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I sink down deeper into my covers. I’ve had so many romantic daydreams about this person—long before I even knew who he was. And only now does it occur to me that even if he’s a perfectly nice person and not the sort whose cabin in the woods might feature in a Stephen King novel, he might very possibly have the general appearance of a troll.
It doesn’t matter, I tell myself.
But I already know it’s a lie.
I knot the corner of my comforter up in my fingers—and one of them pokes right through the material and into the fiber within.
And then an email appears.
“How’s this?” he asks.
I open the attachment and laugh again. It’s a picture of a golden retriever, looking suspiciously up at the camera as if it’s some torturous veterinary device.
Hmmm, I reply. Would our union be legal in America? It may be a technicality, but I’d think that would have come up in a background check.
Cocoa is offended, he replies. Also, she told me you wouldn’t fall for it.
Cocoa is beautiful, I answer. And it’s true. I always wanted a dog—a King Charles spaniel, specifically, but a golden wouldn’t be so far off. But what about her owner?
Okay, okay. Give me a minute.
I realize I’m grinning at my phone, and I’m glad no one’s here to see. I haven’t told anyone where I’ll be going, only that I have a friend in America who wants to fly me out for a visit. I think Anna suspects I have a romantic interest in this friend—she’s caught me humming my mother’s old tunes around the shop far more often over the last few weeks. I settle back on my pillow in the soft glow of the phone screen.
And then I wait. And wait. And wait.
Hunter
I stare at myself in my phone’s camera, but the sun is beginning to lower in the sky, sending stark rays through the window and into my office. I didn’t even realize I was squinting until I looked at myself.
Do I always look like that?
I stand up and move into the hall, Cocoa padding after me. She sits at my feet and looks mournfully up at me like she has no idea what’s come over me, but she doesn’t like it.
“I know,” I tell her. “It’s dinnertime.”
I rely on the sun through the window to remind me to get up from my computer to work, and if I squint into that light too long, Cocoa’s whining also shakes my concentration. If it weren’t for her, I’d probably starve to death on cloudy days.
Cocoa follows me down to the kitchen, mollified by a heaping scoop of kibble in her metal bowl, and I stand at the counter, holding my phone out and snapping pictures beneath the lights over the marble-top island. I take about a hundred of them, some smiling, some serious, some with an expression I thought might be sexy but when I consult the results, it turns out I look terminally constipated. I’m squinting too much in all of them, but when I try to snap a few more with my eyes wide open, I look like a serial killer.
I know I’m no supermodel, but I don’t remember myself being so obviously hideous.
Sophia
After a while, I can’t stand it anymore. I send another email.
I feel Cocoa could have taken a picture faster than this, and she has no thumbs.
A minute later, a response appears.
Sorry. I had to deal with something.
I hope it wasn’t one of his previous wives escaping from her closet or turning over her chamber bucket.
Here you go. Sorry, my camera isn’t the best.
Attached to the email is a picture, which I open and squint at the screen.
There he is. He’s got dark hair and dark eyes, and something of a bewildered, wincing expression. I smile, imagining this is what’s taken him so long—the clear inability to take a simple selfie.
