Page 26 of You Will Never Be Me

Tea company sponsorship: A series where I suffer from various maladies like migraines, digestive problems, etc., then a tea recipe for each one. The recipes will be shot top down, like a baking recipe, with the flowers and leaves laid out on the table in a beautiful pattern

Any company: Elea and Noemie arguing over the last bag of X, and meanwhile Sabine in the corner with an extra large bag of X, smiling to herself

Children’s clothes company: The outfit change idea where the girls tap each other, etc.

I scan the list while shaking my head. It feels as though the notes go on and on. There is no limit to Aspen’s creative ideaswhen it comes to content that is refreshing and fun. Ironic, because when she first got started, generating content ideas was the one thing that kept holding her back. “I just can’t think of anything!” she’d whine. “How do you do it? How do you come up with so many different makeup looks?”

Hah. How the tables have turned. I used to think it was something she just wasn’t very good at, but turns out all she needed was to find her niche, and now it seems she has way too many ideas and not enough time to turn them all into actual content. Well, let me help you with that, Aspen.

I go down the list, this time discarding the ideas that I can’t do because, unlike Aspen, I only have the one baby to work with. It still leaves me with more ideas than I can shoot in a single week. And knowing Aspen, she’ll add to the list every day. I look over at Luca and smile.

“Come on, mister, let’s get you in an apron and chef’s hat and we’re going to bake cookies.”

•••

The video of me bakingwith Luca and him making a huge mess with everything gets over nine million views. Nine million! The comments are all incredibly positive, everybody gushing over what an adorable little sous chef he makes and how good the cookies ended up looking, despite the mess. I would never have thought of doing a comedic video like that. If you’d asked me to make a cooking video with Luca, I would’ve set him a safe distance away from the kitchen counter and given him a pile of chocolate chips to nibble on while I did most of the work. But having him strangle the flour bag with both hands and shovel a stick of butter into his mouth while I scramble to stop him isgenius; you can’t help but stay and watch the carnage. And to have it end successfully after all that leaves the viewer with a pleasant feeling. I really have to hand it to Aspen to think of setting aside a good batch to ensure a positive outcome; in reality, Luca destroyed everything, and I would have had nothing to bake if not for Aspen’s note.

I also did the outfit change video with Luca, where we turn and look at each other, then I tap him on his nose and his outfit changes. He taps me on mine (it took about thirty takes with me saying, “Where’s mommy’s nose? Where is it? Mommy’s nose!” the whole time before he booped me on the nose) and my outfit changes. And so on and so forth, five outfits for each of us. Six million views. Not as many as the cooking one, but considering I have below two million followers, it’s still an amazing view rate.

I do her other ideas as well, each time tweaking it enough so that it’s ever so slightly different from Aspen’s notes. A Moroccan lamb stew instead of beef bourguignon cooked inside a pumpkin. A focaccia instead of a sourdough loaf with butterfly flowers. I tell myself that this way, Aspen won’t realize that I’m taking her ideas. When we had our fight, I blocked her on everything, including all of my socials. I tell myself that she won’t even be able to see any of my content. But of course, with them going viral and people downloading and reposting them, chances are she’ll come across them at some point. And I know she’s not stupid; she would totally know that I stole her ideas. I keep waiting for her to realize that I took Elea’s iPad. Each time I turn it on, I keep expecting a sign to blare,“This ipad has been locked by its rightful owner.”But nothing happens. Her Notes app is updated multiple times daily with new ideas, many of which I help myself to.

And I continue on my meteoric rise.

You’d think that this would make me happy. It’s all I wanted—a proper career as an influencer. But instead, the more followers I get, the more hollow I feel. The more anxious, because what happens when Aspen finds out she’s being hacked into and changes all her passwords? What happens when I no longer have fresh ideas to rely on? Sure, I could go back to mimicking other people’s content, which a ton of influencers do, but there’s something about being the pioneer, the one whom everyone else copies. And above all, doing this doesn’t stop me from missing Aspen. And I do. I miss her so much. I wish I could rip her out of my heart neatly, leaving no traces behind, but instead, I move the other way. I become even more obsessed with her, with trying to find out how she’s doing without me.

At night, after putting Luca down, I lie in bed exhausted, both mind and body depleted. What I find hardest about having a baby isn’t the never-ending chores. I don’t mind changing dirty diapers over and over again. I don’t mind breastfeeding. I don’t mind washing all of the components that make up a baby bottle. In fact, I enjoy it, because it means I can safely turn off my brain and just wash the damn bottles.

It’s the playtime that I find shockingly draining. The pressure of having to come up with ways to encourage learning. Yes, he’s not even a year old, and already I need to find a dozen creative ways each day to make sure his brain will develop to the max. Peekaboo. Dancing and singing. Sensory toys. It is endless, and each game, requiring me to trill at him in a desperately happy tone, is more mind-numbing than the last. Playing with little children is a special kind of torture where you feel your mind slowly sagging, turning you into some kind of cretin, but at the same time you must be one hundred percent aware and present,because babies and little kids are always coming up with new ways of getting themselves hurt.

The only thing that can ease this excruciatingly boring and yet taxing activity is to have a playdate with another equally tortured mother. Something I used to do with Aspen, but obviously not anymore. I could arrange for playdates with other moms, and I have, but finding the right moms to have playdates with is trickier than it sounds. For one thing, your babies need to actually get along. For another, it’s a tough balance to find someone who is equally as vocal as you are about how shit motherhood can be. I haven’t been able to find that yet, and the more I take from Elea’s iPad, the more I find myself being sucked back into Aspen’s world, and yet not actually being a part of it.

At night, I lie alone in bed, drained, but instead of sleeping, I pick up the iPad and pore over it, refreshing the Calendar, Albums, and Notes in case there are new updates, which there often are. Sometimes, exhilaratingly, the update happens while I’m watching the iPad. In real time. Those moments always send a shiver down my spine.At this very moment—I would tell myself—Aspen is tapping away on her iPad. And it’s as though I’m right there, peeping over her shoulder. Then the sudden yearning hits me, a sharp thrust straight through my chest, the message clear as day: I am alone. I have no real friends. I had one real friend, and I picked a fight with her and chased her away.

And the tears slide down my cheeks, wetting my pillowcase, and still I sit there while the iPad screen grows too blurry for me to read.

This morning, as I mash some steamed peas for Luca’s breakfast, I glance over at the iPad and see that there’s an appointment for Ben today. “Open house at 63 Belmont Ave. All day.”

Something inside me clicks. I’ve been toying with the idea of tailing Aspen again, just to see her even if from afar, but maybe it’s time for a change. Maybe I’ll learn more by seeing Ben. Unlike Aspen, he’s always been hopeless at hiding his thoughts and emotions. Maybe he might let it slip just how much Aspen has been missing me.

After a hectic breakfast where most of the peas end up smushed into Luca’s wispy hair, I wipe him down and place him in his playpen. He immediately shrieks; he hates the fenced corner, but I ignore his enraged screams and dart off for a quick shower. I blow-dry my hair into loose waves and apply makeup. Part of me sneers at myself.Are you putting makeup on for Ben? Pathetic Nice Guy Ben?I ignore her the same way I ignore Luca’s screeching, and soon enough I’m on my way to Clara’s.

“For fuck’s sake, Mer,” she says by way of greeting when she opens her front door.

“Clara, language!” I cover Luca’s ears and give her a look of mock outrage.

The corners of her mouth twitch like she’s trying not to smile. She sighs. “What did I say about giving me advance warning before dropping him off?”

“Something came up suddenly. You know how these things are.” I hold Luca up and say in a high voice, “Please don’t be mad, Auntie Clara. We’ll have such a great time bitching about Mommy.”

---