His Prologue
Ten years ago
Here’s the thing about long-distance relationships.
No one ever tells you how painfully hard they are.
We’re talking run-an-ultra-marathon hard. Learn to write in Mandarin hard.
I was seven months into one, and I still wasn’t used to the missing.
Would I ever be?
On Friday afternoon, I stared at the picture on my desk of my fiancée, gazing at Shannon’s bright blonde hair, short and sleek, pushed back in a slim silver headband. I took in her vibrant eyes, her smile.
A smile I knew I’d brought back to her face, and damn, did that ever make me happy.
To be the person who’d done that for her.
One day more, and I could make my way to see her again.
Twelve more hours till my flight.
A knock sounded on the plastic wall of the tiny cube I called home from nine a.m. to midnight most of the time.
There was always a rap on the proverbial door. There was always something I needed to do. There was never time to linger on Shannon, to think about her, let alone see her.
The thing I wanted most in the world.
I looked up from the picture and into the unshaven face of Jed Hawkins, head writer on Late Night Antics. He smiled, the kind of smile that said I’m about to ask you for a big-ass favor.
Since I was low man on the totem pole, and more than thrilled to have that position here at a late-night comedy show, I put on my most professional grin. “What can I do for you?”
I said it before he even had the chance to tell me what he needed.
That was how you rose in this field. You did it by jumping on opportunities before they even came your way. Otherwise, you were too late. I’d learned that in the first six months at this job. There was always someone waiting in the wings.
Jed scratched his jaw, heaving a sigh, like it pained him to ask the next thing. “Here’s the thing. That series of sketches on the new Marvel flick?”
I nodded. I knew the sketches. I’d worked on them, written a few jokes for them.
“The host wants us to rewrite them,” Jed said with a what can you do expression. His eyes were dark—or maybe it was the bags under them.
There was nothing I could do about that.
What I could do was this.
Don’t let on that the request drives you crazy.
It was just par for the course. Rewrites landed on your plate hourly. As a junior writer on a TV show, you just did them.
“I’ll get started now,” I said.
“And . . . we need the first one by morning. The second by noon. The third by—”
“Tomorrow at this time,” I said, masking the heavy weight in my gut.
I had a plane to catch in the morning.
A plane I didn’t think I was going to make now.
Story of my fucking life. I’d had to cancel the last three trips. Shannon had offered to come here each time, but work had piled up and I wouldn’t have been able to see her even if she did.
Just like I couldn’t see her now.
Because of those damn sketches.
But that series of sketches was the linchpin of the show, so I didn’t have a choice. Jed swiveled around, took a step, then spun back and said with a sigh, “One more thing. Host is going to need you on set this weekend after all. In case there are any other last-minute changes.”
That weight? It was an anchor now, sinking me. Sinking my long-distance love affair. “Got it.”
Jed had the decency to look rueful. He shrugged. “Sorry. I think you were going out of town, but—”
“It’ll be fine. I’ll take care of it.”
He left, and out of habit, I glanced at the clock. But I knew it was already the middle of the night in London.
Too late to call.
Instead, with my shoulders sagging, I sent an email to Shannon, telling her I would have to reschedule my trip. After I hit send, I gave myself a minute to be annoyed.
It had been seven months like this. Seven months since college ended. Seven months since we’d promised to find a way to stay together. We’d known it wasn’t going to be easy. We lived thousands of miles apart, a country and an ocean between us. But we’d had a plan. When school had ended, we’d figured a once-a-month visit was doable. She’d fly here. I’d fly there. Every other month one of us would travel, maybe only for a weekend. But a weekend was worth it.
When you loved someone to the depths of your soul, a weekend was worth it. That was what I told myself over and over and again and again.
The problem was we’d only managed one damn weekend in seven months. All the every-other-month plans had flown out the window. Our schedules had never aligned. Our days off were never the same. And work kept shoving itself in the way, the bully in the lunch line.
You had no choice but to let the bully cut in front of you.
That was how it went at age twenty-two, cutting your teeth after college.
Shannon had scored a golden opportunity as an assistant choreographer for a dance company in London, and I’d landed the chance of a lifetime as a writer on a late-night comedy show. These were the chances we had to take, even if it meant being apart.
Those chances also meant missed chances.
In the break room, I poured myself a cup of coffee.
“Hey you,” Holly, a fellow soldier in the fight for a writer promotion, said with a waggle of her fingers.
“Hi, Holly,” I said, turning around.
“Did you get slammed with a rewrite too?” she asked, setting a hand on my arm.
My gaze drifted to her hand. That was becoming par for the course with her. Little touches. I didn’t know what to make of them, or what to do with them. Did I shrug it off or ignore it?
“I did, but I’ll get it done,” I said.
“Then we’ll all go out to Fred’s to celebrate when the show is in the can,” she said with a dimpled smile, followed by a squeeze of my arm.
“Like we always do,” I said, emphasis on always, since that was the MO for the dozen or so writers on the show. “See you then.”
I returned to my desk, draining the coffee as I stared one more time at the picture of Shannon.
Gritting my teeth, I cursed under my breath, shaking my head in frustration.
This was what seven months of working my ass off had come down to. One opportunity to see my woman and many more canceled ones.
And I had to get her out of my mind or I’d never get my work done.
I dug into the script, shoving Shannon aside.
The next morning I’d finished the first sketch, and I found an email from her. No worries! I get it! Maybe I’ll find a way to see you soon.
I smiled, tapped the screen, and blew a kiss across the country and the ocean, wishing it were a real one. But as I went into work that weekend, there was no break in sight, no change in sight, and I didn’t know what the hell to do about that.
Or how much longer we could keep this up.
Her Prologue
The lights flickered across the night sky as I peered out the window. I tapped my nails against the armrest. An older woman slumped on my shoulder, fast asleep. Lucky woman. She’d snoozed for ten hours, across the Atlantic and the heartland too. I envied her. I couldn’t sleep at all, not when I knew I’d be seeing Brent in a few hours. Not when I knew I’d be telling him something huge.