Page 16 of Well, Actually
I exit out of the app, tapping in to my texts again. For the umpteenth time, I start a draft message to him. The Soundbites PR team sent me an outline of how his podcast episodes will be cross-posted on the company’s socials, and William sent an oh-so-subtle email that the first date better happen sooner rather than later. The team included Cooper’s contact info, but, because I’m pathetic, I didn’t need it. I never deleted his number from college. I didn’t even change his name in my phone to something hilarious and mean like any self-respecting woman should.
Stop liking peoples’ thirst traps of us, I type, then delete. Can’t let him know how aware I am of the excitement around all this. I chew on my lip for a second.Let’s get this stupid-ass charade over with and get the date scheduled, I try. No, way too eager.
I sit up, looking out my thumbnail of a bedroom window at the dark fall evening. City lights wink at me, and I frown at their loveliness, my sour face coming into focus in the pane’s reflection. I stare at myself for a moment, my pinched expression and furrowed brows. The curl to my shoulders. My messy bedsheets.
I’ve never had attention like this, but all of it feels fogged, directed at a shell of me—a facade that people are latching onto and fabricating entertainment from. It’s overwhelming and confusing and more unpleasant than I would have anticipated. Something dull and hollow pangs in my chest. It takes me a moment to realize it’s… loneliness.
I glance back at my phone, leg jiggling as the feeling takes root and starts to bloom into a sharper ache. With a small huff I type:why didn’t you ever call me back?
Seeing the words there, addressed to Rylie Cooper, are cold water to my deplorable self-loathing, and I straighten my shoulders as I erase it, letting out a brittle laugh at that pitiful second-long version of me. She’s not someone I want to get too comfortable in this tough skin I’ve worked so hard to grow.
As I exit out of Cooper’s name entirely, another FaceTime call from Ray pops up on my screen, his fifth in the past two hours. I decline it. His follow-up text is instantaneous.
So you aren’t going to explain what the hell is happening on social media rn, huh?
I let out a long breath through pursed lips. Ray is one of my best friends, but he’s notoriously bad at checking in with people, and he and his partners have been having some sort of pet turtle crisis as of late that has been absorbing all his attention, so I didn’t bother to fill him in on the Cooper drama when it was starting. Apparently, he doesn’t live under as thick a rock as I had hoped and has seen the interview circulating. I text him a reply.
What is there to explain that hasn’t been summed up in countless videos already?
Maybe the fact that you fucked a celebrity and never shared it with your bestie??
He is NOT a celebrity.I grind my teeth as I type, feeling so keyed up I scramble out of bed and start to pace.
I’m sick of thinking about Cooper. Sick of his stupid face popping up in my stupid head and stupid thoughts. A pressurebuilds in my stomach, up my throat, and I stomp across my apartment and turn on the shower, cranking the heat so I can wash away whatever grime being around him embedded in my skin.
Because this is New York, my shower is in my kitchen, barely bigger than the sink across from it, and I lean against the counter as I wait for it to warm up. Another text from Ray comes through.
He’s social media famous and that pretty much counts double nowadays
No it doesn’t
Fuck off yes it does and you know it.
I drop my phone on the windowsill at the end of my shower, then step under the steaming spray. It calms me for a moment—the fog dulling the garish mental images of Cooper’s smile, the scorching water smoothing the sharp edges of my nerves, the echoing sound of droplets splashing against the porcelain tub drowning out my intrusive thoughts. My shoulders lower from my ears. My jaw unclenches. The building pressure in my body sighs in relief. Here is peace. Here is a place without reminders of Rylie fucking Cooper.
Then my phone buzzes again.
And, like the well-trained technology zombie I am, my eyes flash open and I follow the tug from my phone, water sluicing down my nose and fingers and plonking on the screen as I read Ray’s latest message.
I know this is probably breaking friend code but I gotta know… was it really that bad? I feel like he’s packing.
I roll my eyes so hard I feel the force of it in the center of my brain. Another message from Ray immediately follows.I also feel like he’s curved to the left for some reason. Just gut instinct. He has that energy.
This at least makes me snort. But the humor is short-lived, a long-buried memory resurfacing with heat along my skin like a fever breaking.
Cooper had walked me home after our shitty second date, the sharp spring night cutting at my cheeks and through the thin dress I’d worn to impress him. He didn’t offer me his coat like I’d come to fruitlessly hope for from movies and books. He’d been distant all night, his thoughts a thousand miles away, and nothing I said was witty or charming enough to pull him back. Growing up, I’d become accustomed to this feeling, my voice not strong enough, my thoughts not interesting enough, to pull the split attention of my parents. Of anyone.
“What are you thinking about?” I’d asked as we approached my building, his head bent low and stare fixed on the pavement.
He startled like he’d forgotten I was there, eyes taking a second to focus as we stopped in front of my dorm. I pressed my back against the rough brick wall, studying him closely. It was odd to see him frown, and I let out a sigh of relief at the slow, sensual smile that traced across his mouth as he came back to me. But that smile didn’t reach his eyes, something tangled and heavy sitting at the corners.
“Just trying to figure out my ren faire costume, Kitten,” he’d said, taking a step closer. “It’s never too early to start planning.”
I snorted. “Court jester is the obvious choice.”
This pulled a genuine laugh from him, and I felt the roughheat of it caress my skin. “God, you’re right. I’ve been overthinking it.”
“Don’t hurt yourself.”
