I purse my lips. “If it’s so important, then why let me mess in it to begin with?”
“Because Jess needs to—” But then he stops himself, and looks away. “She just needed this.”
“So I’m important enough to pretend to be Jessica, but I’m not important enough to know the real reason why,” I infer, and he doesn’t correct me.
He just folds his arms over his chest, looking more uncomfortable by the moment. Finally, he says, “You should get out before security comes by.”
“You mean before I can screw up Jess’s career?” I mock.
“It’s not like you can screw up your own,” he snaps cattily, but then realizes what he said. “I didn’t mean it that way. I just meant—”
Oh no, he’s said enough already. I push myself up the side and out of the pool. I grab the keycard and the wig I’d stashed behind the potted plant. “No, I get it. Don’t worry, Ethan,” I snap as I leave, and he just stands there helplessly. “I won’t screw up.”
I clutch the wig to my stomach as I make my way through the lobby, where con-goers mingle with friends, some with their costumes slowly melting off them, others in pajamas. No one glances at me, no one looks twice, even though I’m sopping wet and my dress leaves a liquid trail behind me. The people who do notice me probably just see a mess of a girl, waterlogged, with runny makeup and pink hair stuck up in a spiky crown around her head.
Don’t cry, I think, unable to get Ethan’s words out of my head. Why did they make me so angry?
I think I’m angrier at myself more than anything. Because I actually thought—
I let myself think—
Because he’s so freaking insufferable, I actually—
I elbow my way through the crowds, breathing deeply so I don’t outright cry, and reach the elevators. There is a difference between loving someone and stanning someone. I can stan Darien Freeman and Vance Reigns and Chris Pine and Cole Sprouse all I want, because at the end of the day I know it’s a one-sided affair. Yeah, I freak out over movie stars. I think they’re hot or cute or SUPER ADORABLE I MEAN COME ON.
But loving someone? That’s expecting them to love you back. I don’t expect love at first sight. That heart-crushing, soul-melting, foot-lifting sort of fairy-tale romance that The Princess Bride sells you. But liking would be nice. A nice warm like that assures you that you won’t be left out on the curb during a fairy-tale ball night without a Prince Charming or a pumpkin carriage.
In the universe of Imogen Lovelace, however, that’s an impossible thing.
I push the palm of my hand against my eyes, willing myself not to burst into tears as the elevator doors glide open.
“Monster?”
The familiar voice makes me look up, and there are Milo and Bran. My brother must recognize the look on my face because in one long step he’s out of the elevator and drawing me into his arms. I press my face into his chest and he smells like the Stellar Party—vape juice and Oh No—and I try really hard not to cry.
“Let’s go get some food—I’m thinking burgers,” Bran says, and I nod against Milo’s chest, and they lead me out of the lobby and down to a diner at the end of the street.
AS IT TURNS OUT, I WAS STARVING—but for more than just food. For company. For a quiet moment like this. Harper and I laugh and talk about all of the things that I never talk about with anyone: the latest trash mag gossip, the perfect eyeshadow palette, that YA rom-com that had the most adorable kiss. We talk about her family—it’s big and loud—and we talk about our favorite bands and childhood crushes.
I want to tell her everything about me. I want to tell her about my parents, and how since I became an actress they live in a big house in Nashville, and they come to visit me as often as they can, and my dad is a computer tech and my mom works with charities. I want to tell them about our dog, and about Ethan, and about how lonely it sometimes is in that posh LA apartment my agent found for me. I want to tell her how I miss going for hikes with my dad, and I want to tell her about that red carpet stumble, and what it was really like on the set of Starfield.
I want to prove that Jessica Stone is not the aloof, cold robot everyone thinks I am. I am not a serial dater. I simply never cared. It was so easy not to care because I’m not built that way.
I’m not built to take a random person into a bedroom, I’m not wired to want those things, and so it made all those dates and chaste kisses with celebrities so easy. It never went further than that. It was never falling in love—it was never even falling into like.
It’s a part to play, and so I played it.
What I am built for is falling in love slowly, page by page, like reading a favorite book. I am built for the nearness of someone, the quirk of their lips, the sincerity of their smile, the dreams just underneath their skin. I fall in love moment by moment, collecting who they are, who they were, who they want to be, into a kaleidoscope of colors.
I have only fallen in love once, and she left a hole in my heart the size of the universe. So I know the feeling, the strange beast in my stomach that shifts and growls whenever Harper laughs, whenever she says something snarky, whenever she calls me Imogen, because in my head I hear her calling me Jess.
I know this feeling, and I try to shove it down because this is not who I am. She is falling for nobody. For a girl who will be gone in the blink of an eye.
And I guarantee she will not like Jessica Stone.
“…And I swear to you,” Harper says with a laugh, telling a story about the ExcelsiCon ball last year, “it was like the entire place just canceled her. The girl went running out of the ballroom so fast, she tripped in the lobby and fell flat on her face. It was hysterical!”
“I kind of feel sorry for her. I didn’t know Darien could be that mean.”
“She was mean, too. Right down to the bone. Sage told me the whole story. If anything, that girl deserved what she got. She’s the reason Elle Wittimer’s called Geekerella. She wanted to be a beauty vlogger or something, but she’s working at her mom’s nail salon now.”
“It’s funny how sometimes we don’t end up where we think we will,” I remark.
Harper turns her dark gaze to me. “What would you do if you could do anything? Doesn’t matter if you’re talented at it or not.”
I don’t even have to think. “An astronomer.”
“Really now.”
“I love stars,” I say earnestly, and she bursts out laughing, which makes me smile sheepishly despite not knowing whether she’s laughing at me or—no, no it’s definitely at me. “Listen! I’m not kidding. I love everything about stars. I love proton stars and neuron stars and cosmic phenomena. If I could, I’d get Stephen Hawking’s equation describing black holes tattooed on me. That’s how much I love space.”
She wipes the tears from under her eyes. “You’re really serious, aren’t you.”
“Of course!” I jerk to my feet, taking her hand and pulling her up with me. She grabs her keycard as I pull her out the door, not even bothering to put on shoes. “Where are we going?”
“I’m showing you some stars,” I reply, and punch the elevator button for the top floor, where we head for the stairwell.