Page 35 of Selfie

Except there he was in his black briefs that didn’t leave much to the imagination.

By the time I get back to my desk from my humiliating encounter with Nathan, a takeout coffee has appeared on my desk. The cup is dwarfed by the kraft-brown sleeve; it’s evensmaller than a tall.Geez.The man is a billionaire, he could’ve splurged for a grande at least. Removing the ice pack I scavenged out of the break room freezer from my face, I take a small sip of the coffee. I wince at the brew that is most certainly lighter fluid.

Frantically, I check the sticky label on the cup and am surprised when it reads, “cortado,” not poison. Clearly Nathan and I don’t enjoy the same type of coffee. I guess he likes this nonsense, whereas I prefer my caffeine not taste like torture. I don’t actually drink coffee much anymore because I can’t enjoy it the way I like—drenched in caramel sauce and a generous helping of cold foam cream. Back when I was on my weight-loss pills, I could survive a whole day off of one grande white chocolate mocha with a heavy dollop of whipped cream.

Selfishly, I miss them. The pills took the anxiety out of eating. It was like outsourcing the constant stress and fear I had when it came to food. Jesse helped me buy them from Mexico. He knew a guy who knew a guy. I should’ve known excessively taking pills that were a far cry from FDA-approved medication would’ve landed me in the hospital.

It scared the shit out of Charlie. My little sister is strong, but I think the scar of losing me, on top of everything else she’s been through, would never heal. After a dramatic collapse, an overnight hospital stay, and the doctor threatening me with terms like gallbladder disease, pancreatitis, high blood pressure, and even cardiac arrest, I decided I couldn’t continue to take them.

Now, I have to sit here and watch my body transform right back into what I really am. My mom told me I was beautiful and perfect every day of my life. She bestowed such confidence in me, I never saw the glass-shattering blow that was coming for me during my first week at UNLV. I might still see myself the way my mom did had nearly an entire college campus not seen me naked and publicly shamed me. Some people have thatnightmare where they are caught on stage in their birthday suit, with all the people they’re trying to impress shining a flashlight on all the parts of their body that are too big, too jiggly, too stretched and marked. It wasn’t my nightmare…

It was my reality.

It’s been five years since I quit school and returned home from Las Vegas. I managed to get my degree from a local Miami college. I busted my ass to finish school on time. I worked all day and studied. I started taking diet pills and lost all the wiggly parts I was teased for. I quietly fixed all my insecurities one by one, but it didn’t make the trauma go away.

It’s partly why I’m so paranoid about Charlie being on the internet and exposing herself to criticism. I don’t want her teased and ridiculed like I was. It doesn’t matter that she’s a child, or beautiful, petite, blond-haired, blue-eyed, and sings like she’s God’s gift to humankind. The trolls have no mercy; they’ll conjure up something. How can I console her the first time someone calls her a mean name, pokes at her appearance, or criticizes her talents when they are talentless themselves? How can I fix for her, what I never learned to fix for myself?

Coming back here, I’m also trying to face what I ran from. There were other jobs—admittedly, none paying as well as Brickstone Ventures, especially when you consider the perks. But I could’ve made it work elsewhere in Dallas or Denver, perhaps. Something called me back to Las Vegas… I’m still not sure exactly what.

After taking another small sip of the cortado—and regretting it—I sit down at my desk and open my laptop, mostly out of habit. Outside of the company-wide newsletters that go out on Mondays, my inbox is always empty. Except now there’s a little notification. A bright red “1” on the email icon indicating I have a new message.

From: Nathan Hatcher

To: Spencer Riley-Brenner

Subject: Important Task

Spencer,

I’ll have to cancel our meeting this afternoon. I’m headed to the East Coast to handle an urgent matter. I’ll be back tomorrow afternoon. I’m emailing over instructions for the task I need you to complete. Please keep this confidential.

I’m sure you’re familiar with Shaylin, the Grammy-winning pop sensation. She’s considering a residency at our new hotel. I’m meeting her for dinner to discuss a potential deal.

I need a reservation at a chef’s table.

I pause reading and roll my eyes. This is way too easy. Nathan’s treating me with kid gloves. Fancy reservations are my calling card. I could get Hank a chef’s table at Swerve, one of Miami’s most exclusive steakhouses, easily. They don’t even pick up the phone there. You have to leave a voicemail at least three months prior, pray they call you back, and when they don’t (which they won’t), you have to grovel via email a few times to be put on a waiting list.

I, however, once helped a random woman on the side of the road change her flat tire in a bind. Turns out she was the lead hostess at Swerve. She’s now in my contacts list and Hank would always get the best tables. I never told him my little secret. My old boss just thinks I wasthat good.

But my cocky smile disappears as I continue to read the email.

To clarify, a celebrity chef’s table, for example, Giada De Laurentiis, Gordon Ramsay, or Bobby Flay. Wolfgang Puck is my strong preference if he’s free.

Thanks, Spencer. It’s a very important meeting. We want to impress Shaylin. Don’t let me down.

Before I forget, I need the reservation for tomorrow at eight.

Cheers,

Nathan Hatcher

Senior Partner, Brickstone Ventures

Consider me humbled.

A celebrity chef by tomorrow night? Did Nathan smoke an entire bowl before he wrote this email? How the hell am I even supposed to get in touch with Wolfgang Puck? Not to mention, do the chefs he listed even cook for guests? I always figured they just own the restaurants and film their cooking shows. This is absolute insanity. No way I can pull this off.

Oh.

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