“That’s not what I mean.” I’m suddenly overcome with the desperate need to be understood. “Up until five days ago, I lived in a place called Greentree, where I was a nobody. Invisible. An unpopular, overlooked Brainiac Nerd who couldn’t get a single girl to look at me or like me, much less kiss me. Or, at least, not the kind of girl I wanted to kiss,” I add, remembering Plum.
“Oh, I highly doubt that!” Tinsley plants an overly bright smile on her face—the kind that’s normally reserved for when you accidentally start a conversation with a crazy person and are forced to mentally calculate the quickest escape route while trying not to alarm them. But I’m too far gone to stop now.
“You acted like I was invisible.”
She shifts uncomfortably, looks over her shoulder toward the house. “Nick—this is getting weird.” Her gaze is flat and discouraged. She’s reached her limits, and she hasn’t even heard the best part.
“Trust me, it’s about to get even weirder….”
I tell her about Josh Frost, the talent show, the magical cupcake, the bizarre Christmas trolley, the crazy driver with the tie-dyed red-and-green sweat suit and long white dreadlocks. I tell her that I’m pretty sure I’ve ended up in another dimension, another version of my life, but Tinsley’s expression tells me she’s simply stopped listening.
“Nick, I think we’re all a little exhausted.” She cuts me off, eager to be done with this. “But if we can just get through tonight’s taping, we’ll be free to finally relax and enjoy what’s left of the holidays.”
“And how exactly will we do that? Will Ezer script some nice romantic moments for us to share where we just so happen to have cinematographers on hand to capture every photogenic second, ensuring that Ninsley remains the number one couple the world is obsessing about? Will we head off on a snowy, romantic vacation together—just you, me, and Ezer?”
Her face pales. Her fingers continue to twist nervously, but it’s not like it stops me.
“And, by the way, I can’t help but wonder how Mac Turtledove feels about Ninsley becoming a thing. How exactly did you explain it to him? Or did Ezer do that for you?”
It’s cruel, I know, but if I’m going to be honest, then I admit it’s intended that way. I’m trying to push her into getting so upset she’ll spill all the horrible truths she insists on keeping from me.
Or maybe I’m hoping she’ll tell me I’ve got it all wrong. That despite how it looks, despite all the scripted nonsense, it really was her choice to kiss me. Maybe I’m hoping that she’ll say all those things in a way that makes me believe them. So I can at least leave this place knowing I experienced one true thing out of so many fake, scripted ones.
In the end, she doesn’t say anything. She just sighs in frustration, which says more than words ever could, confirming that my suspicions were true.
Turns out, she’s not at all the person I wanted her to be.
She never really cared about me.
It was all just pretending.
Tinsley rises to her feet and leaves me to watch the song sparrow in silence.
He hops around a bit, takes a couple more sips, and trills so joyfully his whole body shivers. Then, after fluttering his wings, he lifts into flight—soaring beautifully, high and free—before crashing straight into the pool house window and snapping his neck, his lifeless body tumbling toward the cement.
5 Hours, 54 Minutes, and 13 Seconds till Christmas
PLAYER GETS PLAYED
When I slide into the back of the limo, I make a mental inventory of all of my interactions with Sparks, hoping I haven’t been too big of a pain, not counting the times in the beginning when I may have gone a little overboard with bossing him around. He’s an integral part of my plan, which means that now, more than ever, I need him as an ally.
“You remember that place—that trolley stop—where you picked me up five days ago?” I push my face close to the divider, wanting to get a better look so I can gauge his reaction.
He shifts as though he’s looking at me through the rearview mirror, but the reflective lenses he wears makes it impossible to confirm what he’s thinking.
“You know, that day you were waiting for me because the trolley was late?” I add, really hoping he remembers, because I have no idea how to find it on my own.
Still nothing.
“I really need you to take me there. The sooner the better. And if Ezer calls, tell him you haven’t seen me,” I say, hoping he can glean from my tone, if not my actual words, just how urgent this is. I need to leave now, before Ezer has a chance to notice I’m gone, and hopefully well before my return ticket expires, which is just a few hours from now. I cast a nervous glance toward the street. It’s just a matter of time before Ezer and the rest of the film crew arrive, thereby killing any chance I’ll have of escaping this place.
Sparks rubs his lips together but otherwise makes no move to start the car and pull out of the drive.
“You sure about this, Nick?” he finally says. And it’s probably the first thing he’s ever said to me other than You got it!
Or Watch your head!
Or I got you covered!
Or Ezer called—he wants you on set, immediately!
Not to mention he called me Nick.
Not Mr. Dashaway, which I never fully got used to, but Nick.