Page 44 of The True Love Experiment

“To be fair, you’ve been busy. There’s this whole reality show we’re planning.”

“But maybe that’s a convenient excuse.” She picks up a small piece of seaweed and drags it across the sand. “Every idea I come up with fizzles before I can even get started.”

“I don’t pretend I understand what this is like, but is it something you’ve been able to talk about in therapy?”

“Oh, for sure,” she says. “But I got so tired of going over the same thing and not getting anywhere. I would do little writing exercises, but they felt pointless.” She stares out at the water for a long moment. “I know I’ll be okay if I don’t write again. I know that the death of my writing wouldn’t be the death ofme. But I miss that me. I liked that me, and I’m not sure how to find her. Focusing on it in therapy started to make it worse, if that makes sense.”

“It does.”

“I’m normally pretty self-aware and can work through most things, but this—” She shakes her head. “It’s got me beat. I’d all but lost interest in any man until yo—” She pauses, and then squints out at the ocean. “Until, you know, the show.”

Until you, she was going to say. My heart twists uncomfortably.

She clears her throat. “But yeah, love stories. My current brain block.”

“Maybe your brain needs to live one for a change.”

“Look at you, producer.” She smiles over at me. “Bringing us full circle.”

I watch her tilt her face to the sky, eyes closed as she takes a deep breath. Finally, tonight, our last night before I endeavor to help her fall in love with someone else, I can admit it.

I am falling in love with her.

“What can I say,” I murmur. “I try.”

twenty-oneFIZZY

I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a talker, but I’m good with silence, too. Jess and I have spent many a workday sitting across from each other in productive quiet. I love the gentle moments with Juno on my couch, her little head in my lap while she reads. I love the big-sky serenity of a hike with my brother, Peter, or the leisurely peace of mah-jongg with my mother. Truth is, you’ll never meet a book lover who hates the quiet.

But after the easy, overlapping flow of our conversation tonight, this silence with Connor is heavy. Side by side we sit in the sand, our legs stretched out before us, toes wiggling up at the sky. He’s rolled his pants up, exposing feet, ankles, the lower half of his calves. His legs are tanned and lightly dusted with hair, muscled. The way he leans back on his hands, face tilted to the night breeze… it’s like he’s offering his body up for worship. That geometric, superhero chest. The long, corded neck, the bunching density of his shoulders. I feel my brain shrieking all the breathless, desperate thoughts, likeYour body is unreal

andI want your hands on me

andFuck me into the sand.

But what surprises me is that the silence has quieter thoughts, too. Things likeI really like you

andYou’re sort of my favorite person lately

andI want to be excited for tomorrow but all I can think is how I don’t want tonight to end.

Of course, this final thought lands just as Connor coughs into his fist, breaking the stillness. “So,” he says, and smiles shyly over at me in a way that acknowledges how heavy things just got, how there is something hot and tangible in the air between us but maybe if we talk over it, it will dissipate. “You ready for tomorrow?”

Inhaling sharply, I sit up straighter. Right. Get yourself together, Fizzy. “I am. I hope I can sleep tonight. I really don’t want to show up all puffy and shadowed tomorrow.”

“I was going to say,” he says, smiling, “you’ve appeared very calm for someone who’s about to be on television.”

“I won’t deny that I’ve had regular facials since I agreed to do this and invested in some new gravity-defying bras.” He laughs. “But I’ve also done so many signings where people have taken and posted photos of me from awful angles, there’s really no point pretending to be a supermodel now.”

“You don’t have to pretend,” he says. “You always take my breath away.”

We both go still, staring straight out at the surf while the echo of his words spirals around us. My pulse goes quiet for a moment and then it roars to life, a walloping throb in my neck. And I can almost feel it in him, the way he wishes the waves would stretch up here and wash that moment away.

“Well—so. Anyway.” His voice bursts out now, jazz hands, distracting. “You seem more excited for the first day of filming, at least. That’s good.”

I’m still raw from his declaration. Connor is an oak tree, and the more time I spend with him the more I register how frequently I feel like a stray leaf blown at the whim of my impulsive decisions and my roller-coaster job and even my own moods.You always take my breath away, he said. He doesn’t do casual, isn’t good at it. Of course he isn’t. Unfortunately, that’s partly why I like him. He moves steadily, with intent, through the world. I am so drawn to him it feels magnetic.

“I am excited,” I admit carefully. “And I know you did an amazing job with casting. That said, I hope there’s a contestant in the group who makes me feel even a fraction of what I’m feeling tonight.”

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