“Sandwiches?”
“—you never end up—”
“Finishing each other off?” I say.
For a moment I wonder if that’s tonight’s segue into Hal’s bedroom. My mind goes places…I hear the little click of his glasses colliding against mine when we kiss. I feel his fingers against my back and then tugging up on my shirt, desperate to get it out of the way.
But after a beat, he says, “The ending of that film is so much more honest than a romance.”
I see Romily’s giantLovelornblack circle in the upper left quadrant of failure expanding to swallow me whole.
Hal’s phone buzzes again and I feel myself tense up at the idea of witnessing another conversation with “writer friend.” I reach for my own digital security blanket. I’m surprised to see that I’ve somehow manifested a notification of my own.
waterwingluna16
hi its me kira
hi
hi
hello?
Is 1:57a.m.too late to respond to a nine-year-old’s Discord message? Probably. Is it a sudden revelation about one of her OCs? Maybe some new development in Lana and Lucas’s relationship?
“Hey,” Hal says, knocking my train of Kira thoughts off its tracks. For a second, I’m convinced the next words out of his mouth are going to be “We’re only sleeping with each other, right?”
I’m even holding my breath.
“Can you do that head-scratching thing?” Hal turns his back to me and slouches down even lower into the cushions. “It’s better than sex.”
With his back turned, he can’t see the way my eyes widen at that statement.Well, then!
I have a love-hate relationship with gently running my nails down Hal’s scalp. It’s a confusing form of casual intimacy. It feels like an afterglow activity, just before you drift off to sleep. But a few seconds later, maybe after a few scratches relax him properly, he adds, “That was a joke, Samantha.”
I pull out the mental whiteboard and reevaluate our coordinates. What does it mean that when Hal is in this kind of mood it’s like he’s gently scratchingmyscalp?
Panel 8:Medium shot of Jughead, leaning back, his head practically in Lydia Deetz’s lap.
SFX
soft snoring
12
“The back will look jaw-droppingat the altar,” the wedding dress consultant tells my mother. “And the condition is fabulous on this one. Just a tiny bit of boutique dust.”
I take a sip of my third glass of sparkling rosé offered by the shop assistant and watch my mom scrutinize her reflection in a six-way mirror. The consultant zips her into the blush-colored “effortless crepe sheath with a geometric keyhole back” and stands back.
“And you tightened up that button closure?” Mom asks.
The consultant nods and asks reverently, “How do you feel?”
My mother takes a slow breath, and this look comes over her face that doesn’t require any verbal explanation.
When she and Perry decided to have a ceremony, I assumedshe’d pick out a suit—more akin to something a mother of the bride would wear, but in a rich cream color. Instead, she began asking my opinions while scrolling through Pinterest boards featuring “Stunning Second-Wedding Dress Ideas.”
She did her dress shopping with a few friends, but insisted on bringing me along for the final fitting so I could see the gown in person.
