“He’s so hot. Good for him. Honestly, whoever this guy is, he’s my hero,” Annie is saying. “Making a little space for himself in this weird little section of the internet and raking it in.”
“Little?!” one of the old ladies shouts. I wince. “Fuck your ‘little’. He’s gotta have carved out a full eight in?—”
This is about as much as I can handle.
I crawl away. All the way back to the car. Slither like a snake in the grass. Grab the Pacojet from the middle of the driveway, where I apparently left it in my panic.
I close the car door as quietly as possible.
My ears buzz in the silence.
Annie Li doesn’t know.
Annie Li thinks I’m hot.
And… I am Annie Li’s hero?
Do I fuckin’ believe that?
Yeah. Yeah, I do.
Not just because she said it when she didn’t know I was listening—although that helps. That makes it feel really real. No performative teasing, no bravado, no games. Just Annie and her opinions and her absolutely unfiltered mouth, talking to a room full of old ladies about my dick like it’s a national treasure.
But it’s not just that. It’s what she said to me at the lookout. In the forest, too.
She told me the truth. Her truth. She didn’t have to. She could’ve shrugged it off or made a joke or steered the whole thing back toMy Cousin Vinnyor grisly murders or industrial techno, but she didn’t. She let me in. Told me her mess and her history, the shit she went through after college and how it changed her. I saw it—the jagged parts under the veil. The realness underneath the mask.
And that’s been her pattern, hasn’t it? Every day, a little more. Not the whole story, not all at once. But enough. Enough to know she’s choosing to trust me.
I… I kinda wanna give her the same thing.
I could keep this to myself. I could let her keep thirsting over the version of me behind the camera, the faceless cock on the internet.
But something about Annie makes me want to show her. Makes me want to own it.
Makes me want to say: yeah, that’s me. All of it.
But I also wanna mess with her a little.
A laugh bubbles up in my throat, low and involuntary. It startles me. Feels like it came from somewhere deeper than humor.
I want to see her gorgeous fuckin’ face when it clicks. When she connects the dots and realizes she’s been talking about mydick like it's a museum artifact. I want to be there when her eyes go wide and she short-circuits. I want to see the carnage. I want to be the carnage.
Because Annie is mayhem—grumpy and stubborn and brilliant and unfiltered—but she’s also honest. Loyal. Not nice, but kind in that bone-deep way that makes you feel like maybe the world isn’t total trash.
And I want her to know me. Not just the guy she used to hate. Not just the one who flirts and bickers and cooks. Me.
The illiterate gorilla of a man she doesn’t realize she’s been drooling over in two different formats.
I lean back in the seat, grinning slow and wide, heat rising in my chest like it’s got nowhere else to go.
She is so fucked.
I call Michelle, the head chef of the restaurant, tell her I’ll swing by tomorrow. Ask her what she’s making for family meal. I go right to the grocery store. I buy a steak.
I drive back to the house. Lock all the doors and pull all the blinds shut. Set up my camera equipment.
I start recording.
