My hands stop moving, covered in dough. “Um, why does that matter?”
“You know why it matters.”
I glance around my kitchen, at the teal backsplash I got on a deep discount from a home improvement store and had Nick install for me one weekend a couple of years ago. I shift my gaze and focus on the floral pictures with frames I painted in coral, yellow, and green, the ones I plan on hanging up at Nick’s once he agrees to let me redecorate. I spin around and come face-to-face with my succulent named Geoff—the only plant I can manage to keep alive because it thrives on neglect—and remember how I tried and failed to get Nick to let me bring in some plants to brighten up the place.
No matter how hard I try, the universe won’t let me forget about Nick, not even in my kitchen, the most sacred of spaces.
“Nope. I don’t get why it matters if my boss cares about who I’m hooking up with.”
“Because you’re meant to be together, Chloe! Because—”
She keeps talking but I groan through it. There was once a time when Annie refrained from commenting on my love life. Sure, she would do this little half smile and stare off into space whenever she was around Nick and me, but I knew what she was thinking, even though she clearly thought she was being so smooth.
But that time ended when the news of her script went public, and now she thinks she has permission to tell me the grand, overarching truth about my feelings. Which is bullshit, because they’re my feelings, and this is my life, and I’m the one who has to deal with everything.
It’s easy for her to sit in Drew’s fancy LA apartment and tell me that I should give in to my physical feelings for Nick, because she isn’t the one who has to deal with the fallout. She isn’t the one who has to deal with how weird things already are, and how much weirder they would be if they went any further and fell apart. I’m the one who needs this job, who needs to take care of my dad, and who apparently needs to take care of Milo on account of he’s an overgrown baby. Annie doesn’t get it.
But I don’t say any of that, because I’m pretty sure a lot of it is mean and it violates the unwritten BFF code, which clearly states that you shouldn’t give your best friend a verbal smackdown when they’re trying to help you. Even if they’re really, really wrong.
So instead, after I stick the dough in the fridge to chill, I take her off speaker and hold the phone to my ear as I say, “Annie. Listen, I get it. I get it that your life is a romantic comedy, because you’re the one who’s obsessed with romantic comedies. That’s never been me.”
“True. You’re obsessed with stuff about murder, because there’s something wrong with you.”
“First off, there’s nothing wrong with me, lots of women love to learn about murder and I’ll forward you this article about it and—wait, no. We’re not changing the subject here. All I’m saying is that I know your life is a rom-com and you love it, but that’s not what my life is like. I’m not like you, all cute and tiny and tripping into movie stars—”
“That only happened one time.”
“—and finding myself in hilarious situations. That’s not me.”
“It kind of is you, though. You have a great wardrobe, like any romantic comedy star—”
“I don’t dress this way for anyone but me!” I shout.
“And you are cute, and in case you didn’t notice from the hundreds of rom-coms you’ve watched with me, ‘not believing in love’ is, like, the number one indicator that you’re about to fall in love.”
Well, she has me there. But still. Romantic comedies are supposed to be fun, and cheesy, and above all they need to have that predictable happy ending where two people solve their problems and surmount their obstacles and kiss in a rainstorm to celebrate their perfect lives and perfect faces. None of that’s going to happen here. If there were a rom-com about my real life, it would be a pretty big bummer because it wouldn’t have a happy ending and it would have a terrible Rotten Tomatoes score.
“Annie. I love you. But my life is my life, and I don’t have the time to