SADIE
Shuffling around Drew’s kitchen Saturday morning, I set about what had become a regular routine for me—baking and leaving him a note. Although this morning, I wasn’t feeling as playful about it as usual.
My phone buzzed in my back pocket, and I pulled it out, cringing when my boss’s name lit up my screen.
“Hi, Eirin.” I kept my voice quiet, even though there was no way my call would wake Drew all the way upstairs.
“Sadie, I won’t keep you long.” Her tenor was serious but also subdued. It lacked seventy percent of the ball-busting it normally held.
That made it all the more terrifying.
“I don’t know what today is to you, but I know it’s something.”
I inhaled a sharp breath. “How—”
“You never take any vacation, except you’ve requested this specific day off four years straight. To be honest, I was surprised you didn’t balk at this assignment when I told you the timeline.”
“Right. Well, I’m trying something new this year.”
Actually moving on?
Reckless denial?
Who the fuck knew?
What I did know was that I didn’t need Eirin reminding me that today was the anniversary of the shittiest day of my life. I resisted the urge to fill in the silence she left on the line.
“Why are you not writing the Everett piece? We both know I can’t publish what you sent me. No one is going to read this.”
I pulled a long breath in while I considered how to answer her. It was no surprise she wasn’t on board with my approach. Besides my rebellion with the Rivers-Calderon story, I’d never had a problem with how she ran things before, but I’d been getting more and more restless with my job over the last year. My time in this town had brought that into sharp focus. But I couldn’t sabotage myself by telling Eirin that. I didn’t have a backup job lined up, and I needed to keep my insurance until my next doctor’s appointment. If my test next month came back clear, then I could move to yearly surveillance. That would give me some cushion to look for a better job with an insurance plan Dr. York accepted.
“This town is incredibly tight-lipped. I don’t think we’re going to get anywhere.”
“Then change your approach. You said it yourself in your first draft—the fact that everyone is so elusive about the Everetts means they are protecting them. Be more aggressive. Scour Google Earth and find mansions with lots of privacy in the area then stake them out. It’s not like that town can be rolling in millionaires. Hit up public records and look for tax information on properties in the area over a million dollars. Be creative. The shit you sent me isn’t cutting it.”
Nausea rolled in my gut. Was this what my job was going to be like from now on? Or was Eirin just particularly obsessed with Axel Everett? I’d never had her make demands like this before, but she’d also mentioned restructuring. Maybe she planned to take HypeKey the route of full-on tabloid.
“How about the piece about the festival?” I asked. “I think it’s well fleshed out already, considering the festival hasn’t even started yet.” It was a weak attempt to refocus her attention, but I didn’t have a lot of other options.
“Yes. It’s fine. We both know that’s the least important story though. Those stories only serve to pull in the readers who refuse to admit to themselves how much they love the down and dirty gossip. Once they’re on the site, they’ll click through to all of our other suggested links. The festival piece is good enough as is. Don’t waste any more time on the festival. You don’t even need to go to it. No one will know the difference. Spend your time and energy on finding Axel and Veronica.”
I wondered if Grace needed any help at Strange Brew and whether she offered health insurance. The thought stopped me short. I didn’t want to throw away everything I’d worked on for the last several years just because my boss took a dump all over my favorite part of the job.
Did I?
No.
I was romanticizing this town and my time in it. Sure, a dull ache formed in my chest when I imagined bailing on Kobie and my promise to help her with her search for a replacement Valor King. The idea of not getting to see the festival in action gave me the same feeling I’d get as a child every time my parents told me my dad had been reassigned to another base and we were going to be moving soon. That feeling when I had to start over and make all new friends again.
But that was silly. I barely knew Kobie, or anyone else in this town, and I had plenty of friends back in New York.
Okay, I had one friend. Ward.
I traveled too much to even get to know my roommates, let alone make any meaningful friendships. That was fine though. It meant fewer opportunities for friendships to drift apart because of my busy schedule. Or to have people snatched out of my life when the universe decided it was time to kick me in the ass again.
But if I found a new job with more normal hours, I could change all that.
Besides, Drew made it clear he wasn’t emotionally equipped for anything more than a vacation hookup. Just because he didn’t kick me out at night when I snuggled up to him didn’t mean there was a long-term future for us. My life was back in New York, and that was where I wanted it. I just needed to toe the line at HypeKey until I found something better.