Page 25 of The Perfect Rom-Com

“I know,” I say more quietly, because Jack’s given me this talk before.

“You are competing with quite literally millions of other books.”

I nod. Just as I nod every other time.

“And part of my job, part of you trusting me to do my job, is to know when to pounce for the sake of your career. Right now isn’t it.”

My chest tightens. “But you just said you sent it to Baker. Are you saying they won’t get back with us?”

“I’m not saying that. I’m saying I’ve sent it around because you keep pestering me to do so. But the fact is, and you know this, I think the book could use some slashing. And you’re still an unknown author, with zero platform of your own—” He puts up a finger to stop me from interjecting. “Despite how incredibly frustrating it is to in reality be writing under Amelia’s name—”

“And we can’t—” I interject all the same.

“No.”

“And there’s no way to just, you know, let people wink-wink know—”

“No. I’m not going up against the Benedicts. No. Not unless we wanted matching orange jumpsuits, no.”

I grind my teeth and let him continue. This is maddening. The secret is maddening.

“The reality is, you’ve written an obscure—albeit talented—tale that’s approximately 30 percent too long for the traditional market with approximately four too many genres Vitamixed together. To add a cherry on top, we’re in an election year and the two politicians everybody’s eyes are on right now have decided to hire a little ghostwriter of their own and throw some ink on the page for a boost.”

Jack squeezes my hand. “Let me be clear, Bryony. I think you are a brilliant writer—everyone in the world, whether they know it or not, thinks you’re a brilliant writer—but your time just hasn’t come. Yet.” His eyes hold mine and he sighs. “Don’t look at me like that. I hate it when you look at me like that.”

“Like what?” I draw back and plunk into the back of my chair, my hopes deflating.

“Like I’ve crushed your dreams. And can you do something about this?” Jack gestures at Serghei, who is eyeing him now, elbows on the cash register, still with knife in hand. “Can you please . . . you know . . . laugh or something before this takes a tragic turn?”

I purse my lips defiantly.

Wait.

Throw out an exaggerated “Ha-ha-ha.”

And I know what Jack’s doing, how he’s using himself as a distraction to ease my unyielding disappointment and continued anxiety over waiting on my manuscript. It’s a funny thing, writing books that turn the world’s head but at the same time being unable to tell the world, “But look, look at this one!”

It’s an impossible-to-explain feeling, enjoying with quiet pride that you have done a good job at your work, but at the same time enduring incredible frustration in being unable to prove to publishers that you really do have what it takes. I may not have a million followers on a glowing platform. I may not have six books under my name with glowing sales and a strong readership to give them a sense of security. But I am Amelia Benedict. I wrote Smuggler’s Paradise, the novel set on the beach that sat on the New York Times bestseller list for a whopping fifty-six weeks. I made people laugh and cry at the end of A Leap of Faith and flock to the internet begging for more.

If only anyone could know the truth.

“Honestly, Bryony, what I don’t grasp is how you can’t just be happy,” Jack continues. “You have achieved the goal of every writer who has ever existed. You are successful and you get to claim anonymity. You aren’t receiving death threats. You don’t have to squeeze into all those dresses you say you hate in your closet for all those interviews. You don’t have to worry about smiling all the time. You just get to hole up in that apartment of yours and write to your heart’s content. And,” he says, raising a finger, “let’s not forget the little point that you are making sixty—not six—times the amount with this little ‘side hobby’ you don’t appreciate than you are going to get for your literary–magical realism–historical fiction–nonfiction memoir with a dash of mystery. You are the writer for Amelia now. The one. With a higher salary than any ghostwriter on the planet now. Thanks to me. So how about we just drink to that and not worry about anything else? I’ll let you know the second someone jumps on board with your book. But in the meantime, let’s just enjoy what we’re building up for you here. Now. My turn. On to my email. I know you saw it.”

This isn’t the answer I want.

It’s never the answer I want.

But we’ve talked about it enough that it’s enough to live on. Crumbs to keep me going another day.

Enough hope to subsist for a little while longer.

Serghei sets our dinners on the table, and after the typical back-and-forth between Jack and him, we dig in. Honestly, I think they both kind of like it.

“Do you think you can get it in by August?” Jack says, fork punching into a meatball.

I frown as I dip a meatball into my mashed potatoes. There’s that exhausting pressure again. “I don’t know, Jack . . .”

“Two weeks earlier. Just two weeks.” Jack makes an inch motion with his fingers, as if what he’s saying is the easiest thing to do in the world. Just like the time I turned in A Room for Rose and he read it over and suggested casually that I should write it again from a different point of view.