I’ve been here for over three years.
Keep to myself as much as I can—being the only dude at a commune of women who’ve gone viral for one thing or another presents a variety of challenges.
And fuck knows I leaned on Mabel so much in those first two years that I still feel like I’ll never repay her, especially since she’s given me the same thing she gives the women who rotate in and out of here while recovering from their five minutes of fame.
A safe place to recover.
And there’s been plenty to handle and recover from since Ava died.
“What’s your name?” I ask the woman while keeping half an ear open for Lav in the next room.
She snorts. “You’re the one person on earth who doesn’t know?”
“I’m Heath. Live in the manager’s quarters across the vineyard and fix things up when they break. Here to replace thetoilet. It’s been leaking. I didn’t know you were here. Don’t know who you are. Don’t know why you went viral, but I’d like to help, please.”
She squints one eye open the barest amount.
I keep my eyes trained on her face while I lower into a squat in the midst of a pile of clothes and the broken shower curtain, holding my body loosely to communicate that I’m not a threat.
“Well, now you’ve seen everything the internet’s seen,” she grumbles.
Shit.
Nudity on the internet is about the worst that it gets for women who show up here.
“I don’t go online unless I need to research how to fix something or check messages from Lav’s teachers,” I tell her.
“Are you married? I was told this place is women-only.”
“My wife was Ava Benton. Heard of her?”
Her brows furrow in that way most people’s do when they hear a familiar name. “Maybe.”
“She had a popular social media channel on healthy living.”
“Oh, fuck,” she whispers.
Yeah.
She knows who Ava was.
That’s why I came here initially.
When my wife publicly announced she’d been diagnosed with terminal breast cancer at thirty-four, she became—well, what most women who arrive at this compound are when they get here.
Overwhelmed by and out of their element from the sheer volume of attention that they suddenly have from the world.
Usually negative attention.
In our case, we had a massive outpouring of support too, but even that became problematic when our supporters went to internet war with our haters.
All while Ava was dying.
“Mabel let Lavender and me stay on the property after Ava passed.” It’s not often I say the words out loud. Mabel usually preps visitors for who I am and why I’m here before I meet them. A lot of my scars have healed, but I still struggle with the looks I get for being a widowed dad. “Lav’s pretty attached to the crew around here.”
“I— I’m sorry,” she murmurs.
“Life does its thing. Now. You have a name?”
