Page 129 of Bad Words

“His book launch is happening right now,” I cried. “I went by. Past the window. I saw him.”

“Selina,” Cassie said quietly.

I put my face in my hands. I couldn’t say it, it was too humiliating, but I couldn’t believe that I’d ever had someone like Parker, that a person so kind and good had ever wanted me. It hurt so badly to have had him for that short moment. Now the moment had become a snapshot in time, like Juliette had described in her book, an illuminated window that I would look back on for the rest of my life, as it grew smaller and smaller behind me.

Two sobering days passed. While commuting I kept my face angled toward the windows in the train’s sliding doors, trying to look out at the blurry details of the subway tunnels and not at the harshly lit reflection of my own wan face. After work, to the gym. After dinner, to the Slippery Cork. On Thursday, Nadia asked me, “How are you, sweetheart?”

“I’m okay.”

She glanced down the length of the empty bar, then tossed her rag down. “I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you, but people online don’t know how to act.”

I glanced up quickly from my drink. “You…”

“I saw that video that went around in October. I gave you a follow.”

For a long moment I sat there, jarred. Of course, Nadia had read my name off my credit card biweekly for the last five years and could, at any time, have Googled the antisocial creature who crawled into her bar to read. There had been no reason to assume distance between us.

In the face of her reassurance, I wanted to feel closer to her. Instead I experienced a feeling of suffocation, that even here, in this place I’d come to feel like a safe, anonymous, perfectly scripted version of myself, I couldn’t escape the mess of who I actually was. But I said, “Thank you, Nadia,” and she gave me a pat on the wrist and comped my drink.

When that unending week finally drew to its close, the discourse online had mostly burned out. I’d been wondering if Nextward would fire me on the basis of the hit piece. Hayden had reassured me by email that they didn’t mind the controversy, but that Friday, the City staff came in to find her at our morning meeting, looking grave.

“So, not great news,” said Hayden. “We got word from the Densmore Foundation that they’re considering pulling support for the upcoming year.”

“What?” said half the table.

Hayden’s eyes strayed to me.

“Because of the profile,” I said.

“You’d think,” said Hayden. “No, it’s because the head of their board didn’t love how you dealt with the Parker Navarro controversy this week.”

“They’re pulling support because I wasn’t angry enough about High and Dry?”

“Selina, you’re a public figure. You have forty thousand followers and City Magazine on your profile. You can’t just say whatever you want.”

“What’s the point of having a social media account if I don’t say what I want to say?”

“I don’t know. Let’s think. You support Parker Navarro when he has the popularity of Joseph Stalin, partially thanks to your own review, and you’re shocked there’s a ripple effect?” Hayden turned to Scott, her lips pressed together. “I’m trying to keep the conversation open with them, but between this and the rent situation, we need to start thinking about the office.”

Silence spread from bookshelf to bookshelf. We were reaping what we’d sown. That felt patently obvious now: I should never have stoked the fires of the feud, never caved to my base instincts, no matter how good it had felt at the time.

“Why did you stick up for him, anyway?” Kellie said. For once there was no bounce in her inflection. I let out a leaden-sounding laugh, but I couldn’t make myself answer. At least, now, I would never have to explain anything to Kellie or anyone else on staff. The people online who had already been circling the idea of Parker “sleeping with the enemy” would never be vindicated. My credibility, I reminded myself, was the cornerstone on which my life was built. Maybe I had nothing else, but I still had that. The shreds of my privacy. The idea of myself. A door I could keep locked forever.

I stopped by Jacob and Cassie’s apartment that afternoon with a gift, wanting to thank them for dealing with my outburst. They were scheduled to fly out tomorrow afternoon, so I expected to find a half-disassembled apartment. When Jacob opened the door to the loft, though, I found no sign of disorder.

“Hey,” he said. “What’s up? You okay?”

“Yeah. Just wanted to drop this off to thank you both for Tuesday.” I handed him the small gift bag.

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“Yes, well, it was an embarrassing night, so.” I frowned up at his disheveled hair, his red-rimmed eyes. “You’re sick.”

“We all are.” Jacob’s laugh sounded hoarse. “Lyra’s thing turned into a fever, and Cassie caught it, too. She had to call out sick today.”

“Wait. Your trip…”

“Yeah. We canceled everything.”