“Don’t bullshit me.”
“I suppose you’re going to whip out all your folders of evidence now?” My strategy is to make him show his cards from the start. If he does have proof, I’m finished anyways, and I’d like to at least see it coming. But if he doesn’t, there’s room to maneuver.
His face tightens. “I know what you did. We all do. You can’t lie your way out of this one.”
Could I have guessed right? Is it possible he has nothing at all?
I decide to push him a bit further, just to see how he reacts. “I see you’re still delusional.”
“I’m delusional?” He snorts. “At least I’m not running around parading a friendship that never was. I know you two weren’t close. Best friends since college? Please. Athena never even mentioned you the entire time we were dating. I saw you at a convention once before, you know. I saw your bio in the program—it said where you’d gone to school, and I asked Athena if she knew you. You know what she said?”
I don’t want to hear it. There’s no reason why this should bother me so much, but it does, and clearly Geoff notices, because he grins, bares his fangs like a hound that’s sniffed blood. “She called you some loser from school. Said she didn’t know why you were still hacking at it, that your debut was thoroughly mediocre, and that you’d be better off calling it quits before this industry chewed you up entirely.” He chuckles. “You know how Athena did that over-the-top fake sympathy, when she was trying to convince us she had human emotions? Boohoo. Poor thing. Come on, let’s go before she sees us.”
My eyes feel wet. I blink in irritation. “Clearly you didn’t know her as well as you think you did.”
“Sweetheart, I’ve seen the stains on her G-strings. She’s an open book. And so are you.”
I’m tempted then to storm off, or even to reach over the table and smack him across his smug, cruel face. But then I’d have accomplished none of what I came for.
Focus. I’m so close to the finish. I just need to make this all go away.
“Suppose . . .” I tap my fingernails on the table and blink nervously for effect. “Suppose I did take it.”
His eyes widen. “I fucking knew it, you fucking liar—”
“Okay, stop, please.” I feign terror, lifting my hands up as if to show him I have no claws. I let my voice tremble. “What do you want, Geoff?”
His face settles back into a smug grin. He’s getting cocky; he knows he’s in control. “So you really thought you could get away with it.”
“Can we just make this go away?” I plead. It’s not hard to sound scared. All I have to do is imagine I’m walking home alone at night, and Geoff is on the other side of the road, and that there are none of the usual social mores against violence separating his fists from my face. He’s huge and jacked; he could crush me, and I bat my eyelids frantically to remind him of that. I want him to feel like he’s got me in a corner. “Please, if you leak this, I’ll—I’ll lose everything . . .”
“Or maybe you won’t.” He leans forward, palms flat against the table. “Maybe we can come to some sort of agreement.”
I fight to keep my face still. “What . . . what do you mean?”
“You must be making bank from that book, right?” His eyes dart around, checking for eavesdroppers. “Don’t lie. I saw that advance announcement. Mid–six figures, wasn’t it? And I know you’ve already earned out.”
My throat bobs. “You . . . you’re blackmailing me?”
“I just think it could be a profitable arrangement for the both of us,” he says. “You keep selling your books. I keep your secret. Win-win, no? Shall we discuss my rates?”
Jesus Christ. How stupid is he? Does he hear the words coming out of his mouth? I imagine leaking this sound bite all over Twitter, and the rage that would follow. Geoff would never make a cent from writing again. He’d have to go into hiding. He’d never be able to exist again, publicly, as himself.
But such an implosion would be messy, and I’d likely be caught in the blast radius. What I need is to make this all quietly disappear.
“Hmm . . . no.” I make a big show of tapping my lip, and then pouting. “No, I don’t think I’ll do that.”
Geoff’s eyes narrow. “You don’t really get a choice here.”
“Don’t I?”
“What do you think will happen when everyone finds out?”
“They’re not going to find out.” I shrug. “Because it’s not true. You’re full of shit, Geoffrey, and we both know it.”
“I know you stole the book—”
“But you don’t know. You don’t have a shred of proof; you’re just making things up to get a reaction.” I tap my side pocket, where my iPhone sits secure behind a zipper, recording this whole conversation. “What I do have, though, is a record of you trying to blackmail me for a cut of the royalties on a book you claim was stolen. You’re not doing this for Athena. You’re trying to leech off her legacy. And when this leaks, Geoff, do you think you’re ever going to get another publishing deal in your life?”
Geoff looks like he wants to strangle me. His eyes have gone so wide I can see the whites around his pupils. His lips curl back, revealing canines. For a moment I’m nervous I’ve overplayed my hand, that I’ve pushed him off the edge. I think of all those films about nice-seeming young white men who snap. Chris Evans in Knives Out. That rapist in Promising Young Woman. Maybe Geoff will jump across the table and stab me in the collarbone. Maybe he’ll tamp down his anger now, watch me walk away, and then hit me with his car on the way home.
But this isn’t a movie, it’s real life, and Geoffrey Carlino isn’t an alpha male whose fury can’t be tamed. He’s a pathetic, insecure little boy who’s all bluster, who has no more cards up his sleeve.
He doesn’t have the drive to take this any further. Rage shrinks to defeat. I watch his shoulders deflate.
“You’re a horrible person,” he spits.
“I am a brilliant writer and a good friend,” I say. “You, on the other hand, are on record trying to mooch off the supposedly stolen words of your ex.”
“Go to hell, bitch.”
“Oh, fuck off.” I stand up. I once saw a video of a hunter who shot a lion between the eyes right as it sprang. I wonder if the hunter felt like I do now: breathless, victorious, just this side of safe. I wonder if he, too, looked at his victim and marveled at all that power, that potential, wasted. “Don’t contact me again.”
ONCE I KNOW GEOFF HAS NOTHING UP HIS SLEEVE, I HAVE NO TROUBLE crafting my response narrative. After running some drafts by Jen and Marnie, I post my official statement about the whole fiasco on my author website, which I link to on Twitter. (I thought about posting a phone screenshot of my statement drafted in the Notes app, but Notes app apologies have become a genre in and of themselves, and not a very respectable one.)
* * *
Hi everyone,
I’ve of course been aware of the recent allegations circulating about the authorship of The Last Front. I apologize for not speaking up sooner. Please understand that this has been a difficult time for me, and that I am still struggling to cope with my best friend’s tragic death.
In short, the allegations are completely false. The Last Front is my original creation. I was inspired by Athena to look into this forgotten chapter of global history, and it’s no surprise that her voice shines through in my work.
I understand this whole situation is racially fraught. It upsets me to see arguments that only Athena could have written The Last Front, because Athena’s work was so concerned with Asian diaspora issues. This pigeonholes both of us, and flattens our identities as writers.
I don’t know the motives of the people behind this rumor, but I can only take it as a hurtful, malicious attack on my relationship with someone I miss very much, and whose death was one of the most traumatic experiences of my life.
My agent and editor have conducted their own independent investigations and have found no wrongdoing. I won’t be speaking on this again.
Thank you,
Juniper
* * *