Page 23 of The Wedding Season
“Ohhh. A girl? You were afraid it would make you look like a sissy?” I felt a twinge of jealousy and immediately despised myself forit.
“No. I didn’t want her to know that I immediately read it when I found out she likedit.”
Oh.
Ohhhh…
Ohshit.
Even more disturbing—after I’d left that day—he texted me that I’d left my pen at his place, in case I was looking for it. I wrote back that he could keep it. He immediately responded with:I gave her my heart and she gave me apen.
Spit-take!
I dropped my phone. It was a Lloyd Dobler line fromSay Anything. I didn’t respond. I didn’t know what tosay.
After a few minutes, he wrote:Calm down, it’s a line from SAYANYTHING.
I immediately wrote back:OBVIOUSLY I KNOW THAT IT’S ONE OF MY ALL-TIME FAVORITEMOVIES
He wrote:I SAID CALM DOWN,DUFFY
I didn’t respond. I didn’t want to start having text conversations with him. He was infringing upon my literary and cinematic love life and it unnerved me to noend.
Perhaps I am morecomfortable when I’m being unnerved by him, if that makes sense, and he’s damn good at unnerving me. I finish touching up my make-up and open the bathroom door. Maya hasn’t even showered, but she’s changed into a similar kind of floral dress, so we look adorable together, only she looks like a trillion bucks and I look like maybe two hundred-fiftybucks.
She smiles at me. “You looksopretty. Thanks for letting me come with you. This is fun. Are you havingfun?”
“Woohoo.”
“Are you excited to see your Emersonfriends?”
“Yes. But it’ll be weird, when they find out that Scott and I are workingtogether.”
She waves her hand, dismissively. “It’s only weird to you. You need to have fun tonight. Promiseme.”
“I will certainly endeavor to havefun.”
“Promiseme.”
“Okay, Ipromise.”
“And by fun I mean sex with your writingpartner.”
“Oh comeon.”
“You come on. What’s the worst that couldhappen?”
“There are so many worst things that could happen, I don’t even know where tostart.”
“The worst that could happen is he isn’t as good at sex as you’re afraid he will be, and he will have no power over you and you’ll finish the script, and sell it for tons of money. Or you won’t sell it and you’ll have to move back to Idaho and you’ll never have to see him again. And honestly, the script will sell or not sell either way whether you fuck him or not, so you may as well get it overwith.”
“Well gosh, when you put it thatway…”
I am about to tell her that I have already gotten a taste of his skills, because I hate not telling her things, but there’s a knock on the door. Maya says she’ll get it, because of course it’sSam.
They look so cute and happy together I could cry. They’re even color-coordinated—her indigo blue dress matches his tie—and they swear it was unplanned. Maya keeps messing up his hair, and he’s getting annoyed. He messes up her hair. She slaps his handaway.
“Do not touch myhair!”
