Page 44 of Be Your Anything
At night, I like to leave those doors open, let the sound of the waves crashing lull me to sleep. It’s the best lullaby nature can provide, and I always struggle to doze off when I’m traveling because I don’t have that sound.
I’ve lived here by myself for a long time, my mother coming and going when I was younger, her job as an agent for a record label dominating her life and making her job as a mother come in at a very distant second place.
The truth is that, even though I surround myself with people all the time—friends, strangers, partiers, fans—most of my life has been spent alone, not having to worry about anyone but myself.
That’s all different now. Not only do I have Hannah to think about, there’s Ivy as well.
And if I’m going to make Ivy a priority like I’ve been trying to do with Hannah, I know learning sign language is going to be a big part of that, a big part of getting to know her.
I crawl into bed, my belly full of pesto chicken and salad and cookies, my head continuing to brim with ideas for how I can make things better.
The last thought on my mind before I finally doze off is whether Lennon should be a priority, too.
CHAPTER9
LENNON
Shit like today makes me wish I had never accepted this job in the first place.
I bust my ass in this position even though I absolutely loathe the people in my office who make everything a popularity contest or a who-has-more-money contest, always trying to see who is the most connected.
I hate it.
But that means days like today are completely my own fault, because I’m choosing to be here, day in and day out, actively choosing an environment where I have to work with Ellison MariefuckingTillman.
My mortal enemy and the girl who coined the nickname I despised all through high school.
Sure, I got the normal things thrown my way.
Airhead. Gossip. Trust fund baby, though if that isn’t the pot calling the kettle black, I don’t know what is.
Those names only bothered me a little bit, because they’re mostly true. Iama bit of an airhead sometimes. Idoenjoy gossip. And Iwillinherit somewhere around four hundred million dollars someday, along with multiple companies, an intensive real estate portfolio, and a ridiculous amount of private equity and personal property.
But I never took it that seriously because, if you’re going to survive in this world, you can’t freak out every time someone decides to step on you to try to make themselves feel better.
That was, until sophomore year of high school when Ellison and I were partnered together for an English lit project and, on the day of our presentation, I forgot everything.
I didn’t forget all of mymaterials, like left them at home or in my car. For some reason, that day, I showed up on campus with all of my stuff, and when I stood up in front of the class, my mind went completely blank.
I’ve never been comfortable with the whole public speaking thing, never understand the girls who wanted to be in front of cameras with the public eye constantly upon them.
And that day? I was just…terrified. Scared stupid.
Literally.
I couldn’t remember anything I’d practiced to recite about censorship and banned books in American history, about their impact on society today and the value systems that determined which books wereliteratureand which weretrash.
Of course it all came flooding back to me once it was over, but for those ten mortifying minutes when I had to stand in front of the class next to Ellison as she tried to save our grade, I felt like the biggest idiot in the world.
It was the worst grade I’ve ever received, and the only reason I didn’t fail is because Ellison delivered her half perfectly, trying to step in and save the day in the face of my epic failure and complete mental meltdown.
But that was when it started. The new nickname.
Ditzy Day.
I think a lot of people were too afraid to use it. Fucking with a Roth isn’t something that typically bodes well for your family, but that’s more my mother’s doing than mine.
But that name somehow spread like wildfire, and Iknowit was Ellison who started it.
