Page 50 of Hollywood, Ending

The first time I asked the social virologist if she wanted to stay over, she said, “Either way is fine, to be honest,” and I thought she meant that it was fine if we hooked up and fine if we didn’t, but what she meant was that it was fine if she stayed over after we had sex and fine if she didn’t stay over after we had sex. And then I said, “Maybe we should wait,” and she said, “For what, marriage?” And I laughed it off, and we had sex, and she stayed over.

After she fell asleep, I got up and took a shower and barfed in the toilet for reasons that weren’t entirely clear to me. It wasn’t like I was thinking about him so much as I knew that he was in the room, that indeed he was in every room. And then when I finished showering and got back into bed, the social virologist rolled over and put one arm over me and said, “You smell nice.”

_____

I got up to crack the door open for Juniper and then went back to the bed, on top of the covers, pillows scrunched up behind me so I was mostly sitting. I was scrolling through the absurdly expensive on-demand movies when she walked in without knocking and said, “Hiya.” Juniper was wearing faintly pink sweatpants and an Ariana Grande T-shirt.

“Say anything bad about Ariana Grande and I’ll fucking cut you,” she said as she leapt onto the bed and then sat down, legs crossed. She was barefoot. Her hair pulled back tight. She wasn’t wearing any makeup. “I feel very looked at,” she said.

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay. You can look at me. I’m looking at you.” I didn’t know what to say to that, so I just kept looking. “Can I tell you what I see?”

“Sure,” I said.

“I see my Gavinth.” I laughed and rolled my eyes. She launched forward into a hug that was also kind of a wrestling move, and I laughed and hugged her back. “We are going to have so much fun making war together.”

“Also the money,” I said.

“Also the money! So much money! Just to wear armor and pronounce place names correctly.”

“Altar of Har’koa,” I said.

“Dazar’alor,” she answered.

“Am I correct in guessing that you’ve not just read the book but also listened to all the fan podcasts and everything?”

“I have joined the official fan Discord. I was placed in a guild.”

“A guild?”

“Yes, a fan group within the fan group. It’s a lovely community. A bit overwhelming, though.”

“Awesome,” I said. “You can get me up to speed in the makeup trailer on the first day of the shoot.” Juniper smirked at me, and I thought about that emoji again.

She lay down on the bed, pulled me toward her, and raised up her phone. As she played with angles and facial expressions, I shrank away and said, “Must we?”

“It’s just for Instagram,” she said. “I mean, we are in bed together; what’s wrong with taking a picture of us in bed together?”

“Because we aren’t in bed together.” She raised her phone again, and I rolled away again.

“Can we just get the terrible part of the day over?”

I rolled back toward her and put my arm around Juniper, then smiled for the camera. Juniper took a few pictures, chose one, filtered it very subtly, then showed it to me for my approval.

“Caption?” I asked.

“I was thinking, ‘cud with my bud.’ All lowercase. ‘Cud’ as in cuddle, of course.”

“Of course,” I said.

“You think you are very special for dismissing the immense power of Instagram,” she said as she posted the picture.

“I do.”

“Let’s watch a movie.”

“Okay, but are you going to check to see how many likes the picture has every five minutes and then try to use that information to guess the approximate opening weekend numbers for Andy Warhol Never Gets Old and then tell me that I should be happy and/or sad about how well and/or poorly our movie is going to do?”