“Please.” It’s my turn to roll my eyes. “If you break up with me, I’m going to have bigger problems than an orange tattoo.”
“Such as?”
“Such as a character known as Fox Caldwell, remember him? I still have at least two books to write, and I need the inspiration, so you’re stuck with me.” I nudge him playfully to distract myself from the painful thought of losing him. “Not to mention I’d be devastated.”
His eyes bore into mine, steady but wary. “Me, too.”
I pull open the door to the tattoo shop, and an hour later we walk out with orange blossoms on our inner forearms. I can’t help but stare at mine as we walk side by side in the dark, and I like how permanent it feels.
West hates Times Square. He doesn’t say it, but he scowls as we shoulder our way through the crowds and moves closer to me, his fingers tightening on my waist every time we nearly collide with other tourists.
“I think most New Yorkers avoid Times Square at all costs,” I shout to be heard over a band of street performers. I wonder if he picks up the subtext beneath my words: If I lived here—ifwelived here—we wouldn’t be tourists anymore. Over the last forty-eight hours, I’ve been unable to stop myself from imagining a life here. Every coffee shop we pass could be the one where I write the sequel to my book. Every train stop could bemystop. It feels like a puzzle piece clicking into place.
“I can see why” is all West says, and my heart dips. We stop for a selfie and get scammed into tipping five dollars to an unknown character who photobombed us. Minutes later we come face-to-face with a wall ofINYmerch, and West’s scowl deepens as he dons his new beanie and gloves. “We look like a gift shop threw up on us.”
“We look hilarious. Danielle’s going to laugh.” I glance at my phone, looking for the fastest train to take us to the Lower East Side.
“Are you sure it’s not weird for me to be there?”
“Why would it be weird?”
He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Because I’m not her client.”
“I told her you’re coming, and she said it was fine,” I say, regretting it instantly. “More than fine. She’s excited to meet you!”
“I’m worried I’ll feel out of place,” he confides, which is exactly what I’ve been trying to avoid. “I can hang out here until you’re done.” He gestures to the famous red stairs in the center of the square, and I know instinctively that if he sits here for the rest of the evening, his opinion of the city will have fallen into hell by the time I return.
“Iwantyou there,” I say. He presses his lips together, thinking. “I always want you where I am,” I tell him seriously.
“That might not always be possible,” he says, as if my skin isn’t still sore from my fresh tattoo, as if we didn’t just dosomething to permanently cement our relationship. He shakes his head like he’s shrugging off a bad thought. “Ignore me. I’m coming. I can’t wait to meet Danielle.”
“West’s a writer,too!” I tell Danielle an hour later as we sit in a booth, an expensive and foreign cocktail in front of me. The dark and bustling bar has an industrial feel. The walls are exposed brick, and pipes and beams are visible where the ceiling should be.
“Barely,” West says quickly before taking a big gulp of his soda.
Danielle is shorter than I expected—barely five feet—with a mane of curly brown hair. Her size and Southern accent are immediately disarming, and I can see why her other clients refer to her as a “shark in disguise.” She is charming and friendly, and after the past few months of phone calls and emails, we fall into an easy conversation about my book, how excited she is to submit it to publishers, and her recommendations for the best pizza in the city. West has been polite but uncharacteristically quiet, and he’s resisted all my attempts to pull him into the conversation.
“He’s being modest, but he’s anincrediblewriter,” I tell Danielle.
“What do you write?” Danielle asks him.
“Nothing worth talking about,” West says quickly. Under the table, I nudge him with my foot. He shifts in his seat. “Fiction. Um…literary, I guess.” He grimaces, and I feel a twinge of annoyance. Writers pay good money for the opportunity to pitch their books in person, and he’s wasting this chance.
I shoot him a curious look before turning back to Danielle.“He blurs the line between fantasy and reality in a really beautiful way that always leaves you guessing what’s real.”
West fixes his eyes on the table, and I remember how uncomfortable he gets talking about his own stuff. Luckily, I’m here and can do it for him.
“His writing inspires mine so much. I can’t even tell you how good he is. He was always the best in our writing classes.”
“Do you have a manuscript?” Danielle asks.
West clears his throat. “I’ve been working on something, yeah. It’s sort of like a coming-of-age thing.”
“I’d love to read it when it’s ready,” Danielle says, and I nearly jump out of my seat in excitement.
He looks stricken by the offer. “Oh. Um, thank you, but no,” he says abruptly. I shoot him a look.Why is he being so rude?
“I mean, it’s not even close to being done. I’m not as fast as Mars,” West adds.
