Moffy glances at me while I upright the salt.
Jealousy.I’m jealous of a nameless, beanie-wearing dickhole on a barstool. My ex-boyfriends would laugh at me for caring this much about a twenty-two-year-old celebrity.
I unwrap a piece of gum, and as soon as I peel the foil, Maximoff asks, “What’s your favorite color?”
The corners of my mouth curve upward. “My favorite color?” I repeat like he asked me a kindergarten question. Which he did. But I keep thinking,he’s not interested in that other guy anymore.
He’s more interested in me.
Maximoff crosses his arms. “What kind of high school names someonevaledictorianwhen they can’t even answer their favorite color?”
I lean forward and whisper lowly, “Says someone who doesn’t know what it’s like to be valedictorian.”
“Just admit it,” he says, “you don’t have a favorite color. It’s sad.”
“It’s silver,” I retort.
He nods a couple times, his own smile appearing, and just as he goes to speak, the waitress brings out two Fizz Lifes, a plate of loaded potato skins, and basket of French fries.
He stares off for a long second, lost in his head.
I wad a straw’s paper and toss the tiny ball at his face. It hits him square in the forehead, and he wakes up to glare at me.
He asks, “Do you know mine?”His favorite color.
“Orange.”
“You actually Google-searched me,” he says it like he caught me jacking off.
I almost laugh. “Man, you have amomwho buys orange plastic silverware and plates for any Maximoff-Hale-related event.” I count off my fingers, starting with my thumb. “Which includes your sixteenth birthday party, your prep school graduation?—”
“Alright.” He cringes. “You knew me when I was sixteen. I get it. The world gets it?—”
“The world doesn’t care that I was at your sixteenth birthday.”
He flips me off with one hand and grabs a potato skin with his other. He gestures at me with the potato skin. “Eat. Stop staring at me.”
“Not until you admit that I know you better than a Google search.”
Maximoff pauses eating, just to quiz me, “Why don’t I date anyone, Farrow?” That’s not a fact available on the web, and it’s also something he’s kept private from me.
“You’re not into relationships,” I guess.
“Not because I wouldn’t want to be. I just can’t.”
I shake my head. “I don’t follow.”
“I’ll never be in a relationship,” he tells me flat-out. “I’llneverexperience any kind of romance beyond a one-time hookup. Because once I date someone in public, media will hound them to the point of intrusion, vulnerability—I won’t ever subject someone to an extreme loss of privacy that they’ll never get back. I’ve accepted that this is my life, and I’m satisfied with that.”
My brows ratchet up. “You’renotsatisfied. You’re just resigned.” Before he protests, I ask, “Have you ever wondered what it’s like to hold someone’s hand romantically? To see them in your bed two nights in a row? Cook breakfast the next day, share clothes, wake them up before work? You’ve never imagined that?”
Maximoff shakes his head once. “I can’t.”
“That’ssad.” Because he wants to desire those things, but he’s not even allowing himself that.
And no one else among the Hales, Cobalts, or Meadows would sacrifice the possibility of a relationship just to protect their significant other from the media.
Only him.
