Laney and Sabrina and Zen and Grey and Theo and the triplets listened to an early copy last night.
They’re all asking the same question.
Are you sure?
But they’re saying theotherthing Jonas has said too, and the same thing that my PR coach told me just fifteen minutes ago.
If this is the absolute truth and you won’t care if Bash hears it in another ten or twelve years, do it.Be in control and do it.
“Do you know what I finally realized about the wedding and Hawaii and Fiji and me?” I say as I stroke his arm.
“What’s that?”
“I was the island then. I was alone. I was mad at my friends and scared they were more mad at me. I was mad at Theo and afraid I was a burden instead of the kind of family I wanted to be for him. I was mad at myself. I was mad at the world. I put up all of those barriers and I didn’t want to let anyone in. Iwouldn’thave let anyone in if it weren’t for you.”
“I guess sometimes getting drunk and passing out on the wrong porch ends okay-ish,” he murmurs with a light grin.
“Please don’t ever say that in front of Bash. He’ll take it as life advice.” I kiss his jaw. “But my point is—I’m not alone anymore. Whatever anyone else says about me—it doesn’t matter. You matter. Bash matters. My family matters. My friends matter. What the world thinks of me and you and us—it doesn’t matter. I still want my version of the truth to be out there, but what happens after you hit that button—so long as you’re still here and I’m still here and Bash is safe and my friends and family are still my friends and family—that’s what I care about most. Not what strangers on the internet think of me.”
“Okay,” he says softly. “You’re ready. Push the button.”
“Wait,me?”
He scoots us closer to the desk. “Unless after all of that, you’ve changed your mind?”
I shake my head. “No mind-changing. I mean it. But I don’t want to hit the wrong button and erase everything or—”
“You won’t hit the wrong button.” He jiggles the mouse, making his monitor blink on.
I don’t recognize the app he has pulled up, but when he hovers the pointer over a giant yellow button that sayspublish, I get the gist of it. “That one?” I whisper.
“That’s the one.”
“The big yellow one right here?” I shift to take control of the mouse.
He puts his hand over mine, holding me steady. “Yep. That button controls your podcast destiny.”
I snicker.
Can’t help it.
He smiles at me, warm patience and easy acceptance.
“Okay,” I say. “I’m doing it.”
“I’m waiting.”
“Right now.”
“Okay.”
“I’m pressing the button.”
“I can see that.”
“Are you sure this is the right podcast? The right files? It’s going to all of the right places?”
“Checked and double- and triple-checked myself. Here. Look.Episode one-thirty. The Guest Who Changed My Life.”
