“You’re beautiful. Stop,” Theo says, pulling my hair into his hands and parting it over either shoulder.
“My hair looks like an airplane pillow,” I joke. It’s not a big exaggeration.
Theo pulls at the sides, making it bigger, and I force my eyes far to the right to watch it grow.
“It’s a little big, yeah. But still . . .” He moves his hands to cup my face, then leans forward to kiss me. “Beautiful.”
What is this life?Part of me knows Theo is forcing himself to exude happiness. What we just went through was heavy, and even through his smiles and sweet gestures, the lines on his forehead show how worried he is for his mom.
“Hold my things while I run to the restroom?” I hand over my pile and he takes it, exaggerating how heavy my keys, phone, and wallet truly are. I probably should get one of those cross-body bags or something, but it feels as if that’s just adding one more thing to my body, and I carry enough.
I wait through two people in line to get my turn in the restroom, so I skip the plan of braiding my hair while I’m in there. If Theo thinks it’s beautiful, so be it. When I leave the restroom, he’s hovering just outside the door, under an overhang, talking on his phone. The rain has picked up, so I run out and grab my wallet from him so I can get a coffee.
I decide to get two, figuring if Theo doesn’t drink his, I always can. Maybe I’ll make two trips to the pool today and work off the caffeine buzz.
When I exit, Theo is waiting in the car, the door propped open despite the rain probably pelting his side. That mask he was working so hard to cultivate has morphed from a peaceful expression to one weighted with concern. His eyes droop, and the corners of his mouth are arrows pointing at the ground.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, quickly slipping into the passenger side. I don’t bother fishing for an answer. We’re past that point. Theo . . . he’s my person.
His phone is still in his palm, the screen on an ended phone call. I lean toward him, placing the coffees in the cup holders while I read the number. It isn’t anything familiar.
“I just got fired fromThe Affiliate.” He blinks a few times then shifts his gaze to me. My mouth is hanging open. That’s not the news I was expecting.
“Why?”
I brace myself for him to tell me it’s because they found out about his fight on the field or his slip-up in sales last week.
“The CEO wants a story about you and Anika, and they said you didn’t seem interested in writing it. He called me personally and asked if I was ready to have the ‘byline of my life.’” He breathes out a short laugh through his nose.
My stomach sinks. I hoped the conversation I had with Abby would simply vanish; that she’d forget about the idea completely. I had no intention of ever bringing it up again, but maybe that was a bad idea. I never thought she’d try to get Theo to do it. Unless she doesn’t realize who he is?
“What did you say?”
The fact they fired him tells me it was probably a hard no. I’m just not surehowhard.
“Something to the effect of fuck you, you fucking fuck.” He scrunches his nose as if he swallowed something bitter, and I smile with clenched teeth.
“Do you think maybe they don’t know she’s your sister?”
My question draws a bigger laugh from him.
“You see, now, that’s what I was hoping. Turns out, though, that’s exactly why they asked me. In fact . . .” He claps his hands together for emphasis and forces his mouth into a tight-lipped grin. “That’s exactly why they hired me in the first place.”
That’s why they hired both of us.
He doesn’t have to say that part. He might not even know it or be thinking it, but it’s clear to me. It worried me when Abby proposed the idea, but I dismissed it. I earned this internship. I interviewed and fought for her attention.
Or did I?
Theo elbowed me. I tripped out of my borrowed shoes, and before that I tried to get them to hire him instead of me, out of guilt. What do I really bring to the table—besides my story?
“I should have told you Abby approached me with the idea. I wanted it to go away, and I was hoping it had.” I sink back in the passenger side and Theo pulls his door shut. He turns sideways, resting an arm on the steering wheel and studies me. His expression is hard to read—I can’t tell whether he’s upset about being fired or mad that I didn’t stop this from happening.
“You should write it,” he says. My stomach drops as though I’ve just gone over the edge of a rollercoaster.
“No,” I respond immediately.
He nods, though, to combat my refusal.