“What?” Sara asks. My emotions must be written all over my face for her to plainly see. “What is it, Ivy?”
I stare at the e-mail, still frozen, trying to process if what I’m seeing is real.
From: Ford models. Subject: Congratulations! You have been accepted to our women’s modeling division!
“It’s impossible…” I whisper.
“What?” Sara asks. “What’s impossible?”
Ford models. The holy grail of modeling agencies representing some of the biggest names in the fashion world—and they’ve accepted me?
“Ford Models…I have an e-mail from Ford Models…” I say slowly.
“Say what!?” Sara nearly shouts, leaping over to get beside me on the bed. She peers over my shoulder at my phone and sees the subject line, and then turns her head to face me. “Ivy…what the fuck?”
I shake my head in disbelief. “I don’t understand…I don’t know how this could have happened.”
“Did you submit to them?”
“Hell no!” I reply. “In what world would I submit to Ford Models?”
“Well, did Mike?” Sara asks. “Maybe he submitted some of the photos he took of you the other day during your shoot?”
And like that, my heart nearly stops. Panic sets in, and a cold sweat breaks out over my entire body. I drop my phone and leap off the bed and race down the hall to the bathroom and hang my head over the toilet bowl as a wave of nausea hits me.
I want to puke, but nothing comes out. I’m cold and hot at the same time and have to strip out of my shirt to try and deal with some of it.
There’s a knock at the door. “Ivy?” Sara calls. “Are you all right?”
“Be right out,” I answer.
“Can I come in?”
I take a deep breath. I guess I’m not going to throw up. I’m wearing a bra, so I call back, “Okay.”
The door opens, and Sara enters as I slide down into a seated position and press my back against the cool ceramic of the bathtub.
“Here,” she says, wetting a hand towel and handing it to me. “Put this on the back of your neck. It will help.”
I do, and it does. Although my heart is still racing like I’ve just finished doing sprints before soccer practice.
“I’m gonna kill him,” I say. “Horror movie style. I’m going to splatter his blood all over the walls and mount his head on my bedroom wall—”
“Why would you do that?” Sara asks. I look up at her, astonished by her question.
“Is that a joke?”
She shrugs. “No?”
“He sent in my photos, Sara. My photos without even asking my permission.”
“And got you accepted to Ford Models,” she replies. “One of, if not the, biggest and best modeling agency in the world.”
“Without my permission!” I repeat. “And what if he sent in my nudes!?”
Sara scoffs. “There’s no way. He wouldn’t do that.”
“Oh, he wouldn’t?” I’m instantly on my feet and storming back to my bedroom. I grab my phone up off of my bed and dial Mike. “Let’s just see about that.”
It rings and rings and rings, but Mike doesn’t answer.
“See?” I say, waving my phone in the air. “He didn’t pick up. So he’s either dead already by some other girl he betrayed, or he’s ducking me because he knows what he did was wrong.”
“Or,” Sara says cautiously, “he’s taking a shower, or he’s napping, or he’s doing errands or one of the other million things a grown man does during the day when he doesn’t instantly pick up his phone.”
I drop my arms to my side and sigh, then quickly lift my phone up and open the Uber app.
“What are you doing?” she asks.
“Taking a little trip to New York City,” I reply. “A little unannounced trip to New York City.”
“You’re joking.”
“I’m not.” I smile. “If Mike wants to just throw a curveball into my day, well I’ll throw one into his.”
The whole train ride into the city I can’t stop thinking about Mike, and not the way I normally think about him when we’re apart. Normally it’s all butterflies in my tummy and heat between my legs, but this time he’s conjuring up images of rupturing volcanoes and buildings on fire. I’m that angry.
I feel completely and utterly betrayed. The one man I’ve ever been with, ever done anything with, who basically forced the start of our relationship to even happen, went behind my back and did something I would never have been okay with. He didn’t ask for my consent; he just did it. And beyond that, he didn’t even prepare me for what might have happened.
I can’t stop my leg from jittering the entire way down. It’s like I have an excess of energy I can’t get rid of—like I’ve drunk fifty cups of coffee or something, although I haven’t even had one. And by the time I’m stepping off my second Uber at Mike’s apartment, I’m ready to tear his head off.