Manny scoffs and I backpedal.
“I mean, sure I thought about it…but I never actually wanted to do anything with her. She’s my friend. And my colleague, on top of that. But we were out a week or so ago—St. Patrick’s Day—and we get really drunk, go back to my place, and then outta nowhere we fuck.”
“Ok, I’m with you.”
“And…” I trail off, realizing how difficult it is to put this into words, struggling to find some toehold within my memories of what happened, of what’s happening to me. “I don’t know…it was fine after, no hard feelings and no strings. Nothin’ got weird. Then I get the go ahead for my show and start going on those dates and it’s like I just wasn’t feeling it. And she’s on her dates too, and I can’t stop looking over, checking her out, making sure she’s not having too much fun, you know? And then we hook up again—and the sex is off the charts insane. So I figure: what the hell, I’ll bend the coworker rule a little. Have a little fun with her. I mean, she’s cool. She’s wants it to stay as uncomplicated as I do.”
I shrug and work on the last of my taco while Manny studies me like he’s trying to read my mind. It’s only when I’m done, tossing the trash into a can, that a slow smile breaks out on that Easter Island face.
“Dude,” he says, like he just discovered the secret of life, “you’re in love.”
“What?”
“You’re in lo—”
“Whoa!” I say, waving my palms at him like I’m stopping him from jumping. “Nonononono. Don’t go getting crazy ideas about this now, Manny. I put up with a lot of your shit but that’s—”
“You’re in fucking love, dude!” Manny says, laughing out loud as he steps back, his hands on his head. “Never saw that one coming.”
“Shh! Stop!” I say, stepping after him as if his shouting it out loud might make it true. “No!”
Manny steps forward suddenly as if he’s about to hit me, but instead he slaps a giant palm on my shoulder, his other hand waving a finger in my face.
“You’re in love. That’s why you wasn’t interested in Jessica just now, even though she’s got a body that would make a monk cry. And the girl on your show. And how many times have you told me you’d never fuck a coworker? How many years have you kept your hands off those pieces in your office?”
I slap his finger away and sigh. “I thought you said you weren’t Sherlock Holmes.”
“Sherlock never solved a mystery by seeing something in someone’s eyes. And I can see it, dude. I can see it.”
I don’t want to admit he might be onto something, so I look away, turn around and walk back toward the railing to look out at the waves.
“There it is! You can’t even argue with me!” Manny says, as he comes up and leans over the railing beside me. “Dude, you’re in love!”
“Ok, calm the fuck down,” I say, smiling at him. “I don’t even know what love is, ok? As far as I’m concerned it’s just something they put into movie scripts to explain dumb characters. It’s just something they use instead of ‘fucking’ in pop songs.”
Manny chuckles lightly. “Well it looks to me like you’re about to get a firsthand education on it.”
I stare out at the ocean, let the rhythm of the breakers calm my thoughts a while.
“I just like her,” I say. “I like being around her, talking to her, getting her to laugh. I like sleeping with her, touching her, smelling her, listening to her breathe…”
Manny exhales in a long, low whistle. “Shit. You’ve got it bad.”
“No I don’t.” I shrug the idea away. “I’m just gonna see where it goes. I’m doing the same thing I’ve always done—having fun. It’s just that my idea of fun is…different now.”
Manny slaps me on the shoulder as he moves to return to his truck.
“Don’t lie to yourself, dude. Tell yourself a cliff is just a step and you’re gonna fall hard. Trust me on that one.”
I watch Manny walk back to the truck, wishing I could dismiss the advice as useless, coming from a guy whose ambition in life is to fuck a girl so hard he makes her hallucinate. But as insane, wild, and careless as Manny is, he’s got a habit of being right.
16
Margo
For the next few days life is just…better. Owen and I film our post-date segment and I don’t feel apprehensive about the cameras, no awkward self-consciousness as we joke about our terrible dates. I finally grab the last of my stuff from Carl’s apartment with Owen’s help, and even though Carl’s not there, with Owen beside me it feels so much easier and simpler, and ever-so-slightly ridiculous that I even left it this long. I completely forget about New York, and suddenly find a million things to love about TrendBlend, work seeming easier, getting along with coworkers better—I even appear in one of Davina’s make-up videos and have a great time getting made up like Lady Gaga.
Whatever is going on between me and Owen is making me feel born again—so natural, so simple, so right, that I can almost forget everything before him. I struggle to remember what it’s like not getting random text messages throughout the day about how wonderful and amazing and special I am. The knots in my stomach and the constant, constricting thoughts that I’m underachieving in my career and in life become distant memories. I start waking up clear-headed and excited to go to work and see him. Every night we text or call each other before I go to sleep, conversation swinging between pantie-pulling eroticism and spiritually uplifting connection, until I fall asleep in a deep glow of happiness.
A guy like Owen is seriously good for your health.
Even Brad seems to stop bugging me at work, as if there’s some kind of invisible shield around us now, and I know that even if he tried to tear me down, I’m in a place where I could only laugh at him pitifully. Barring a few close calls (we figure out exactly how much time the elevator takes to stop at each floor during the numerous make-out sessions we have in there) I begin to genuinely believe that this could work. As long as I keep it cool and avoid cornering him with the ‘where is this going?’ talk.
And as long as we keep it a secret.
And as long as Melissa never finds out.
It’s not just that Owen’s dating vlog—the one he spent months trying to create and then convince Melissa was a good idea—is predicated on the basis that both he and I are interested in other people, it’s also the drama that would explode if we told everyone. The TrendBlend office is full of cool people—but even cool people can get nasty when the guy who’s been rejecting their advances for years suddenly starts dating the bookish girl he sits next to.