Page 44 of Not a Strong Enough Word

That was the piece I hadn’t seen at the time. I had thought she loved the work but felt she wasn’t being compensated appropriately for what was expected of her. But what she had wanted was fewer expectations and more reasonable deadlines.

In my twenties, everything had been about the money. My classmates who had gone on to get MBAs were making seven figures by the time I started at JMP. My only thought was that if I could get Scarlett that kind of money to write, surely she would have felt successful. And we had talked about it, too—what we would do with a million dollars if we had that kind of money. I should have gotten the hint when her fantasies were always about moving to a cabin in some remote area, luxuriating in hot tubs with bottles of wine with nothing but time to read and write and be together.

“True.” Anastasios snaps me out of my reverie. “But you could have negotiated that later, after you had been more established.”

Scarlett nods slowly, as if that’s a fair assessment. “Yes, but I needed it then. I don’t know if you’ve experienced burnout, Mr. Martis, but it feels like…” She trails off, then sighs deeply. “Nothing has any joy anymore. There’s no sparkle, no excitement. Colors aren’t as bright. Songs you used to love grate on your nerves. Everything feels like too much and not enough, all at once. The people you love become a burden. It’s hard to get out of bed. Puts a real damper on the creative process.”

Anastasios tilts his head, regarding her. “Sounds an awful lot like depression.”

“There’s a lot of overlap, at least in my case. After all of that, I isolated myself, which did lead to depression. Eventually, I got help. I have a plan now, and a support system, even if it is small. And my agent negotiated a contract with longer periods of time between deadlines and a cap on the press I’ll do when you decide to release my identity, as I’m sure you know.”

He rubs a hand over his close-cropped beard and nods once in acknowledgment. “There are a lot of people at JMP who are still very angry with you. If it gets out prematurely that we signed you here, there could be consequences.”

“I don’t blame them, sir. But I was young and inexperienced, and I didn’t have the vocabulary to clearly express what I needed at the time. The irony of me being a writer and not having the words does not escape me, but it doesn’t make it less true. I could tell a story, but I couldn’t figure out my life.”

“There were many other authors who spoke up about their work-life balance after you left. JMP had a lot to consider.” Anastasios dips his chin to look at her across the table.

“So I’ve heard,” Scarlett responds without missing a beat.

I don’t think Anastasios is trying to intimidate her or make her feel bad in any way, but she’s not backing down. She’s frank and unapologetic in her explanation of what happened, and even though I know it’s not the full story, I’m so fucking proud of her. For everything. For working through all of that, for getting to the place she’s in now. Even if there are slipups like she had a week ago, she’s trying so hard to get her life back to where she wants it, and she’s unashamed of the journey. Of course, hindsight is twenty-twenty, but I’m even proud of her for walking away back then. She did what she needed to do. Even if it broke my damn heart.

He nods slowly, narrowing his eyes and taking her in. “Thank you for your candor, Ms. Frye. It wasn’t my intention to ask straight away, but I appreciate the information you’ve given me. And, more importantly, I am sorry. I can’t speak on behalf of JMP because I wasn’t there at the time, but you deserved better. My goal is that here, at Anastasios Press, we can provide that for you.”

She smiles, and this time it’s more relaxed. “I appreciate that.”

“I’ll say it again, though. We have to keep your identity under wraps until our team is ready to do a reveal. We are still owned by JMP, and there are a lot of people over there who wouldn’t be too happy if they knew you signed with us. We’d like to be ready to provide sales data to show them, irrefutably, that signing you was a worth the risk.” He shoots a warning glare at Scarlett, then turns the same look to me.

“I’m also hoping that there’s a plan to mitigate some of the anger I incurred when I canceled my press tour,” Scarlett says, drawing his attention back to her.

With that, Anastasios launches into an outline of the marketing and publicity plans Meri has mocked up, complete with a tentative timeline for everything with Becoming. Scarlett listens attentively, asking questions where appropriate.

After that, the rest of the meeting goes off without a hitch. He asks her about the new book she’s working on, and she lights up when she starts explaining the plot to him. Watching as she speaks—her hands waving wildly in the air and her expressions changing rapidly the way they always used to when she was talking about her books—I can’t help but realize I’m falling a little more for her with each minute that passes. She’s still the Scarlett I was in love with all those years ago, but better. She’s more confident. Her eyes are clearer. Excitement radiates off her in waves.

She’s magnetic, and I’m a piece of metal, powerless to resist her pull.

Eventually, the meeting comes to a close. Anastasios asks me to stay back to discuss a few other projects that are on the docket. On her way out, Scarlett grins at me, clearly relieved the meeting went so well. That glittery smile reminds me of the one she was flashing Charles when I came down to bring her up to the meeting. In my pride for her, I had almost forgotten about her date tonight, but now I can’t get it out of my head.

All throughout my conversation with Anastasios after she leaves, I try to avoid seeing them together in my mind’s eye. It distracts me, and Anastasios has to repeat his questions a couple of times before he ultimately dismisses me, telling me to get some more sleep so I can focus.

I have no right to be as obsessed with this dinner as I am. Scarlett deserves to have writer friends she can talk to. Just a few days ago, I was hoping she’d find new critique partners, which makes me a hypocrite. Admittedly, I had hoped she’d reconnect with her old roommate, Mandy, or something, but I guess beggars can’t be choosers.

And yet, even though I know it’s wrong, there’s no way I’m getting any sleep tonight while Scarlett is out with that guy.

Chapter 22

Ryan

Six Years Ago

“I don’t think secluded is a strong enough word.”

Without looking, Scarlett waves a hand over her shoulder to swat at me. I take a step back, laughing as she narrowly misses knocking the glasses off my face.

“Will you please not read over my shoulder? You’re interrupting greatness here.” Her keyboard doesn’t even stop clicking as she speaks. If I hadn’t been witness to her process for over a year now, I would think she was just click-clacking at fake words to make a point, but she’s not. She really can talk and type at the same time.

Sort of. Sometimes I find little snippets of our conversation buried in parts of her draft where they have no business being. I quietly delete those for her with a soft smile, unlike when I find familiar phrases very purposefully woven into the fabric of her writing. I bask in those and let them warm me to my core.

Scarlett is likely only vaguely aware of the way I’m watching her right now. She’s sitting cross-legged on a chair we dragged in from the kitchen at a table turned desk in the corner of my bedroom. There’s a perfectly good home office in the next room, but she insisted on this setup. I like to think she wants to be close to me as she works, especially as more and more of her time has been taken up by working. The requests from book clubs and podcasts and other interviewers have continued to roll in, especially now that her second book is getting closer to release. I picked up editing some of it in order to speed up everything and save her some time. Writing, editing, and doing press has proven difficult for her. On more than a few nights. I drift off to sleep and wake up before the sun rises to her clacking keyboard, sure she hasn’t slept at all.