Page 23 of The Likelihood Of You

Does this person want to know me? Or do they want to know Jacob Emerson? The man in front of them, or the man on the screen? It's the same questions I repeat in my head whenever I meet someone. Kick-started by none other than Darcie James, the night she slipped into my life, way before I’d joined the big leagues.

You could tell she was a small-town girl just by looking at her. Her mousy blonde bob hadn’t known platinum highlights, her body looked as though it was trying to hide away in the dark corners of the bar we were in, and her clothes weren’t grabbing anyone’s attention, apart from mine.

I spent the whole night working up the courage to say something to her. Say anything to her. It took a whiskey or three and a pep talk from Nate to finally shuffle my feet over to her, and once I’d learned her name, that was where they remained the rest of the night.

She was the definition of sweet. She had glacier-blue eyes that held you captive and a charming voice that confirmed my suspicions about where she’d come from- one that charmed me quicker than I could wrap my head around. Before I knew it, she was telling me the names of her siblings and the town in Georgia she’d grown up in as she lay beside me in my bed the next morning.

I think I fell for her that morning, and at the time, it felt like nothing more than my life progressing. This was the next chapter. A moment I’d anticipated. But what it really was, was a plot twist, one that was never meant to belong in a love story.

We started seeing each other shortly after that night; she confessed to me that she wanted to be an influencer, creating content for her followers and sharing her life for the world to see. It shocked me, at first, given how timid she was around people. I don’t think I understoodthat at the time; I don’t think I get the appeal of sharing all the intimate parts of your life for strangers to judgenow, but she was passionate about it, so naturally, I supported her.

Her online influence plateaued after about six months, which gutted her, I think. I was sad for her, too, especially because by that point, I’d already bookedDefendersand was already getting attention from the world.

Looking back now, without the rose-coloured glasses, I can see that was when the light bulb went off in her head.

It was then that I saw her switch. She went from a girl with no motivation, to a girl with an agenda. A mouse, to a lioness. Suddenly, I was the main subject of her socials. I was the branding she stuck with. And it worked. Her accounts bloomed like they were flowers blossoming after a drought.

And before I could so much as ask her about it, I was one-half of the internet’s IT couple, and I wasn’t sure how to feel about it.

No, I knew how I felt about it. I fucking hated it. But after seeing how happy it made her? I kept my mouth shut.

What hurt most was how I’d told her I hated the lack of privacy that happened with a career like mine, and how I wanted our bubble to be made up of only us and not the whole world. But once she saw what I did for her career, my voice, the one she said she could listen to forever, she was deaf to.

I feel my eyes start to blur as I stand in front of the windows, so much so that skyscrapers have doubled, and there are now two crescent moons shining down on the city. I shake my head and hold it in my hands, squeezing my eyes and reminding myself that tormenting my brain with what she did to me wasn’t the way I was going to getover it. Replaying what she said to me the day I found out her plan was only going to deteriorate me again, my body, and leave my heart just as fragile and delicate as the day she left.

I blow out a breath and head towards the kitchen, pushing open the door and making headway for the refrigerator. I pull open the silver door and reach for the bottle of merlot I’d opened a few nights ago, grabbing a glass from the dishwasher and pouring in the wine, that I’m hoping will wipe my thoughts of Darcie and take the edge off the most Monday Monday I’ve had in a while.

My feet, still dragging under themselves, take me to my bedroom, where I place my glass on the bedside cabinet and sit in the middle of the bed, my back resting against the ivory cushioned headboard and my legs stretched out in front of me. My phone dings from my pocket, and I pull it out, read the name on the text,Charlie, before launching it to the bottom of the bed and instead find the book that I’d shoved under my pillow this morning and skimming it to the page I’d bookmarked.

I don’t know why Charlie insists on saving his lectures for after his workday had finished; almost like being on my ass for eight hours a day wasn’t enough, like he’ll implode if he doesn’t find another way to bully me and play it off as keeping my career on a steep trajectory. So I ignore him.

I pick up where I left off in my book, but after reading the first few lines, it becomes clear that my mind is elsewhere, because just as Darcie leaves my mind, she leaves the door open just enough for Florence to waltz right on in.

I still don’t think I’ve processed what she confessed to me earlier, like I was taking on grief that wasn't mine to hold onto.

Howcould someone bring themselves to cheat on her? To cheat on anyone, for that matter. I’d been cheated on in high school, and while I was young and probably feeling things that I confused for true love, it still fucking sucked. But I imagine for Florence, walking in on what she saw probably broke her heart more than any heart ever should. Did her fiancé not realise who he was about to marry?

That five-letter word makes the merlot in my stomach want to shoot right back up and make my white bed sheets look like a scene from a slasher movie. And I don’t know why I stick on that thought for as long as I do, or why it was setting off every alarm bell in my brain. Perhaps it was because I didn’t like the idea that she was about to marry someone.

If there’s anything to be grateful for about this whole thing, it’s that she caught them. Just imagine if she hadn’t. What if she got stuck in traffic? Or if her fiancé was able to sneak her sister out somehow, leaving her clueless and still completely in love. She would be married by now. Dressed head to toe in the perfect shade of white, with a ring on her finger, vows exchanged, and a three-tier cake being sliced. I feel the merlot start rising again.

I try to get my mind to focus on the words in the book before I fall down the rabbit hole my brain is luring me to, but they might as well be written in Italian, because I’m not absorbing them. I’m just thinking about her. That sweet, rosy face of hers, eyes that are my new favourite colour, a laugh that I wanted on repeat, and a body I wanted to explore, standing at the foot of her bed, those emerald eyes all glassy and face drained of all its colour, watching her waking nightmare bounce around underneath her sheets.

As if she could sense that I needed a distraction, my eyes ping up from the pages of my book, spotting the cream bundle of fur charging toward the bed. Bagel jumps up onto the covers, knocking the book out of my hand, and clearly very happy to see me home.

When I got this apartment, the building manager made it very clear that pets weren’t allowed, much to my disappointment. But once I showed him a photo of baby Bagel and explained how I’d had my eye on her for a few weeks, he caved.

She’s a golden retriever…and she’s huge. When she jumps up on the bed like she’s doing now, it’s like being ambushed by a polar bear. But a very sweet one.

“Hey, little lady!” I coo to her, trying to tame her excitement.

I have no idea why I chose the name Bagel. I think I Googled ‘Good Names For Dogs’, and somewhere in the mix was Bagel. I do love it, though, especially since we live in New York: the land of the best bagels in the country.

She's worth every cent I spend on her. I’ll talk to her about my day, and she’ll sit there and take in every single word. Or she could just be waiting for me to finish talking so I’d feed her, but I like my interpretation of things better.

But as useful as she is, she barely manages to blur the image of Florence that’s still burning in my mind.

It was as if there was no topic I could focus on better than I did with her. Every inch of her always seemed to make its way back to the very front of my mind. There’s no doubt that I like her. It’s stupid how much I like her. It’s a crazy thing to even admit, given today was the first time I’d spent a significant amount of time with her. Butsomething about her draws me in, telling all my natural hesitations to back off and let me bask in her energy.

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