Page 35 of Make Me Laugh

“I want this to be about both of us making money. You can choose to monetize HexedHeroine if you want… but that’s not what I’m offering you.” West fiddles with one of his rings, spinning it around his finger. “I need someone to do that for me. I need to continue to have these viral moments and sell out shows. I’m clearly not doing enough on my own. That video didn’t go viral because of me.”

I shake my head. “That’s not all true. Sure, it got pushed through the bookish algorithm because of me, but the people buying your tickets aren’t just readers.”

Frankie’s voice plays in the back of my mind: this could be life changing for you too.

If I let it…

Hasn’t my life changed enough in the last twenty hours? Did the universe really have to throw this at me too? How am I supposed to figure out what I want—what I need—when I’m not even sure what any of this means for me yet?

I could reclaim my identity. But what even is my identity?

Am I really Hex deep down, or am I the perfect-corporate Jo I became while trying to convince Dylan’s family I belonged in their pristine, high-society world?

Am I both? Can I be both? Do I want to be both?

“It’s only two days, Joey.” His words yank me out of a spiral before I can lose myself to the anxiety threatening to take me under.

The ice around my bones breaks, and I crack a fragmented smile.

“Two days.” I say it as a statement, not a question.

“Forty-eight hours,” West confirms. “I think that’s all the time you’ll need to fall in love with me.” He winks, biting his lip playfully.

I’m fucking obsessed with how much he does that.

He continues while I force my eyes from his mouth. “Kidding, of course, but it might be long enough to realize you can make more money in two months with me than you did all year at Vyce Talents.”

I glower. “How do you know where I used to work?”

“I called you after Enzo showed me the video. It went straight to voicemail. You blocked me in record time.” His grimace looks kind of real.

“My phone died,” I say quietly.

“Oh, thank God,” he laughs, putting a hand over his heart. “I can live with you not thinking I’m funny, but blocking me after the sex we had? I’d never recover.”

I puff a barely amused laugh.

Don’t be so uptight. Frankie’s words are a broken record in my brain.

My whole life has been planned since I was nine. I knew exactly what college I wanted to go to and exactly what I’d need to get in—what my GPA had to be, weighted and unweighted. How many hours of community service would look best. What extracurriculars would make me stand out. I graduated high school with my Associates from a local community college. I did everything according to plan and got accepted with a full-ride scholarship, which led to grad school and another full-ride, and then eventually the great jobs… And all that was to prove my mother wrong.

If she were still in my life, she'd be eating the words I’d heard her tell Grams before she walked out: “So what, she failed first grade! Who cares? If she’s anything like me and you, she won’t even graduate high school.”

At the end of the day, I don’t currently have a backup plan, and this is a way to ensure my rent is paid for at least a couple more months.

Live a little.

But if this is a business transaction… “I have one, well, two conditions.”

West nods. “Name your price.”

“No sex, and no fake dating.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

THE ONE WHERE HE SELLS HIS SOUL

Comment: He could do so much better. Her tattoos and piercings? YUCK!