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God, I love him.
“So, me and you, we’re going to do this for a while?” I whispered against his persistent mouth as soon as the kiss broke, instead of taking in air. He chuckled, leaning his forehead against mine.
“At least until we look like these creepy fucking puppets.”
It was the best damn declaration of commitment I’d ever heard.
Not a proposal or a diamond ring or a promise of marriage. It was the opposite of traditional. But it was one hundred percent us, Reed and Lola—two weirdos who’d spend the rest of their days loving, laughing, fighting, and feeding squirrels with the creepiest marionettes the world had ever seen.
This is love, my mind whispered, the mental wall I’d put up long gone. I didn’t want to hide anything from Reed anymore. I wanted to share everything with him—my heart, my soul, my life.
“This is love,” I whispered into his ear, and he responded by wrapping his arms tightly around my body and clutching me close to his chest.
In that instant, I knew, with his soap and essence flooding my nostrils, there wasn’t anything better.
We belonged to one another.
I hopped off the trolley—while it was stopped, I’m not Reed Luca, for shit’s sake—and started the short walk toward Judy’s School of Palmistry. As outside of the box as it was, I’d been determined to be able to read palms—or have a certificate that said I could—ever since one gloomy afternoon when Reed had audaciously proclaimed that I couldn’t.
If you’d talk to my instructor Judy about the art of palmistry, she’d probably prattle on about how hands are a detailed map of who we are, and the lines within them are a result of brain-directed activity which tells us how we respond to life emotionally, mentally, and physically…and blah blah blah.
That all sounded fantastic.
But my motives were more of the self-serving type than a comprehensive step toward being self-aware. In laymen’s terms: I just wanted the diploma so that Reed would believe any line of bullshit I told him about his palms. Basically, I wanted him to do what I told him, when I told him, and Reed wasn’t the kind of guy who just went along with whatever anyone said.
I want Reed to quit smoking? Easy peasy. I’ll just tell him his palm says it is an urgent matter that he stops.
I want us to take a vacation to the Maldives? Wish granted. Reed’s palm says we need to.
If that wasn’t brilliance in manipulation form, I didn’t know what was.
Before I reached the doors to Judy’s, my phone started vibrating against my hip. I pulled it out of my pocket to see who it was.
Incoming Call: The Devil
I paused outside the entrance and took the call. As annoying as these calls usually were, this was a horse of a different color. I’d been trying to get ahold of Joe for the past twenty-four hours, and the bastard had been avoiding my calls.
“Hey, Joe.”
“I’ve got five voice mails from you, and not one of them makes a bit of sense,” he said, forgoing a greeting completely. “What’s this urgent matter you’re rambling on about?”
“Well, Joe, I’ve got an idea that’s worth gold, but I don’t have a lot of time to chat right now. I’ve got a palmistry class in ten minutes.”
“Ministry?” he fired back in confusion. “You’re becoming a nun? I didn’t even know you were Catholic.”
“Palm-istry, Joe,” I corrected. “You know, as in the art of reading palms.”
“Jesus Christ,” he muttered. “Why do I even bother asking for clarification? Pretty sure the nun gig would’ve made more sense than you paying someone to give you a bunch of hullabaloo in the form of reading lines on your hands.”
“Hullabaloo?”
“Yeah. Hullabaloo,” he retorted. “Otherwise known as a load of bullshit. Hands are hands, Lola. Not some goddamn portal into predicting the future.”
“You’re such a pessimist, Joe.”
“I’m a realist,” he corrected. “Anyhoo, I guess it’s none of my business what kind of hogwash you waste your time and money on. What’s this idea you were prattling on about?”
“It’s a brilliant idea.”
“The last time I heard those words from your lips, you wanted me to give an angry cat his own column.”
“It was Grumpy Cat,” I amended. “And that’s still a brilliant idea, by the way.”
“Yeah, right.” He scoffed. “I’m still trying to understand how having a four-legged animal on my payroll would benefit the paper.”
“One day, you’re going to open the New York Times to that cat’s face in the byline of his column, and you will feel like a total failure for not listening to me.”
“I’d love to know how a fucking cat would be capable of writing his own column.”
Obviously, he was warming up to the idea. I smiled.
“I’d write it.”
“Then, it wouldn’t be his column. It’d just be you writing another column,” he retorted.
“It’d be from his perspective.”
“How you get me to entertain these conversations is truly beyond me.”
Instead of focusing on the offensive nature of his statement, I pulled the conversation back to the matter at hand. I had a class to get to, and time was ticking.
“Grumpy Cat’s column aside, I have another brilliant idea.”
“If this has anything to do with puppies interviewing celebrities or pigs writing food reviews or even fucking clowns, I don’t want to hear it.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Joe. No one likes clowns.” Stephen King had pretty much ruined the reputation of clowns. Once you’d read or watched the film adaptation of It, the circus and balloon animals and red-nosed jesters spelled the opposite of happy smiles and laughing children. They were the kinds of things nightmares were made of.
“Then, what is this brilliant idea?”
“Well, what would you say if I could get one of the most sought-after columnists in the San Francisco area on your payroll?”
“I’d say keep going.”
“It’s a guy who’s been out of the game for a little while, but he isn’t short on opportunities. He’s just yet to find the right match.”
“And you think we’d be the right match?”
“Yep.”
“And what kind of column would he write?”
“A satire column without boundaries. Nothing would be off the table.” At least, I was pretty sure that was what he’d write…
“All right,” he said after a pregnant pause. “I’m intrigued. Who is this mystery man you think could fill these kind of existential shoes?”
I closed my eyes as all of the truly full-circle notions of what I was doing rushed into my mind like a stampede. “Reed Luca.”
A shocked laugh barked from his lungs. “Are you shitting me right now?”
I opened my eyes, and as the sound of hoofbeats faded into the distance, a smile settled onto my face in their wake. “Nope.”
“You honestly think he’d be a good match?”
“Yep.” I wasn’t joking, and I had no doubts. Destiny was rounding the goddamn bend, and I could smell the sweetness of the finish line.
“And this doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that you just so happen to live with this guy?”
“Nope,” I answered honestly. Reed’s mind had so much to offer, but I was already reaping those benefits. This move wasn’t even about Reed—it was about everyone else.
“This sounds like a risk, Lola.”
“I can assure you it’s a good risk. One you’ll only profit from.”
“I don’t know…”
“You do know,” I chimed in. “His one and only YouTube video still gets thousands of views daily, and the instant he left the Journal, every other paper in the area tried to snatch him up.”
“Fine,” he finally answered. “I’ll consider this, but only under one condition.”
“And what’s that?”
“I want one thousand words from him on my desk by Monday,” he announced. “I need to see what this no-boundaries satire column will look like.”
“Deal.” A victorious smile crested my lips.
Even though Reed didn’t have a clue about his future column, it didn’t matter. It also didn’t matter that I now had to convince Reed to write a column by Monday.
Just minor details.
“All right, JoJo. I’ll see you on the flip side.”
“JoJo,” he muttered, and the exasperation in his voice could’ve been heard in LA. “Sometimes I wonder why I always find myself letting everything slide with you.”
“Because you love me,” I teased. “And if you could clone me, you’d do it because I’m your favorite employee.”
“Yeah,” he said, but it wasn’t in the form of agreement. “I need a clone of you about as much as I need to give my wife another credit card.”
“Uh-oh…more shipments from Groupon?”
Joe’s wife had a penchant for buying anything and everything that came with a sale or a coupon. And Groupon was her number one go-to site. About a month ago, I’d stopped by the offices for a meeting and witnessed one of her genius purchases—The Banana Bunker.
