cowboy
it is now
we’re having a cast thing tonight and… I’m not a popular guy
Shocker
cowboy
could I convince you to come to an indie movie cast party?
My jaw practically hit the floor of my car as I read his last message. Before I had time to think of an excuse to decline, he’d sent me information and what time he’d pick me up.
A pool party.
AfuckingHollywood pool party.
In Seattle.
InOctober.
Abs-fucking-lutely ridiculous.
What did they evenwearto those things? Not that it mattered. I wasn’t going. I didn’t have to go. I could just… say no. I could text back a super polite “sorry, can’t make it” and go back to pretending my life wasn’t a sitcom.
But the invite sat there, glowing on my screen like a trap I very much wanted to fall into.
‘Call in a childhood crush favor,’ he’d said… like it was normal. Likewewere normal.
Like I didn’t already feel like I’d stepped into someone else’s life the second he opened that rental house door in hisCrocs.
I stared at my phone. Then at my closet.
Then at my phone again.
“Absolutely not,” I muttered.
Less than fifteen minutes later, I was tearing apart my laundrybasket looking for the one swimsuit that didn’t make me want to crawl into the sea and vanish.
I held up the black one-piece. Sleek. Structured. Modest. “This says: ‘I’m normal. I’m chill. I’m not here to seduce a man in Crocs.’”
Then I held up the wine-red two-piece. High-waisted, minimal coverage. A little vintage. A lot of boob. “This says… ‘I still got it, bitches.’”
I dropped both onto the bed with a groan. “This is so stupid. I’m talking to myself.”
It wasn’t like I was going toimpressanyone at an October Hollywood pool party. Not with my awkward jokes and half-dry hair and stress-sweat. And I wasn’t trying to impress Ansel.
I wasn’t.
Except maybe I was. Just a little. Maybe I wanted him to look. Just once. Just long enough for me to remember what it felt like to be wanted by someone whosaw me.
Quit it, Haddock.
Friends.
I just wanted a friend. I’m not in the market for anything more, andespeciallynot with Ansel Barlowe.
I had only twenty minutes left.
