Dear Noelle Breland,
Thank you for applying toThe Adventureverse. We’ve had some unexpected last-minute changes to this upcoming season’s cast and would like to speak with you and your partner about an available (click to read more)
Holy. Shit. For the first time today, the inescapable heat disappears behind full-body chills.
I want to call for Mr.Allen to come back. I want to tell him I get it—that suddenly, viscerally, I understand the Big Bang. It’s happening in me. I feel everything: the superheating, the matter and the antimatter, the explosion that founded a universe. As my shiny new heels sink into the Sparrowhill High School lawn, the very nature of pure energy collides and accelerates within me. I am a cosmic old-school mall coin funnel. I am the point of singularity itself.
And, dude. It fucking suuuuuucks.
Space expands, entropy increases, and the brave part of me—it’s small, but it’s there—clicks on the voicemail notification. It’s too loud as people continue to pour out of the stadium, so I read the auto-generated transcription.
This message is for Noel Brellin and you, me Pong a knee bon. Good morning, this is Aliona calling from the Adventure Verse casting team. We just sent you an email and I’d love to follow up with you as quickly as possible regarding an available spot we need to fill ASAP, so if you could give me a call back at this number as soon as you get this, I’d really appreciate that. Thanks and talk soon.
I return to the lock screen and watch as[now]turns to[2m ago], and[2m ago]turns to[4m ago].
What I wouldn’t give for galactic heat death right about now.
I could try to describe how much I love reality TV, how many insomnia-fueled Google searches for casting applications are in my history, how often I’ve imagined myself standing at the finishline ofThe Adventureverse. But nothing could capture my feelings in totality.
Ever since I was first baptized under the neon pink glow ofRuPaul’s Drag Race, I’ve been evangelical about the virtues of televised competition shows. Yes, they’re exploitative and manipulative sometimes, but they’re also sohuman. Secluded from the outside world, people can’t help but be the purest forms of themselves, and watching someone overcome their fears or cave to pressure will never not be exciting to me.
And obviously, I dream about the life-changing amounts of money and social media followers reality TV could give me. One season of a Netflix dating show and you’re a brand-sponsor magnet for life. The barrier to entry for influencer stardom is literally getting a callback on your audition tape.
Yet here I am, with everything I’ve daydreamed about in all my quiet moments sitting in the palm of my hand. And I can’t do it. I can’t talk to Yumi. I can’t berejectedby Yumi. Not when the dissolution of our friendship was one of the most devastating things to ever happen to me.
I click the X on my lock screen, tapping again when it prompts me to clear all notifications. I put my phone on airplane mode and slip it into my pocket.
I can’t.
I won’t survive that feeling again.
Chapter 4
Place
“Great speech, sweetie,” my dadcalls from the couch. The TV in front of him is muted, now tuned to pregame coverage for this afternoon’s playoff game.
“Thanks,” I say, pausing to watch the Florida players warm up as I kick my shoes off. “What time does the game start?”
“This”—he nods at the screen—“starts at one, and then Vegas and Vancouver play at eight.”
I hum acknowledgment and turn right, away from the living room and through my bedroom door. Our apartment is small, and much of our communication takes place through open doors to other rooms.
“I’m changing, don’t get up,” I say, stepping out of his line of sight.
“Wasn’t planning on it,” he replies before groaning at something I can’t see. “No way, c’mon.”
“What’s happening?” I strip off my cap, gown, and dress, in that order. My body is drenched in sweat, but I pull on a pair of basketball shorts and a sports bra to wear until I shower.
“Ads! One ofseven,” he spits, disgusted. “I pay three hundred dollars a year to watchsevenads before the game even starts? Garbage. They’re bleeding me dry.”
I laugh, undoing my hair and rebraiding it tighter to fix the damage my cap did. If there’s one thing my dad hates more than the Bruins, it’s the ads. I love that man.
Sliding my closet’s mirrored panel aside, I toss the crumpled ball of my cap, gown, and dress into the canvas laundry hamper that sits beneath my color-coded wardrobe. I’ll sort it later, but leaving the cap and the gown out would drive me crazy.
Our house used to be cluttered.
My mom was a maximalist, just teetering on the edge of hoarding. Whenever I had friends over, I felt like a museum curator:“This lamp shaped like a glass birdcage was unearthed at a vintage store in Sweden. To your right is a rare Hawaiian pothos she acquired in college—note, the leaves are bigger than my head. As we enter the hallway, you may recognize a modernist painting of the characters from a popular nineties television show,oil on canvas.”
