3
NOVA
After the show, my problems felt lighter. I allowed myself to get lost in the laughter of the crowd and our connection with the performers. When the headliner told a story about a toxic friendship, it felt like she’d written the joke specifically for me. It wasn’t unlike someone sitting in church and hearing the pastor speak directly to them, but I much preferred my new religion.
I was having an NA beer with a couple friends I’d met up with, friends I exclusively saw at comedy shows and never outside this specific scene. New York was funny like that—it allowed for a network of connections in niche communities that could remain sacred and separate forever. I enjoyed the feeling of slipping in and out of identities and realities, a phantom traveling through walls, listening to interesting conversations, dipping as far as I wanted to go into a particular world and changing my focus one day to the next. The city was a tapestry of endless intertwining fates, and it didn’t take much to unravel one weave or begin a new pattern.
Ella thanked the bartender and slid her second drink closer. She was one of the event coordinators, and her partner Derekjust abandoned us at the bar to play pool with some guys. The energy of the upstairs bar area was slightly rowdy and boyish, but it was tolerable when you were with the right people.
“How’s the new book coming along?” she asked.
Wow. To think I once considered Ella my friend. And now, here she was, interrogating me about extremely sensitive and personal information such as how the new book was coming along.How dare she.
“Great!” I chirped. “The floodgates are open, the muses are singing, et cetera.” I sipped my drink.
“Aw, that’s wonderful, Nova. Every time I see someone reading romance on the subway, I tell them about your books!”
I forced my lips into a small smile and shifted in my seat. “I made a burner account,” I blurted, because it was the first thing I thought of, and I was uncomfortable. Ella’s efforts were appreciated and touching, but compliments and public promotional efforts made me viscerally recoil.
“Big step,” she said. “The stalkee in question is Lorelei, I presume?”
I resented the insinuation I was a stalker rather than a concerned citizen, but I let it slide. “She joined acult.”
Ella’s blue eyes lit up. “Show. Me.”
Because I had already exhausted my first choice of investigative partners—Hudson—I wasted no time catching Ella up on the information I had gathered so far.
So much for letting it go and enjoying my summer.
“After I show you, I’m deleting this burner account, because I cannot get sucked into her latest shitstorm.”
“Oh my God, totally, totally. You need to look out for yourself.” Ella’s gaze was laser-focused on my screen. It reminded me of Inara’s approach to pieces of string.
The moment I had the profile pulled up, Ella snatched the phone right out of my hand like a feral racoon.
“Oh myGod,” she said while scrolling. “Another victim of the stay-at-home-girlfriend trend.”
My stomach lurched. For the past seven years, I’d moved forward, and Lorelei had decided to slide right back to where we came from.
It made me sick.
“Wait, so where’s the cult?”
“Oh, um…” I took my phone back and moved to the search bar, only to remember nothing would come up if I typed in @O. The website had disappeared too. I started scrolling through my regular feed, but the ads were all for robotic cat toys and books.
“Ooh, spicy,” Ella said, placing her finger on my screen to stop my scrolling.
We stared at character art an author had posted, hearts artfully pasted over nipples and genitals. The nude woman was in a collar and leash underneath an equally nude, ripped man gripping the handle. She was biting her lower lip, and he stared down at her mercilessly.
“Can I find that in your books?” Ella asked, fanning her face and giggling.
“No.”
I hit the snooze button on the side of my phone and asked Ella about her new part-time marketing gig. She soon forgot why we’d been scrolling in the first place.
When I got home, I didn’t delete the burner account.
Inara curled up by my belly, and I re-read one of my comfort books on my e-reader.
