ERIC’S FACE FILLED THE screen, just as chiseled and perfect as it had been at the game and on TV. The snake. “Macy.” He said my name with the kind of awe reserved for the church we never bothered attending. “I’m so glad you called.”
“Why? Because you’re hungry to extend your fifteen minutes?” He came off as all sad and sincere, but I wouldn’t bend. Not on this.
“It got a little out of control, but I really did want to see you again. I missed you.”
“You don’t even know me.” Or maybe he did? My stomach rolled at all the pictures I’d put on Instagram and personal details I’d shared on Twitter, thinking no one would care because I’d kept them separate from R3ntal Wor1d and my Misty Morning persona. “Were you in on it?”
“No.” He put enough bite in the word to have me considering. “I had no idea Jessica was taking our pictures or that it would go viral, or any of it. I swear.”
“But you had no problem playing along.” My voice was like ice, and I didn’t care. I wasn’t going to be the stumbling and awkward girl he’d met at the game, or whoever he expected me to be after he’d rifled through the images of my life online. I was an Evans. I came from Gram. Fire and steel. And today I’d let Eric see that the monster crawling within her heart also lived and breathed within mine.
“Didn’t you also play along by following me on Twitter?” A careful smile, like he was teasing me. “Jessica isn’t a bad person. We’ve sort of become friends through all this, and she had no idea it would go viral either. She’s catching a lot of shit for it.”
“Boo-fucking-hoo.” I had zero sympathy for Jessica. She’d fully brought the shit she caught on herself when she’d decided to make a sideshow attraction out of two strangers. “People in my hometown are talking about me.” Just thinking about Jared and his quarters again made my hands shake. Eric’s face went temporarily blurry. “Everyone thinks I had sex with you in a public bathroom. Thanks for not setting the record straight on Twitter, by the way.”
“I said we didn’t have sex on Today.” He frowned. “I’ll fix that. Right now. Hold on.” His face paused, then a moment later he was back. “Done.”
I opened Twitter, which paused FaceTime on my end.
@baseballbabe2020: Talking to @MacyAtTheMovies and need to say again that we did NOT have sex at the Royals game. Carry on. #baseballbabe #flyballgirl
I closed Twitter. “Okay. Good.”
“It’s been wild.” He continued on like he hadn’t even heard me. “Me and Jessica have both gone on Today; we’re scheduled to go on Entertainment Tonight. I think if you agree, the two of us together could get a spot on The Tonight Show.”
“Why? What’s in this for you?”
He went somewhere faraway in his mind, taking on the dreamy expression that had sent the Internet swooning over this pretty, sun-kissed boy. “I want to be a sports reporter.”
Whatever I had been expecting him to say, that hadn’t been it. “Go to college. Major in journalism or something. You don’t need to be famous to do that.”
The dreamy expression vanished. “I have a blog. I had a handful of hits before this whole thing took off, but now I’m competing with guys who have been doing this for years. As for college, I’m already going. I have a baseball scholarship, full-ride at Mizzou.”
“And?” It’s not like he’d shown off his reporting skills with all the strutting he’d been doing on various TV circuits, but at least that explained why he hadn’t told the truth about the fly ball. The type of people who followed a sports blogger with a baseball scholarship probably wouldn’t be impressed that I’d caught that ball right out from under him.
“Don’t you get it?” He leaned in so close to his phone, for a moment he just became a single deep brown eyeball. “With my recent numbers I can get more access, locker room interviews. Thousands of people go into journalism, but only a few make it. This is how I’ll stand out. It’s the edge I need.”
No wonder he had no problem telling everyone we didn’t have sex. He needed to stay in my good graces. One post from me would cause enough doubt to ruin his chances. And here I thought he was just being a decent human being. Silly rabbit.
“And you need me too,” he said.
“W-what do you mean?” I stumbled over my words, knowing exactly what he meant.
“Your YouTube channel. I know you’ve seen your numbers. Imagine how high they could go. Imagine if you didn’t have to work at the rental store anymore or live in that shithole town. You think I don’t know you’re scraping by? That the whole damn Internet doesn’t know, with all those pictures you’ve posted on Instagram? They’re dying to crown you and make you a queen. They want your Cinderella story.”
It was like he’d sliced me open and looked directly into my soul. All of my hopes and wants and fears spread out before him like a buffet to pick over, to decide which ones he could use to manipulate me. But at the same time …
He wasn’t wrong. I wanted that picture he’d painted. I wanted it so bad, it was like a living thing inside me. A twin I’d absorbed in the womb. The kind that still had its teeth, gently chewing away at those useless things like pride and honesty. The things that hadn’t gotten me anywhere except a dead-end job in a dead-end town with a future so eerily like my mom’s. A future of working until every muscle in my body ached, and it never being enough. Of always being one emergency away from utter despair. Of not even getting the peace of living paycheck to paycheck because those never stretched as far as they needed.
“What, exactly, are you suggesting I do?” Every word on my tongue tasted like the bitter aspirin my mom had never quite been able to mask with syrup. From the gleam in his eye, he knew he had me. And I’d never hated myself more.
“We should make a public appearance. Nothing too obvious, but I know the perfect place. We could meet halfway on Wednesday or Thursday. I’ll handle the reservations.”
“You want to pretend we’re dating?” I shook my head. Too far. This was going too far. It was one thing to tweet and play coy on the Internet. That wasn’t really real. Seeing him in person though. Driving to see him. That was completely different territory, and not one I was equipped to navigate.
“It doesn’t have to be fake.” His voice softened. “I really do think you’re cute, and I’m sorry I didn’t get your number.”
“Yeah. Why is that?” I gave him a coltish bat of my lashes. He thought he was running this game, but I knew how to play too.
“I’m—” He scratched the back of his neck. “I’m not so good at talking to cute girls. My buddy Rod called me a dumbass the whole way home, and I felt like it too. I was so scared you’d say no that I left before I could ask you.”
What an absolute load of bullshit. I’d seen his Instagram. He had no problem in the confidence department, nor did he appear to have trouble talking to cute girls. Unless he had a lot of cousins who he routinely took shirtless pictures with.
“Even if this isn’t the way we expected things to go, I’m really glad I got to see you again. I mean that.” Nothing but sincerity in Eric’s voice, and I … just didn’t buy it. He was too good. Too smooth. It set off all the warning bells in my head, even if he was dateable on paper and tried very hard to seem like he was into me.
But he was right about one thing. We needed each other. If Jessica’s thread got me over a hundred thousand views on my videos, I couldn’t imagine how many I’d get if I let this fauxmance play out online. Half the Internet was rooting for us to get together. Granted, the other half thought I had crabs, but I wouldn’t think about them.
“You have my number now,” I said. “I have to work on Thursday, but I have Wednesday off if you want to make reservations. Just let me know where, and I’ll be there.”
“Sounds good. See you, Macy.”
His face faded from the screen and I sat down hard on my bed. On a scale of one to ten, I had no idea how gross this made me. We were lying. For clicks and retweets and blog hits and subscribers. The whole thing was deeply disturbing. But Eric and I both had things we wanted, and could maybe get with whatever happened between us.
Thanks to Jessica, I had nothing left to lose, and I was tired of letting her and Eric reap all the viral benefits. They got spots on the Today show, while I spent my nights in an anxiety-soaked black hole, scrolling through Twitter in incognito mode and absorbing every nasty comment.
I was so done with that.
After I tossed my phone on my bed, I put on a blue shirt to complement my eyes—light enough to bring out the glow of my summer tan, plain enough to avoid ending up on any more Ugly Clothes of Twitter lists. I took an hour getting ready, fixing my hair until soft blond curls framed my face, then did my makeup. Smoky eye shadow and bright red lips. I could’ve been a darling or a demon, and I honestly didn’t care either way.
In front of my green wall, I smiled at my phone, already recording from my makeshift pedestal. A smile big enough to show all my teeth. “I’ve been thinking about you for days, Eric. Can’t wait to see you soon.”
I adjusted the graphics, double-checked to make sure all of my videos were monetized, uploaded it onto YouTube, and then flipped back over to Twitter.
@baseballbabe2020: Making dinner plans for me and a beautiful lady;) #baseballbabe #flyballgirl #datenight
I clicked on the link to tweet. Even if my real name and real life were out there, playing this game with Eric wasn’t a whole lot different from donning my Misty Morning persona. This was just a different type of wig, a different costume.
@MacyAtTheMovies: Can’t wait to find out what @baseballbabe2020 has planned for Wednesday <3 #DateNight #FlyBallGirl #BaseballBabe
I linked the YouTube video in my tweet, and then pulled my quilt over my head.
What the hell had I just gotten myself into?