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This is the way it always goes, and a small part of me wonders if he’s pretending to be terrible at typing on purpose. That’s exactly the kind of thing a man would do; I’m certain of it.
I’d tilt my head in contemplation if I had the time.
Instead, I speed-type my way through the next ninety minutes of class and promise Kevin my notes when I get home.
He thanks me, stoops low to give me a kiss on the cheek, and then bounds up the stairs of the lecture hall four at a time to make it to his shift at the law library.
I grab my stuff at a much slower pace and head for the door, as I have much different obligations.
I’ve got a novel to read and a Starbucks booth to warm. Sounds luxurious, I know. But there’s a little more to it than I’m letting on.
When I first moved here to start law school, I did it on a wing and a prayer. I had a bit of money saved up, but not much, and my parents removed any chance of paying for more education when I took time off to travel the country.
But NYU Law was an option I couldn’t turn down, despite knowing it was going to take some sort of a miracle to keep myself from becoming homeless.
Rent in this city is ridiculously inflated—especially if you’ve ever lived anywhere else—and as a result, I live in a tenth-floor walkup.
But it’s a place I can rest my head at night, an amenity I pay for with something I, quite frankly, stumbled into.
I’ve always loved books, especially books about love. They make my days bright and my nights warm, and reading them has taught me almost as much about the world as traveling.
Every night, I’m able to immerse myself in a new city, a new time, a new world.
When I got really busy working three jobs to stay afloat, I started listening to audiobooks. They were a way to get my fix without having to stop moving.
After listening to close to a hundred of them, studying the way they sounded and comparing it to the way I read in my head, I realized I might be able to do it too.
It took me a month and a half to save up enough money to rent booth time to make a demo, but it turned out to be one of the best investments of my life.
I was hired a week later as a narrator for my first novel, and because I want to keep my law school life and narration life separate, I’ve been working under the pseudonym Elizabeth Aster—my late grandmother’s name—ever since. It’s how I’m paying for law school and my apartment and, give or take, enough food to keep myself from becoming malnourished.
It’s also my sanity in the middle of an extremely chaotic life.
Because the more involved in everything I became, the more I realized I didn’t want to give up any of it. I want to narrate books and be a lawyer. I want to put in enough hours to know what I need to pass the bar exam, and I still want to have time to read for pleasure.
And one day—one distant, fantastical, almost mythical day—I want to have a family. A guy who can’t get enough of me, a sex life to go along with it, and the support I’ve spent years giving to myself—only, from someone else.
They’re big dreams, all of which require a lot of work and sacrifice, but somehow, I know I’ll make them come true.
I always do.
Starbucks on Fifth and 32nd is jam-packed full of businesspeople and tourists alike as I squeeze my way in the door. The line is long and the baristas are busy, but I’m not here for the coffee anyway.
I’m here for the space and free Wi-Fi, plain and simple.
I weave my way through the crowd to the back of the small store and grab the only empty booth in the place before some guy wearing high-rise socks and sandals can snag it for himself.
He looks at me like he’s expecting an apology, but I’m sorry to say, he won’t get it.
There are few things I’m cutthroat about, but my booth in Starbucks to read between class and recording is absolutely one of them. I will cut a bitch and her baby should she get in the way of reading in the ambiance of a good dark roast, so you can imagine what I’d do to sandals guy if tempted.
Cutthroat? Maybe a little. But you have to have a spine of steel to live in this city.
I slide my bag onto the seat next to me, pull out my Kindle, and flip open the book I’ll be recording today.
It’s a really interesting story about a celebrity turned recluse, a bearded, hot-as-hell man who rescues a woman who gets separated from her tour group in the brush. She’s unconscious when he takes her back to his cabin, dresses her wounds, and nurses her back to health, but when she wakes up, boy oh boy, do things heat up.
