Page 37 of It's a Love Story

Dan shakes his head.

“No, I don’t meanyou.I mean anyone. A woman anyone would want to date.”

We’re quiet for a second. I’ve totally overshared and I don’t know how to claw it back.

“And how do those dates play out?” he asks.

“Fine, mostly. I usually nail the first three dates, but it fizzles by the fourth. I don’t really know why.”

“Maybe you need to work your old-school bathing suit into the mix.”

“Great idea.”

“I’m kidding, it’s terrible. But you should leave your hair curly. It’s soft around your face. I like it.”

“Oh,” I say and press my lips together.

There’s something happening here, and it’s unfamiliar and frightening. It’s a thing I’m opening up to because of this script and the humidity and all the reckless laughing I’ve done tonight. I need to change the subject.

“I came up with a backup plan,” I say. “About the movie.”

“Don’t know why we’d need one of those. This whole plan to ambush a pop star so he’ll write you a song seems foolproof.”

I smile and look back to the ceiling. I need to not be staring at his mouth if we’re talking business. “If he won’t write us a song—I know it’s a big ask—maybe he’ll just license us one of his early songs. Like ‘Fresh Eyes.’”

“I don’t know that one.”

“No one does probably, it was on the album before his breakout. It goes with the vibe of the story, the small-town feel of it and the innocence every time they try again.” I hum the beginning. “Know it?”

“Not from that.”

“Come on, it goes,Look my way so I can see you, fresh eyes on us.”

“Nope.”

I hum the beginning again, and he still doesn’t know it. So I start singing, just quietly. It feels perfectly natural because we’re in the dark, sort of out of space and time. I sing half of the first verse before I remember to be embarrassed about it.

I turn to the outline of him lying on his side in the dark. “What?” I say. “Do you know it? It’s a good song.”

“I’m confused,” he says.

“About what?”

“You sound just like Hailey Soul.”

“No.”

“You do. You’ve got me all worked up over here.”

I cannot overstate how much I like the fact that he’s all worked up. Even if it’s over his teenage crush on someone else. I want to claim that crush for myself, reach right into his head and make it me he was thinking about all those years ago. So I do.

“Yeah. That was actually me. I recorded the songs and Hailey lip-synced.” Once I’ve said it, the secret is out. You cannot unring a bell, as they say.

“What?” He swings his legs off the bed and sits up, expertly avoiding hitting his head on the top bunk. “And she got famous, and you got to sit in the background? This is outrageous.”

“This is my life.”

“Why don’t people know this?”

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