“Um, you’re growling again?”
“Shut up.” But I try to soften it with a smile.
Her eyes go wide and she looks back down at her phone. “Well, Priya read them all and then forwarded them to Jaxon and me. And—”
“What?”
“Um . . .” She looks quickly up and then back down again. “I just . . . Are you smiling at me?”
Fuck. Why is this shit so hard?
“I am trying to seem less like a ‘misanthropic dick who gets off on being mean.’” I use the phrase one of my former grad students yelled at me when he quit. I don’t know why I keep thinking about that or why knowing Holly has made me start questioning everything.
“Oh.” Still looking at her phone, Gwen nods. But after a moment she looks up, frowning. “Topher shouldn’t have said that to you. That was mean of him. I don’t think you’re misanthropic. Or a dick.”
“Good,” I blurt. I don’t try to smile again, since that seemed to freak her out. Instead, I add, “I don’t want you to be afraid of me.”
“I’m not,” she says quickly. And then adds tentatively, “But you do growl a lot.” Then she goes back to her phone, says, “Thank God you have us. According to the documents Holly sent, your official account needs one to three tweets a day. Insta needs two stories a week and one post.”
“That’s the stupidest—”
“Don’t worry. We’re taking care of it.” She turns the phone around to face me, as if I care or even know what she’s showing me. “And, can I just say how impressed I am by how fast your following is growing. It is off the charts.”
I try to return my attention to the notes in front of me, but she clicks some more and then slides the phone across the counter so I can’t avoid looking at it.
It takes me several moments—far too long—to realize what I’m looking at.
“This is me,” I say, picking up her phone.
“Yeah.” There’s an implied“well, duh”in her voice.
Which I resent.
I’m not a stupid man. And it’s not like I haven’t looked at myself in the mirror since Friday night. I have.
But it’s different seeing a picture of myself. Imagining the picture seen through the eyes of a stranger. It’s both me and not me.
The tag on the photo reads, “I don’t just study dirt. I study the connection between every living creature on this planet. We can’t heal our world until we understand that connection.”
I look from the phone back to Gwen, and cock my eyebrow, more than a little annoyed.
“What the fuck is this?”
“That’s a quote.”
“That’s not a quote.”
“Yes. It’s a quote.” She gives me another “duh” look and points to the papers in front of me. “Didn’t Holly tell you I helped with the speech? I listened to the audio clips from Friday night. That’s a direct quote. That’s how you described research to Holly. I think there’s even a transcript at the back.”
I flip through the pages to the end and, sure enough, there’s a section titled “Transcript.”
“When exactly did you and Holly do this?”
“She DMed me last night. We met up this morning at the pancake house.”
Great. That is just fucking great.
She DMed Gwen last night? Was that before or after she begged me to fuck her and then practically kicked me out after her ex showed up?
