.” He grunted before kissing my temple and leaning his head on mine, while I sipped away the chocolatey goodness that was thawing out my hands.

It’s been a week since we got back from Boston, and a week since I had to say goodbye to his Mom’s who I’d truly fallen in love with.

We stayed with them for a few more days than we had intended, thanks to Charlie’s reluctant help in freeing up some time in Jacob’s diary. And every second we spent there felt effortless. Like I’d been a part of their family for years, like Julie’s monopoly victory dance was something I’d seen a thousand times before, and the fish and chipsthey’d served for dinner one night to make me feel at home had been a tradition for so long we’d forgotten when it started.

It made me wonder how I’d survived without a normal family unit for so long.

All it took was one phone call with Nanna the morning after to remind me that I’d done just fine.

Julie and Fiona spent most of their time kindly showering me with all the useful tips and tricks they’d used when making Pins. I pushed the guilty thoughts aside as best I could, but they escaped from their holding cell in the bathroom later that night, in the form of tears and silent sobs, and I kicked myself for once again relying on others to do the dirty work I’d sworn to do myself.

Jacob caught me when I hurried back to his room, reminding me that I shouldn’t feel guilty for leaning on others from time to time. I let him believe that I agreed with him, but old habits die hard, you know.

The following morning, we talked about marketing tactics and business concepts that they’d used to help them make Pin’s the national sensation it is currently. I cornered all their advice into an empty corner of my brain, storing it away until the day my bakery plans were strong enough to rise from their laboratory bench and eventually come to life.

And thanks to the money I’d made working at the production lot, as well as how strict I’d become with grocery shopping and cutting down on my secret trips to The Rolling Pin, that day didn’t seem so far away anymore, which made my heart twirl and twinkle like a catherine wheel.

A lot of things in my life right now made my heart do that, and for once, I wasn’t questioning whether it was allowed to. The idea that a bakery of my very own wasn’t that far from my reach anymore was one of them; the view of the snowstorm I was letting my eyes go lazy in front of was another. The newest one, however, was that the rest of the world was clued up about me and Jacob…and they loved us.

The news that Jacob was seeing someone got out pretty quickly after we got back from Boston. The night we got back, we had a stampede of frantic calls, one from Charlie, who demanded we tell him the short version of our love story to pass onto the press for an official statement. Another from Addy, who wanted the extended version, and another from Nate, but he was more focused on getting Bagel back home after she’d taken over his life.

It turns out that in the time we were gone, we were trending on every platform imaginable, all thanks to photos Jacob’s high school buddies posted on their socials, one of a group selfie with us smiling in the background, another of us sitting at the table with pie jammed in our mouths. My favourite, though, was the solo selfie of Davey, with me and Jacob tucked away in the background, his head resting on top of mine, his arms wrapped around my waist, and me gazing up at him.

Well and truly exposing us to the world.

It may sound silly, but the thought of us going public and being seen by what felt like the population of the universe hadn’t ever occurred to me. It was so easy to lose sight of the fact that he was famous and adored by millions. Even while working on the set, I found myself paying attention to him, and instead drowning out the lights, cameras, and other Hollywood stars who were present. Nate and Addy were the same; they were my friends, not movie royalty. But after an hourof reading through the hashtags, tweets, and articles about us, it felt like his fame had finally caught up with me.

Luckily, the majority of what we read was positive. Some people thought I looked like a goddess, which Jacob confirmed when I showed him, by undressing me and leading me to the bedroom. Others gushed over how cute we looked together and how happy we seemed. One tweet, which came from a plus-size influencer I’d worshipped for years, said that our relationship was a beacon of reality for other girls who looked just like me.

She’d advocated for the acceptance of plus-size people in the media to have real-life storylines, because we were all sick of the fat girl’s only problem in her life being her weight, which is why I loved her so much. So seeing her using our relationship as a sign to say screw the stereotypical big girl fate, that we can only date other plus size people, and only fret about finding stores that stocked our sized clothes, made me feel so hopeful about our outing.

But obviously, the keyboard warriors left no corner of the internet untouched by their heinous opinions and pointless hate bombing. Somewhere along the miles I’d scrolled on my phone, I came across a thread named ‘JACOBXDARCIE’, and knew I’d stumbled on what I’d feared the most. I hardly read the first three comments before deleting them from my search history and putting them on the first flight out of my memory. I knew better than to keep reading; what was the point in ruining this amazing, once-in-a-lifetime moment with the useless opinions of others? There was none. Simple.

Although seeing Darcie’s name thrown about so casually bugged me, it didn’t concern me. It was impossible for these people to know the real reason for her and Jacob’s breakup; of course, they would saythey hoped they were back together. What surprised me was that there were still those who were willing to praise her.

No one stays cancelled forever, I reminded myself. I just hoped that whatever lesson she had to learn from all this had already rung its dismissal bell in her head.

“What are your plans for today?” Jacob asked, redirecting my attention to him.

“Oh, the usual, work on finalising the potential menu for the bakery, finish decorating the gingerbread men, wallow in how stupid it was to watch a thunderstorm naked, and then scour every property website in the city and not find one decent space to get this bakery show on the road.” I sighed. “What about you?”

“Well, after I distract you in the kitchen and steal another one of those brownies you made yesterday,” He said, sitting up against the headboard, allowing me to fall further against him, before leaving my now empty mug on the bedside table. “I was thinking maybe we could do that last one together.”

I tilted my head backwards, and laughed at how funny he looked upside down. “You want to help me look for spaces? I thought you had those line changes to run through?” For the rom-com he’s filming in the new year.

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