Page 37 of Written By a Woman

I raised my eyebrows at her—

“Oh my god, you all are the worst!” She groaned and covered her face with both of her hands, hiding herself for a few moments before playfully glaring at the screen flooding with questions and hearts and laughing emojis, “Look. While there are physical similarities between Zayne’s character and that man you saw on my feed weeks ago, Zayne is not based on that man at all. That man doesn’t even know that I write romance. Everyone, this is what authorsdo,” she shrugged, “Looking back, I shouldn’t have been so on the nose with my physical description of Zayne. But my romance author brain just looked at him and thought, ‘perfect candidate, it would be fun describing that appearance to the reader’, which you all immediately proved me right about.” She raised her eyebrows with an accusatory stare at the camera, making my lips twitch.

I knew Zayne’s character was different than my personality, but I still felt a little jab of disappointment at her answer for some reason. She was acting so nonchalant about it, making me second guess myself. Was she simply using my appearance for her writing and nothing more? Was she not interested in me in any sort of romantic capacity?

Before I could stop myself, I typed a question into the mess of others right when she paused to read them.

Avytk890: Who is the man you based Zayne on?

Thankfully, dozens of other people had the same question ready to go. Suddenly, different variations of that same question took over, and Signe’s nervous expression as she bit her bottom lip with her teeth made anticipation rise.

Was she going to ignore the question until someone asked something else?

Signe released a heavy sigh, before tucking a strand of red hair back behind her ear, “Full disclosure, he is a coworker. I am not going say where I work full-time because I don’t trust any of you to not invade my or his privacy,” she smiled, though her tone was firm, “He’s a really great guy, and it would mean a lot to me if everyone could leave him alone.”

I was clutching my phone with my hands, desperate for her to sayanythingmore about me.

Was I truly a mature man? A grown adult?

I doubted it as I typed my next question.

Avytk890: Are you two friends?

My question was immediately lost in the mess of other questions readers were asking, but I could see Signe reach forward and scroll through the mess.

I was a trendsetter. Other people started asking variations of my question as well, and I caught myself holding my breath as I waited to see what question she would answer next.

“You know me, I try to be friends with everyone,” Signe shrugged her shoulder this time, “Though half the time I can’t tell if we’re friends or if he just tolerates me because we work together,” Signe replied, her shoulders shaking as she controlled her laughter and narrowed her eyes to comb through questions again.

Avytk890: But you based Zayne off of him because you’re attracted to him?

Signe’s lips were moving as she mumbled through questions, and I felt my heart lump itself in my throat as her lips murmured my latest question to herself.

“Okay,” Signe laughed again after reading my question, “Obviously my coworker is good-looking. You all saw him, and you all left thirsty comments about him. You all thought he was attractive when you drew fan art of Zayne and Sydney. Don’t be silly.”

That made my heart thump heavy in my chest, my breathing shaky as I watched Signe Lange tell thousands of followers that she was attracted to me to some degree. I breathed a sigh of relief, especially when I saw her cheeks turn the slightest bit pink after her declaration.

“I’m not answering any more questions about the inspiration behind Zayne,” Signe shook her head once, “Again, you all need to be mindful of my and my coworker’s privacy. If you have any questions for me about writing or the querying process, I’m ready to answer what I can at this point.”

Probably should have thought of that before creating a fictional character based entirely on my appearance,I thought to myself.

I knew how to keep my privacy; the fake account I was using to stalk her was evidence of that. I closed out of her live feed, wanting to do more research, instead of watching her answer other questions from those who were more interested in her work itself than I was. I scrolled through her page, opening up the three pictures she’s posted of herself so far.

Signe was stunning. There was no other way to describe it. I found myself even liking the images, feeling a little better that there were already thousands of likes and comments left by her following.

A following that grew to nearly fifty thousand.

I grinned, a feeling of pride that I didn’t deserve flooding my chest. I scrolled, skimmed captions, and learned a few more details about Signe that I didn’t know before.

How she preferred peppermint lattes over pumpkin spice lattes and was desperate for fall to come and go so she could finally enjoy her drink of choice.

Or how she was allergic to flowers, something she announced by posting a selfie of her with swollen watery eyes after walking through a park where the flowers were blooming everywhere.

I found myself chuckling at that, loving the confidence she had to post a picture most people would consider unflattering. Not Signe, she posted whatever she wanted even if she wasn’t wearing makeup or didn’t have her hair done. She wasn’t even dressed up in her posts, just wearing leggings or loose-fit jeans with casual t-shirts.

A desperate, lonely part of me truly hoped that one day, I would be able to see her casual loungewear in person.

At that embarrassing thought, I decided I had done enough internet stalking for the night and decided to finally plug in my phone and go to sleep, but it took a while for my mind to calm down enough to do so. I needed to find out what Sun Steer’s official policy on fraternizing in the office was. My romantic feelings towards Signe were only growing each passing day, and I needed to make sure I wasn’t being unethical by constantly entertaining the idea of her and me, together.

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