Page 18 of Unrealistic Expectations

Maybe she was both?

He didn’t know, but he certainly wanted to find out.

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Even though she’d looked up some basic information about Galvin’s ex, Jessica went back and forth about watching the video. It didn’t really matter what Kennedy had said about Galvin, but she felt as though she should at least look at the video for her own awareness. It would be pretty hard for people to believe that her love had rehabilitated Galvin—a concept that Jessica did not believe in regardless—if she did not know what she was rehabbing him from.

If she didn’t see it, she could at least say that she didn’t need to know what was in it because she knew the man that it was about. Every relationship was its own individual thing. Someone who behaved poorly with one partner could have a completely different experience with another. Or maybe the video had been a wake-up call that Galvin had needed to become a better boyfriend. It wasn’t as though Kennedy had accused him of anything that could even remotely be categorized as abuse, had she?

It was that question in her mind that nagged her as she tried and failed to move the furniture in the condo around so that it wouldn’t look quite so empty. By the end of that futile endeavor, she was sweaty and tired, but the question of whether Galvin was some sort of monster in disguise was like a cricket under the floorboard of her psyche. She couldn’t make it shut up.

She suddenly had a great deal of sympathy for people who came in with obsessions that they couldn’t rid themselves of. Of course she never judged people for their obsessive thoughts about the partner who’d made it clear that they didn’t want to be in a relationship or “the one that got away,” but she’d never been quite able to identify with the feeling. She’d never been obsessed before, and she probably wasn’t right now. It was just a weird time, during which she was considering something colossally stupid. The kind of thing that you only read about in romance novels—fake dating.

She finally got her computer out when she realized that part of the reason she couldn’t stop thinking about the video was rooted in Luke walking out without a true explanation. She didn’t want to be confused or caught unaware again. In fact, her mind wouldn’t let the Kennedy video go because it was actually something she could find and process. Luke had left her with nothing but the furniture she’d purchased for their life together, and her brain wasn’t ready to sort out her feelings about that yet.

It was probably why she had such a visceral attraction to Galvin right now. It was an intense thing that felt safe—well, safer—to feel compared to anything regarding the end of her relationship. Why obsess over the fact that you had to re-envision your entire future when you could obsess over what an infamous fuckboy that you were fake-dating for PR had done to deserve said infamy?

She clicked play and immediately felt insecure. She’d known a little bit about Kennedy from her previous internet search, but she’d never engaged with her content before. Jessica just wasn’t the target audience for tummy tea and sunless tanner. Instantly, she realized why Kennedy Mower made millions selling products to women who looked at her and felt like they were not enough.

Jessica had worked long and hard on her self-esteem. She’d had to, with a mother who had picked apart her appearance practically from the womb, but her inner work was no match for the fact that Kennedy Mower looked like a movie star, supermodel, and actual angel all wrapped into one.

The idea that this woman didn’t have whatever sauce it took to keep Galvin’s attention made her wonder if he needed vision correction. But then she started talking, and Jessica understood why he might grow tired of her.

It was not that the way she talked was bad or wrong. It was just very obvious that Kennedy was very young. Not jailbait young, but young enough that she and Galvin were not looking for the same things in life.

As Kennedy broke down the reasons why she’d only continued to date Galvin out of pity, and why she thought he needed a prescription for Viagra and that he lacked “creativity”—secondhand humiliation threatened to make Jessica pass out.

She could see why Galvin was messed up about this whole thing, and her heart went out to him. She was relieved that he hadn’t seemed to do anything truly manipulative or abusive, but she didn’t know that she could do anything for the poor man’s image.

She was also slightly less attracted to him, which filled her with relief. She would just have to remember how she’d felt watching this video every time Galvin tried to turn his charm on her. If she could do that, she wouldn’t be tempted to do anything stupid, like kiss him again.

CHAPTER TEN

Galvin was filled with confidence when he knocked on Jessica’s door a few evenings later. He was going to take her to the hottest restaurant in town, where they might be seen by people who knew him but did not know her. They were going to “soft-launch” their relationship on her Instagram page—no faces or tags, but some linked hands and maybe a photo in silhouette.

In a week or so, he would start Liking and Commenting on all of her posts about the book. His breakup with Kennedy had been featured on Who? Weekly, so hopefully the podcasters would pick up that he was in a new relationship when he and Jessica finally posted a selfie at their college reunion in a few weeks.

After that, they’d post a few more times, and then they would have an amicable breakup sometime after Jessica’s book went from frontlist to backlist.

At least that was Jessica’s plan. The more Galvin thought about her and how he felt when he was around her, the more he wanted to see if there was something beyond a tenuous friendship between the two of them. He was certain that she saw him as a bad candidate for a relationship, but he was up for the challenge.

He thought.

He certainly felt stupid standing outside her door with flowers. He got a weird look from a neighbor, and it made him doubt himself. He’d never doubted himself so much before, and he was having trouble following his therapist’s advice and viewing it as a good thing. Apparently, self-doubt was healthy, because questioning our own automatic assumptions led to greater self-awareness.

But it felt pretty fucking terrible.

He knocked again, wanting to steer clear of any more nosy neighbors. The last thing he wanted to do was make Jessica the victim of gossip among the people in her building. This scheme was supposed to make her life easier, not harder. If he made her life harder, she’d get rid of him the first chance she got. He could see her being ruthlessly efficient with her relationships, which kind of turned him on. But he also feared her.

She opened the door and looked between him and the bouquet of flowers for a long beat. He instantly regretted bringing them with him. It was weird, and it had felt weird when he was buying them. He should have listened to his gut.

“I’m sorry.” It was the only thing he could think to say. And he wanted to kick himself for it.

“Why are you apologizing?” she asked, and he got a sinking feeling that this was going to be one of the worst dates in history.

It was probably best to just be as transparent as he could be without revealing that he was treating this like a real date. “The flowers are too much.”

She scrunched her forehead in this adorable way that made him want to kiss her. “No, no, no.” She opened the door wider and motioned for him to come inside. “I just didn’t expect that.”

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