Page 7 of You Will Never Be Me

Aspen had the safety sensors installed the year the twins started walking. She was terrified that they might get squished under the garage door. I had laughed at her then, calling her a paranoid helicopter parent, but hey, I have to admit, I’m not laughing now. Or rather, I am laughing now, because look who just got inside your garage, Aspen? There are two doors in the garage—one leading straight into the house, which is locked, and the other leading into the backyard, which is unlocked. Since I haven’t acquired the skills to pick door locks, I choose to go out into the backyard.

And now what? I feel ridiculous. For a few moments, I stand there in Aspen’s magazine-worthy backyard, frozen. Her beautiful pool shimmers before me, so utterly inviting in the LA heat. Before our falling out, I used to come here every day and plunge into the pool with Luca. His face would light up as he splashed around in the clear blue water with Sabbie. The memory cuts at me, and I have to look away from the pool.Maybe I can go inside through the patio doors.I try them, but they’re locked as well, and I don’t want to set off any home alarms. It would be très awkward if Aspen had to rush home because an alarm went off and found me in the middle of her house.

With a sigh, I plop down on one of the lounge chairs. There’s a damp towel scrunched up on the lounge chair with a print of Princess Elsa fromFrozen. Probably Elea’s. She’s a hard-core Elsa fan. Has an Elsa everything—lunch box, water bottle, even underwear. I smile sadly—god, how I miss the girls—and pick up thetowel to hang it up neatly over the back of the chair. It’ll get moldy otherwise. But then I freeze. Because there, underneath Elea’s towel, is an iPad. Presumably hers. I pick it up and hit the Home button. It asks for a swipe code, and I figure out quickly that the swipe code is an E. I’m in.

As expected, there are all the usual apps. The kid-friendly educational games, all of them shouting about how they promote STEM. I swipe again, feeling stupid for snooping inside a kid’s iPad. WhatamI doing? But then I tap on the Calendar and freeze. Holy shit. They have a family calendar. Everything is connected. Everyone’s schedule is spelled out clearly, in painstaking detail.

There’s Ben’s work stuff, the houses he’s showing, the chores he needs to do, the twins’ extracurriculars, Sabine’s pediatrician appointments, but most importantly, there’s Aspen’s schedule. Aspen’s meetings with potential sponsors, with fellow influencers, with photographers. Times and dates and locations. Notes on each one. Hand shaking, I go back to the home screen, and this time, I tap on Instagram. It opens, and I stop breathing.I’m in Aspen’s account.

I have access to everything. Her drafts. Her scheduled posts. Her DMs. And I know then, clear as lightning, that the universe has decided to give me this one. Because I have taken the back seat long enough. I’ve been in her shadow long enough. I’ve endured enough of her subtle patronizing digs.

Things are about tochange.

4

MEREDITH

Hold up. I can sensethe judgment seething from you. You’re thinking:What kind of monster steals a CHILD’S iPad?First of all, I’m not stealing it. I’m borrowing it. Second of all, Elea (and Noemie, and Sabine) is my goddaughter, and if I asked her to lend me her iPad, I’m one hundred percent sure she’d say yes. In fact, she would insist that I take it, because she knows that would annoy her mom. Third of all, I think you need context. You’re sitting there thinking I’m this horrible jealous bitch who can’t handle her best friend’s success, and that’s not at all the case. Let me paint a picture.

Eight Years Ago

With my help, Aspen very quickly realized that there was, in fact, no future for her in music. We quickly became close enough to each other to have regular sleepovers at my place. She shared aone-bedroom in Culver City with three other girls, whereas I at least had my own place: a studio in Glendale. It was during one of these sleepovers that we took a deep dive into her YouTube channel. I pointed out that five thousand subscribers in two years wasn’t good enough to cut it—wasn’t going to get her noticed by a record label. To my surprise, Aspen agreed.

I very quickly learned that Aspen is one of the most agreeable people I’ve ever known. She’s a compulsive agree-er. At first, I found it a bit off-putting, but now, a year into our friendship, I’ve grown to appreciate it. Unlike most of the people I’ve gotten to know in LA, Aspen is low drama—happy to go along with most of my suggestions, even when they contradict hers. Truly happy, not an “I’mfine” happy. Being friends with her is like paddling in the kiddie pool: safe and predictable. I do not hate it. It’s why, when I was invited to a huge influencer event in Las Vegas, I took her along as my plus-one. The event went as expected: lots of photos and videos were taken, and I signed with two more sponsors while Aspen looked on with naked admiration.

We spend a lot of the drive from Vegas trying to figure out her niche. I’m huge on Instagram already, with over three hundred thousand followers (“I can’t evenimaginewhat it must be like to have a hundred thousand followers!” Aspen squeals. I give her a humble smile in return, my insides glowing, vibrating with glee at her open admiration), but Aspen has foolishly neglected Insta in favor of YouTube and Facebook. Thanks to me, she’s started up an Insta account, but nearly a year in and she’s gained fewer than ten thousand followers.

“I think I’m just not cut out for fame,” Aspen sighs, gazing out at the desert.

“Bullshit. Look at you, you’re beautiful. Of course you’re cut out for fame. We both are. We just need to find your niche.”

Aspen props herself up on her elbow and gazes at me. “I don’t know, Mer, I’m not like you. You’ve got that…X factor.”

I snort. “Trust me. If you’d known me back in Ohio, you wouldn’t have said that. It’s just that I found my niche: beauty and fashion advice with some sass.” I wink at her, and she gives me a small smile.

For a while, neither of us speaks, lost in our own thoughts. I’m mulling over my success in Vegas, caressing the memories of me signing with my new sponsors, when Aspen says, “You know what strikes me about this place?”

“Huh?”

Aspen gestures at the lonely desert around us. “This huge stretch of nothingness.”

“What about it?”

“I mean, it’s literally an endless expanse of nothing between two major cities, isn’t that crazy?”

“Uh…” I shrug. The topic isn’t catching my interest, so I’m only half paying attention. “Sure, I guess.”

“There must be so many dead bodies buried out here. Anyone could just walk off the road, into the desert, and never be found,” Aspen murmurs.

“What the hell?”

Aspen gives me an apologetic smile. “Sorry, too creepy?”

“Uh, yeah? Why are you thinking of bodies in the desert? Geez.”

She laughs. “I guess sometimes my thoughts just go to dark places. Anyway, I love what you’ve done with your hair.”

“Really?” I take one hand off the wheel and primp my curls self-consciously. One of the many gifts I picked up at the event was a high-tech hair curler that promised me the world. “I think they’re a bit too tight.”

---