Page 38 of My Unscripted Life

“I can’t believe you think I wouldn’t,” I shoot back. “There’s just so much you’re not telling me about all that.”

“What can I tell you that can’t be dug up via Google?” Milo practically spits the words.

“That’s crap and you know it,” I reply.

“Excuse me?” Milo looks indignant.

“Don’t give me the poor tortured celebrity story. It’s all crap, as evidenced by your James Bond act at the diner. Isn’t all that about keeping who you really areoffthe Internet?”

He’s silent for a moment, and we both know I’m right. Sure, there’s a lot of information about him out there, but how much of it is reallytrue? I honestly have no idea. And faced with the fact that he’s less than an open book, Milo takes a deep breath, then launches into it.

“My album sales are flat, which is appropriate since so was my last album. I want to try something different, but the label wants more of the same old crap, because even a poorly selling Milo Ritter album still sells well. And they won’t leave me alone. I swear, I’m six steps away from rhyming ‘love’ and ‘dove’ just to get them off my back. And while we already talked about it, I think it bears repeating that my very famous ex-girlfriend very famously cheated on me with a very not-famous dude.”

I gape at him. “Wait, is it the cheating, or the fame of the dude that bothers you?”

“Both. Or neither. I don’t know, it’s like I didn’t know who I was without her. I’m supposed to bethe guy,and then she goes off and hooks up with some rando.”

It’s not the answer I was hoping for. What I wanted to hear was something closer toLydia’s a she-devil and we were never meant to be together to begin with. The cheating was a blessing in disguise, and I’m happy to be rid of her forever and ever, amen.But instead, he’s telling me his biggest problem with the cheating was that it was a blow to hisego.It’s all been so thoroughly set on fire that I feel like I need to flee the scene.

“I can’t tell if you’re not who I thought you were, or if you’reexactlywho I thought you were,” I whisper. Then I turn on my heel and go.

A door slams.

MOM

Dee? Is that you?

Another door slams.

It’s Saturday, which means no work for the weekend, and I’m glad. I don’t think I can face Milo after yesterday’s fight. Did I break up with him? Did he break up with me? I shouldn’t have bolted, but I was too afraid to see our conversation through to its end. But the joke’s on me, because now I’m left with a mountain of ambiguity and a bundle of nerves preventing me from sorting it out.

I roll over and glance at the clock, happy to see that my week of ass-crack-of-dawn wake-ups hasn’t broken me from sleeping in. I wish I could stay asleep for the entire day, but the frantic rustling from beneath my window is keeping me from drifting off again. I swear, if Mrs. Newington’s cat has had another litter of kittens down there, I’m going to…well, have kittens as they say.

I flop out of bed and pad across the floor. I lean into the window and look down, sighing as I lean too far and my head thunks on the glass. Thankfully, it’s not kittens down there. It’s my mother. At least, I think that’s her beneath the wide straw brim of that embarrassing hat.

I throw on a clean tank top and switch out my boxer shorts for a pair of running shorts, an item of clothing I only own thanks to my brief relationship with Trent Schneider, captain of the cross country team. Our relationship lasted exactly four days and three miles before I realized that if it continued I’d be found in a heap on the side of the road.

Outside I find my mother doing battle with the English ivy that’s attempting to climb the side of the house. She’s got it in her fists and is leaning back like she’s about to scale our house, but it doesn’t seem to want to let go. That’s not stopping her from yanking while grunting like a Williams sister.

“That’s how I feel,” I say, which causes Mom to startle, let go of the ivy, and fly back onto her butt. The ivy winds up twisted around her ankle, and she kicks at it.

“Trouble in paradise?” she asks.

I pause. “What does that mean?”

“I think you know,” she says. I can’t look at her, but I can practically hear her eyebrow shooting up. When I finally glance over at her, still in a tangle of ivy but staring at me, her face soft, like she wants to hug me, I know for sure.

“How did you know?” I ask.

“I saw the picture,” she says.

I couldn’t be more shocked if my mother started growing ivy out of her eyeballs.

“Yousawit?” I screech, practically tipping over the porch railing with the force of my surprise.

“I’m not clueless about the world, Deanna,” she says. “I like a little celebrity gossip with my public radio.”

“This is so much worse than I thought,” I say. I bend over, thunking my head on the porch railing.

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