Page 84 of Play Along With Me
My stomach drops. I'd forgotten that Patricia had taken photos at dinner Saturday night. With a sense of impending doom, I open the app.
The photo isn't bad, objectively speaking. Jake and I at the restaurant, heads tilted toward each other, both laughing at something I can't remember now. We look... happy. Natural. Like a real couple enjoying each other's company.
The caption, however, is pure Patricia:So wonderful to meet my son's new girlfriend this weekend! Audrey is justdelightful—funny, bright, and clearly makes Jake so happy! #proudmom #mysonhasgoodtaste #futurefamilymembers
That last hashtag makes me choke on air.
What's worse, the post already has seventeen comments, mostly from what appear to be other hockey moms and Patricia's friends, all variations on "They look so happy together!" and "What a beautiful couple!" and most alarmingly, "Ring soon????"
I'm still staring in horror when another notification pops up—a direct message from Jake:
Jake: I am SO sorry. Just saw my mother's post. I've already called and demanded she remove the "future family members" hashtag, but she's claiming not to know how to edit Instagram posts. I'm 90% sure she's lying.
Despite my embarrassment, I find myself smiling at his message. Of course Jake would immediately try to fix this, and of course Patricia would conveniently forget how technology works when it suits her purposes.
Me: Your mother works fast. I've been officially inducted into the Marshall family digital footprint. Also, seventeen people I've never met now think we're headed for matrimony.
Jake: Twenty-three and counting. My aunt in Minnesota just texted to ask why she wasn't told I was "getting serious with someone special."
Me: The Marshall family gossip network is frightening in its efficiency.
Jake: You have no idea. By tomorrow, my third cousin twice removed will be asking about our wedding registry.
Me: I'll tell her we're registered at "Mind Your Own Business & Beyond."
I slip my phone back into my pocket, still unsettled by the photo but somewhat soothed by Jake's immediate damage control attempt. The picture is out there now, though—tangible "evidence" of our fake relationship, circulating among people who believe it's real. The web of deception grows more tangled by the day.
"Order up for table twelve," Marcus calls, sliding two martinis toward me. "And whatever you just read on your phone made you smile for the first time tonight, so maybe stop overthinking it?"
"That simple, huh?" I say, carefully lifting the martinis.
"Sometimes, yeah," he shrugs. "We make things complicated because it's safer than admitting what we actually want."
When did everyone in my life become an amateur philosopher specializing in my emotional state?
"Table twelve," I mutter, escaping Marcus's too-accurate observations.
The rest of my shift passes in a blur of drink orders, polite small talk with customers, and my increasingly futile attempts to stop thinking about Jake. By the time I'm clocking out at midnight, I've checked my phone approximately thirty-seven times, exchanged fourteen more texts with Jake (mostly about his mother's Instagram habits and speculation about how many distant relatives now believe we're engaged), and convinced absolutely no one, including myself, that this fake relationship isn't affecting me.
When I get home, the apartment is dark—Mr. Darcy greets me with his usual blend of neediness and disdain, winding around my ankles while somehow communicating that my late arrival is both inconvenient and personally offensive to him.
"Yes, I know, I'm a terrible cat mother," I tell him, filling his food bowl. "The service in this establishment is appalling."
After changing into pajamas, I settle at my desk with my laptop, determined to focus on my novel. Chapter 7 has been giving me trouble—my protagonist, Eliza, has just discovered that her ability to see people's regrets has unexpected consequences. The more regrets she sees, the more she becomes entangled in strangers' lives, trying to help them avoid future regrets while neglecting her own life in the process.
It's not at all a metaphor for my tendency to prioritize others' feelings over my own. Not even a little bit.
I stare at the blinking cursor for several minutes, then begin typing:
Eliza knew she should stop. Each intervention pulled her deeper into the web of others' lives, their potential regrets becoming her responsibility. But she couldn't help herself—not when she could see so clearly what they might one day wish they had done differently.
The young man at the coffee shop, regret cloud forming over his future decision not to call his estranged father before it was too late.
The woman on the bus, future regret of turning down a job offer that would have changed her life.
The barista, the neighbor, the dental hygienist—all carrying the shadowy outlines of decisions not yet made but already mourned.
What Eliza couldn't see were her own potential regrets, taking shape above her head even as she focused on everyone else's.
