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And could she even do this? Be on TV? In front of thousands of people?
As each thought invaded, she whacked it away like one of those plastic moles in a carnival game. This was not the time to be scared. She should be celebrating!
When she got home, Everly found Becca in her usual afternoon spot: curled up on the couch in front of the big bay windows in the living room, making the most of the last rays of natural light. She had her sketchbook propped up against the mountain of a dog lying beside her. Bagel was a mix of yellow Lab and pit bull and had somehow managed to inherit the largest genes from each breed.
Holding up her free hand, Becca signaled that she needed another second of silence to finish her pencil strokes. She’d been an artist basically from birth, and her first love was making character sketches for fans and creators, but her steady income came from illustrating picture books. One of her college professors had helped her to get a foot in the door, and by the time she’d graduated, she already had enough books on her résumé that Ellis had filled the upstairs hallway with poster-sized reproductions of their covers.
It was one of the many things that Everly loved about her best friend. Becca hadn’t hesitated to chase her dreams, while Everly didn’t let herself have any.
Another box she was too afraid to open.
Maybethatwas whatOTPScould help her change.
“Okay. Done.” Becca gently eased her sketchbook closed and set it on the coffee table.
A whoosh of air escaped Everly’s lips. “Thank god, because holy crap do I have news.” She didn’t even make it across the room to the couch before blurting out, “I’m going to be onOn the Plus Side.”
Becca’s eyes widened, the palm of her hand that had been smoothing Bagel’s short tan fur coming to a stop. “Wait. What?”
“Jazzy and Stanton showed up at my office this morning. Out of nowhere.”
Becca shook her head. “Shut. Up.What?”
“Stanton took my desk hostage. He was answering the phones and going through my drawers. He dismantled my tea station.”
Everly had spent her first three months at Matten-Waverly painstakingly building that setup. She’d found this perfect little apothecary cabinet that housed each of the teas and an adorable mug tree and matching tray to display cups and fixings. It was organizational nirvana. And Stanton was Godzilla.
Becca clutched her chest. “Not the tea station.”
Everly tossed a pillow at her head. “Jazzy was charming everyone, as usual. At one point, she was holding court with the entire design department, giving them all fashion advice.” Everly grabbed Becca’s hand, as if her best friend wasn’t already captivated. “She talked toJames.Forever.” And despite his scorching levels of hotness, Jazzy had shown no anxious tics. No weird hesitations. No silences that stretched out into the great beyond. And they were laughing so much. Not once did Jazzy cut herself off or force a tight-lipped smile to strangle the too-loud sound at the back of her throat. Jazzy Germaine never thought she was too much.
“No.”Becca rose up on her knees to lean her small frame across Bagel. She grabbed Everly’s hands and waved them wildly in her own. “NO!”
“YES,” Everly yelled back.
Here, with her best friend, in her brother’s house, she could do that. It wasn’t like at work or out in public, where Everly worried what people would think of her and her naturally loud voice. Or her tendency to get overly excited. Or her unfiltered sense of humor. All the things that made her mother tense up when Everly didn’t rein them in.
The relief of it, of letting her voice, her whole self, justbe,was like releasing a breath she’d trapped in her lungs for too long.
“They were justthere. In the flesh. Like they’d stepped right out of the TV. And so was the showrunner, Sady Sanders. And some cameraman.” Everly wasn’t sure why she’d added that last part. Obviously, there was a crew: it was a TV show. But Logan, with his rough voice and plaid shirt and uncannily blue eyes, was still stuck in her head. A splinter she couldn’t dislodge. “They hung around the rest of the day taking… what did he call it… B-roll? For some special they’re going to air the week before season three starts.”
“I can’t believe you met them.” Becca was practically bouncing with excitement. “And they’re going to totally bibbity-bobbity-boo you.” She flicked a hand in the air like she had a magic wand. “This is amazing.”
“Itisamazing.” Everly’s voice caught a little on the last syllable.
Becca dropped back on her heels, her features scrunching together. “But?”
Everly heaved out a breath. There were so many contradicting thoughts in her head it was hard to shape them into something logical. “Obviously, I want to do this. But I don’t know if I should. If Ican.”
“What do you mean? Of course you should. You’re anOTPSsuperfan.”
“But all those people…”
Bagel had set his head in Everly’s lap, and she ran his short, folded ears gently through her fingers. Something about the presence of ananimal—their warmth, the way they were so uncomplicated, loved so easily—had always helped to ease her nerves, and already she could feel her heartbeat slowing.
“I don’t want to humiliate myself in front of a TV audience.”
Everly’s mother, half of social media, random passersby on the street, everyone had their own ideas about how someone who looked and acted like Everly should exist in the world. And navigating it all—insisting that she had the right to live exactly as she was—was exhausting. It was easier to blend in. Be quiet.
