CHAPTER TWO
EVELYN
“Uh, hey.” A throat clears somewhere above me, a rough rumble. “You waiting on someone?”
I glance up from my phone to the tall figure leaning with his hip at the edge of the table, a frown tugging his lips down. I don’t think I’ve seen him smile once since I got here—on the limited occasions I have seen him, of course. I think he’s been hiding in one of the barns every time I’m touring the grounds.
It makes me sad.
A little annoyed, too.
“I’m not.” I push the empty seat across from me back with my boot. A silent invitation.
He waits a beat and then folds his body into the small seat across from me. I watch him over the edge of my coffee mug. Elbows on the table, hunched shoulders. His body curls forward as he stares at his plate like it holds the secrets to the universe. Minutes pass, and he doesn’t say a word.
“So,” I drop my chin in my hand and take a noisy sip of my coffee. I keep my voice light and bright, markedly different from the awkward tension that’s curling in my gut. My mom says I’m impervious to the moods of others. That I could brighten even the darkest storm cloud.
With Beckett, I feel like we’re both the storm cloud. Together, we’re a monsoon.
“How is your day going?”
He glances up at me, a bite of zucchini bread perfectly poised on the end of his fork. “Hm?”
“Your day,” I repeat. If he wanted to sit in silence, he could have gone to any of the empty tables lined against the wall. Instead he sat down here, with me. “How is it going?”
“Oh,” he shifts in his seat and traces the edge of his porcelain plate with his thumb. “It’s fine,” he mumbles. Blue-green eyes peek up at me and then dart back down. Another awkward pause, the silence stretching a moment too long. I can’t believe this man walked right up to me in a bar and put his body next to mine. Leaned into my space until I could smell the summer rain on his skin and asked me what I was drinking. “Yours?”
“Fine.” I want to fling his plate across the bakehouse, if only to get a reaction out of him. I wait for him to say something else and when he doesn’t, I sigh. “Stella is taking me on a tour through the fields later.”
He makes a vaguely interested sound.
“It really is beautiful here.”
Another sound under his breath.
Alright, fine.
I collapse back in my seat and cross my arms over my chest, busying myself with looking out the floor-to-ceiling window to my left. From this angle, I can see a couple of kids weaving in and out of the trees—a tiny squirrel hiding in the brush, digging a hole in the dirt. The bakehouse is hidden in one of the fields, a surprise for visitors to stumble upon when they’re out hunting for the perfect tree. Inside, condensation gathers at the bottom of the windows, a perfect frame of gray-white. Tree branches brush at the windows. It feels like I’m in one of those vintage Christmas cards, and I bet it’s damn near magical when it snows.
“You know, I was walking past the strawberry fields earlier.”
I dart my gaze back to Beckett, still staring at that stupid plate. “Yeah? I didn’t know you had strawberry fields here.”
He ignores me, a bob in his throat as he swallows tightly. Stoic. Insulated. A million miles away.
“I heard some of them crying, I think.”
“What?”
“The strawberries,” he explains. “I heard some of them crying.”
I blink at him. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“It’s because—” a small smile curls at the edge of his mouth, right at the corner. It tugs at his bottom lip as he shifts in his seat and I remember, viscerally, what that smile feels like tucked in the place between my shoulder and neck. He looks up at me through his lashes and it's the moment after a storm when the sun decides to peek out from behind the heavy clouds—rain still dripping from the edges of the roof, the trees, the mailbox on the corner. “It’s because their parents were in a jam, I think.”
It takes me a second to understand.
A joke.
Beckett just made a joke.
A really stupid one, too.
A surprised laugh bursts out of me, bright and loud. Several people turn to look.
But I’m too busy staring at Beckett, the grin on his face wide and unrestrained. A little bit wild. A lot bit beautiful.
I press my fist to my lips, delighted by his shining eyes. He ducks his head down and takes another bite of his zucchini bread.
“That was a dumb joke,” I tell him.
“Yeah.” His smile settles into something soft. Something I’ve felt before with the palm of my hand in the dead of night. His eyes shine bright in the afternoon sun. “Yeah, it was.”
I’m pulled out of my daydream with a sharp kick to my shin.
I jump in my seat, my knee hitting the underside of the shiny wooden table that stretches the length of the room. Josie gives me a look from her place across from me, both eyebrows raised high. I haven’t been able to keep my thoughts from drifting since I sat down at this meeting, and given the bruise forming on my leg, she’s noticed.
“How do you feel about dance?”
My agent-of-the-day, Kirstyn, taps her pen against a pale pink notepad. Peony pink. The sky right before the sun hits the water pink. Sway doesn't believe in assigning one specific agent to a client. Instead, I have a rotating fleet of young, attractive, and trendy consultants at my beck and call. Kirstyn and her severe cloud of perfume has me yearning for Derrick and his fluorescent nail polish. Shelly and her oversized blanket scarves.
Kirstyn pinches her lips together in annoyance. “Did you hear what I said?”
Josie’s teeth clamp down on her bottom lip and she widens both her eyes. Well, that looks says. Did you?
I did not. I was too busy remembering a quiet November afternoon in a sun-filled bakery. I wonder what Beckett would think of a place like this. I imagine him here, overwhelmed and confused, squinting at the chalkboard placards on the outside of each workspace. Glaring at the mason jars in the open kitchen. Scowling at the fresh cucumber water and complimentary warm hand towels.
I shake my head.
“I’m sorry,” I clear my throat and curl my hands around my mug. “Could you repeat what you said?”
Kirstyn flicks her shining blonde hair back behind her shoulder. She’s wearing oversized glasses with a thin, gold wireframe. A collection of bangles dance down her wrist. She lifts the mint green tea kettle off the tray in the center of the table and offers it to me. I shake my head.
“Dance,” she says, placing the kettle back down with a small pout. “You know, like those challenges you see everywhere?”
She gestures to her phone face up next to the tray—a cohesive stream of dancing influencers. I try to picture myself there, wedged in between all that content. I can’t even begin to imagine it and I feel a twist of anxiety. I’m pretty sure the last time I did any sort of choreographed movement, I was thirteen in my parent’s basement, singing to Backstreet Boys at the top of my lungs with Josie using an umbrella as a microphone stand.
“I know the challenges,” I offer, with no small amount of hesitation. I can see where this is going.
This isn’t where you’re supposed to be, a voice in the back of my mind whispers. It’s been getting louder and louder, that voice, a steady trickle of doubt. But if I’m not supposed to be here, where am I supposed to be? What am I supposed to be doing? I’ve spent my entire life curating this platform, building this audience.
I blink away from the phone and look out the window at the bustling sidewalk below, distracting myself with the people on the street. I watch as everyone moves past one another without looking up—a mindless, endless drive forward. A gust of wind tunnels down the sidewalk and lifts the edge of a bright red scarf. For a second, the woman clinging to it looks like she’s flying, her hand grasping at the ends. She manages to catch it just as she stumbles past a tiny empanada shop—a bright pink building with string lights across the top, sandwiched between a national box store and a glossy bank. A small woman with olive skin laughs in the window and snaps her towel at someone on the other side of the counter. A smile kicks up the corner of my mouth. I can hear her joy from here.
“Evie,” I feel Josie’s boot under the table, nudging against mine. “You okay?”
“I’m sorry,” I repeat. I shake my head and force my attention back to Kirstyn. I’m all over the place today. I need a strong coffee and a six day nap. “I’m here. I’m listening. Explain to me what you’re looking for.”
“We think you should add some choreography to your videos,” Kirstyn repeats slowly, enunciating each word. I would hazard a guess that I won’t be seeing Kirstyn again after today. “Sway believes movement and dance would make your content more approachable.”
Josie slowly turns her head to look at Kirstyn. If looks could kill, I’m pretty sure Kirstyn would be a pile of ash. Movement and dance. I tap a fingernail against the lip of my cup.
“What do you suggest?”
The light pinching of her lips turns into a tightening between her eyebrows. “Dance,” she repeats, the first hint of frustration spilling out of her lightly-lined lips. “Movement—“
I wave my hand. “Yes, movement will make my content more approachable. But as I am sure you are aware, my content is largely aspirational. Travel focused.” I frown. “Do you think I should do “Yah Trick Yah” in the aisle of a small-town bookstore?”
Josie snorts. My sarcasm goes sailing right over Kirstyn’s head.
“That’s amazing,” she tells me, greedy hands reaching for her laptop. She begins to frantically type, her hot pink nails dancing across the keyboard. “What an incredible idea. I can’t believe we didn’t think of that.”
A dull headache pounds at the base of my skull. “That wasn’t—“ I sigh and look back out the window, down towards the empanada shop. The woman laughing in the window is gone now. “I was joking.”
“Oh, well,” Kirstyn doesn't look up from her computer. “It’s a good idea. Maybe you can workshop it on your next trip.”
Josie widens her eyes at me. Workshop it, she mouths. She mimes a dance move from the early ’90s I’m pretty sure we workshopped during our Backstreet Boys routine.
I don’t dignify the suggestion with a response and attempt to change the subject. I am weary down to my very bones. “Where is my next trip?”
Half of me hopes Kirstyn tells me my next trip is home, to the tiny and mostly bare apartment I rent here in the Bay Area. I don’t know why I signed a lease to begin with. I think I’ve spent a total of six nights there over the past three months. But I had been yearning for some roots and an apartment seemed the logical answer.
“Oh, right. Here we go.”
I began my partnership with Sway because I wanted to help more people, tell more stories, access more communities with small businesses trying to get their name out. Like Peter in Spokane, a retired veteran with a grilled cheese food truck and—no lie, the best tomato soup I’ve ever had. Eliza and her dress shop in Sacramento, recycling fast fashion into sustainable pieces. Stella at Lovelight Farms, working so hard to create a whimsical winter wonderland. The people I visit have everything they need to make an impact, I just … help them along. Give them a boost.
Account management was starting to be a little too much for Josie and I to handle. We were spending more time on the administrative side of things instead of the creative bit of it. My partnership with Sway was supposed to make all of this easier. But honestly, it’s been one headache after another.
“This is your next trip,” Kirstyn announces with all the flair I’ve come to expect from Sway.
A blank screen hums its arrival as it drops from the ceiling. It winks awake with a burst of color, a loud and heavy bass drum filling the space. Josie jumps in her seat, scrambling to keep her mug from flipping over.
Bejeweled bodies sway with their arms in the air. A woman with fur boots to her thighs and a bright purple sequined bodysuit swings from a vine across—I squint at the screen—a bright red pool of jello.
“Holy crap,” Josie whispers.
My headache deepens.
“Why are you showing me Burning Man?”
“It’s not Burning Man. It’s the Okeechobee Music & Arts Festival,” Kirstyn tells me, almost bubbling over in excitement. The bracelets on her wrist make a tinkling noise that I feel in my teeth. “It’s a newer festival, and Sway thinks this will be a good fit for your brand evolution.”
Sway thinks. I pinch the bridge of my nose.
“My brand evolution.”
“Yes.”
“Is it run by a small business?” I’m distracted by the half-naked bodies thrusting and rolling on the screen and the strobe lights are giving me a headache. I glance through the industrial glass window to the rest of the office where employees are set up in a co-working space. A guy sitting at the corner in a beret bobs his head to the music. A woman with hot pink tips looks like she’s humming under her breath. Everyone is completely unperturbed by the three-woman rave happening in conference room two. “Does it have an interesting story?”
Maybe I’m missing something.
“You’ll be sponsored by Covergirl,” she tells me. The screen changes to a video I did about a month ago, a clip from one of my accounts of me holding up a bright orange tube of mascara, a gust of wind blowing my hair over my face. I think you see the actual product in use for less than a second. The tiny number in the lower right corner is highlighted. Over 4 million views. I wince.
I had agonized over this piece, iffy about such heavy-handed product placement. Most of my income comes from sponsorship, sure, but it lives on my blog in ad spaces. In a place where people expect it to be. But Sway had been insistent that it could be a strong experiment for more branded content and I was tired, distracted. I caved and posted a stupid video of myself promoting mascara.
And look at me now. A Covergirl sponsorship.
I should be overjoyed.
Why am I not overjoyed?
Because this isn’t where you’re supposed to be.
I shouldn’t be panicking about partnerships and promotions and music festivals. I’ve spent all of this time creating content and breaking off pieces of myself for public consumption and what do I have to show for it? An empty apartment and millions of strangers following my every move.
I’m so tired.
“I think I need to take a break.” The words slip from my mouth with a sigh, quiet but gaining strength as they settle in the space between the three of us. I roll my shoulders back and take a deep breath. I lift my chin. “I’m going to take a break.”
Josie does a tiny fist pump on her side of the table.
“I’ll book you a spa package at your hotel in Okeechobee,” Kirstyn says. Something tells me Okeechobee is not known for their spas. “Oh! If you wanted to extend your trip and start in Miami, I bet we could snag you a couple of club sponsorships.”
I shake my head and nudge my teacup back to the ornate porcelain saucer. I absolutely do not want to go clubbing in Miami. “No, I mean I’m going to take a break. From all of … this.”
Kirstyn blinks up at me from behind her screen. I can see the dancing bodies from Okeechobee reflected in her oversized lenses. It’s disorienting, like something from Alice in Wonderland. She gapes at me, hands held perfectly still just overtop the keyboard. “Like a hiatus?”
“Sure.” That’s a fine word for it. I have plenty in my savings account to support a mini-vacation, bolstered by years of meticulous financial planning. An influencer’s income is hardly stable and I’ve always been afraid of the attention slipping away as quickly as it arrived. Social media is a fickle thing.
Maybe some time away is exactly what I need. Space to refocus, realign.
I turn and look over my shoulder through the big windows to the empanada shop below. I start gathering my things.
Some space to eat empanadas.
“But you’ll keep posting, right?” There’s a thin thread of unease in Kirstyn’s voice as she slides from her chair, trailing me to the open door. Josie waits for me at the entrance to the room, quiet pride in her big brown eyes. She’s been ready to leave since we got here. I’m not even sure she packed her laptop. She bounces on her feet, curly hair bouncing with her.
Kirstyn follows us, hanging onto the edge of the industrial glass window like she’s about to leap from a plane. “You won’t, like, go completely dark?”
I shrug. “I haven’t really thought about it yet.” But now that she’s mentioned it, completely ignoring my social media channels for a couple of weeks sounds amazing. I shrug on my jacket and curl my hands in the sleeves. “Do I have any sponsorship things I’m on contract for?”
She practically sprints back to the table, flipping through her pink notebook. “No,” her face falls in dismay. “No, nothing you’re obligated to post. But we’ve got some interest from Ray-Ban if you want—“
“That’s alright, thank you.” I try to smooth the edges of my quick refusal. “Listen, Kirstyn. I’m thankful for the work you did on this pitch, but I think it’s best if I take a step back right now. Go into planning mode for a couple of weeks.”
Her face blanches. “Weeks?”
I need to figure out what I’m doing, why everything suddenly feels like shrugging on a sweater that’s way too small. I keep waiting for this feeling to go away, but it’s not. It’s only getting worse.
“I’ll keep you updated, okay? Check in. Feel free to keep sending me options, but—” I glance at the screen, the strobe lights and the face paint. “—this doesn’t feel right. I’m looking for something different than this.”
Kirstyn nods. “We can do that. We can support something different. I’ll have options in your inbox tonight.”
I start backing my way to the elevator. Josie is already aggressively jamming the button with her thumb. “I won’t look at them tonight, so take your time. I’m serious about the break.”
She follows me like a baby lamb. Some of the people at the collection of tables in the center of the room are half-standing from their seats, watching our progress. There’s a woman at the front with blunt bangs, her teeth sawing her bottom lip. A man behind her in a short-sleeved button-down stands, his palm against his forehead. I feel like I’ve just flipped a table and drop-kicked one of their mothers. All of their faces are stricken, concerned. I give them a wave and what I hope is a reassuring smile. They stare blankly back.
“Always a pleasure, guys!” Josie waves over her shoulder, not bothering to turn from the elevator. The doors slide open and Kirstyn follows us, right to the edge of the sliding doors.
“Your followers would miss you,” she tells me as I slip into the tiny vestibule, green fern wallpaper wrapped floor to ceiling. There’s a gold framed mirror on the ceiling and white shag carpet on the floor. It is the most ridiculous elevator I have ever been in. “Everyone is going to wonder where you went.”
It’s not the incentive she thinks she is. If anything, it makes me want to drop my phone right down this elevator shaft. They’ll wonder, and then they’ll find someone new to follow. Another account. Another collection of reels and posts and … dances. The elevator doors begin to close. I give her a reassuring smile.
“We’ll talk soon.”
The empanadas, as it turns out, are incredible.
“I thought her face was going to melt right off,” Josie says around a mouthful of spinach and cheese. She does something grotesque with her palms pressed tight to her cheeks—an attempt, I think, to illustrate her face melting. It’s difficult to tell exactly what she’s going for. I snort into another bite of flaky buttery goodness. “She was genuinely shocked you don’t want to start wearing body paint.”
“It was weird, right? I don’t think they understand—” me, I almost say. An unfair comment considering I don’t understand myself these days. “I don’t think they get the type of content I’m looking for.”
“Obviously. I’m proud of you for saying something. I’ve only been waiting the past six months for it to happen.” She pokes around in the empty basket between us. “We need more empanadas.”
The lady behind the counter laughs when I slip out of the small booth and wander up for a third round.
“You’re still hungry?” Her laugh is loud and boisterous, just as magical as I thought.
“Give her a croqueta,” an older woman sitting at the edge of the counter says, half-hidden behind a giant plant, her long gray hair wrapped in a bright purple silk scarf. She’s been eating tres leches since we sat down, a tiny cup of Cuban coffee on the counter in front of her. “Jamon.”
“I’ll have two,” I smile at the woman and glance at the handwritten menu board. “And a pastelito.” I glance back at Josie and she holds up two fingers. “Actually let’s do two of those.”
I consider a coffee, but I'm pretty sure I’ll be bouncing off the walls if it’s as strong as it smells. I slip back into the cozy booth in the corner and pick at what’s left of my empanada, pulling my phone from my pocket and placing it flat on the tabletop. I glance down at my lock screen, a picture of my parents with their arms around each other in front of the tiny boutique store they own on the outskirts of Portland. Beaming smiles. St. James Sundry Store hand-painted on the window.
I don’t know how I got from there to here.
“I love that picture,” Josie says with a smile. “They look so happy.”
“They do,” I smile, looking at my mother’s face. “They are.” We have the same smile, the same scrunch in our noses when we laugh. I wonder what she’s doing right now. If she’s restocking the candy she keeps in a small basket at the back of the store for the kids who manage to find it, or if she’s washing the windows with the same ratty, bright pink towel she’s always had. A pang of homesickness hits me right in the chest.
“Evie.”
“Hm?” I blink up from my phone and look at my friend, the face of the person who knows me better than anyone. She tilts her head and gives me a soft smile.
“What’s going on? You feel like—you feel like you’re half here. Stuck in your head somewhere.” I drop my chin and press two fingers above my eyebrow as Josie rushes to explain. “Not in a bad way, necessarily. You seem distracted, I guess.”
This break feels less like an idea and more like a necessity. I wake up every morning with a hollow feeling in my chest, an anxious pounding that gets worse the longer I lay in an unfamiliar bed staring at an unfamiliar room. I spend more time in hotels than at the small apartment I rent. I check my social accounts and I feel ballooning pressure in my chest. I feel like a liar. A fake.
“I’ve got no idea what I’m doing,” I sigh.
Josie frowns. “That has never once been true.”
“It’s been true more than you think,” I mutter. I’ve gotten excellent at pretending everything is okay.
I poke around our empty basket, fingering at the edge of the greasy paper that’s crinkled at the bottom. I pick up a crumb with my finger and lick it off. “I’m just going through the motions.”
Smiling for the camera. Adding pithy captions. Making my life seem like it’s one big, wonderful, adventure when really I’m stuck in my head. I’ve become obsessed with numbers, how posts are performing. I’m more interested in the aesthetic of a story than the actual story part of it. On my last trip, I forgot the name of the town I was in. Twice.
“How long have you felt like this?”
It’s settled in slowly, like a fog rolling in off the water. Everything lately has felt … off … and I don’t know why. The blogging started as a hobby, something fun for me to do. I never intended to build a career out of it. Now though, I have everything I’ve ever wanted from a job. I’m successful, sought after.
And terribly lonely.
I feel disconnected, I guess. Muted. Far away from anything that feels real. The guilt kicks in and I avert my gaze to the tabletop.
Poor social media influencer, sad she has too many followers and not enough friends. I feel like an impostor. Like the worst kind of fraud.
“I’m lying to everyone. I post this content and I’m just—Josie, I’m just pretending.”
“Pretending what?”
Everything, I think. Everything, all of the time.
The owner of the empanada shop makes her way over to our table, a plate full of fried deliciousness in her hands. She sets it on the edge and shouts over her shoulder in Spanish, another loud, cackling laugh echoing through the space. My heart lifts. A little bit of real-life magic.
“I don’t want to post content,” I say to Josie, still distracted.
She pops a pastelito in her mouth. “Then don’t.”
“I’m tired of traveling.”
“Take a break.”
“I don’t want to lose everything I’ve worked for.”
“You won’t.”
“I feel like I’ve forgotten how to be happy,” I whisper, my most secret thought. The one that slips through my head like a wisp of smoke when I’m flat on my back and staring up at the ceiling of whichever hotel I’m staying in for the night, unable to sleep. Mind racing. Thoughts buzzing.
“Did this ever make you feel good?” Josie asks. “Before you exploded into internet stardom, I mean. Were you happy making videos?”
I was. Some of the very best memories I have are from wandering around with my dad’s old camera. I’d spend my Saturdays sitting on a bench at the farmer’s market and just listen to people talk. I lost some of that, I think. Somewhere along the way.
Josie reaches for a croqueta and studies me. “I think this is a good thing for you. Most people go through this. You want to take a step back and evaluate if this is still the right fit. I champion a little self-reflection.” She raises her croqueta in a little toast, knocks it against my forehead once. “Do you, baby girl.”
“You don’t think I’m being ridiculous?”
“I think you are being forty-five percent ridiculous. And that is primarily attributed to the way you’re talking about yourself. Nothing you have has happened by accident. You work hard and move at the speed of light. I think that’s the crux of your problem. You’ve been bee-bopping all around and haven’t found roots to dig in. Your cute little body is exhausted. Your brain, too.”
I reach for a croqueta and take a bite, salty flavor bursting on my tongue. “I’m happy when I’m eating these,” I mumble around a mouthful. Josie grins.
“Well, we could send you on a food tour.” She leans back in the booth with a satisfied sigh. She pats her belly once and twists her lips in thought. “Seriously though, when was the last time you felt like you weren’t doing a job? Where is the last place you felt happy?”
It comes to me instantly. Leaves beneath my boots. A cloudless sky as blue as a mountain lake. Dirt roads and a big red barn by the road. Rows and rows of trees, pine needles in my hair.
A stupid joke about strawberries on a sunny afternoon. A plate of zucchini bread on the table.
I feel myself settle, my shoulders rolling back with the first deep breath I’ve taken in what feels like months. “I think I know.”
She nods, a satisfied glint in her eye. “Then let’s start there.”