Page 3

“You’re doing great,” Paula says, flashing another genuine smile my way. She now has cards in her hands. “Remember, we’re two old friends.”
“Thirty seconds,” technology assistant Mike warns.
It would be easier to think of ourselves as two old friends if someone wasn’t counting the seconds down to us having a conversation.
I take a deep breath, letting my eyes flutter closed for a few short seconds.It’s only a few minutes.Talk about the video a little bit and then, of course, Pet Threads. It’s all worth it.It’s been worth it, I say like a mantra.
I never wanted to be in the spotlight, but I can’t say it hasn’t helped the business. Millions of eyes on my most embarrassing moment meant millions of people introduced to Pet Threads. The two went hand-in-hand. In a way, Tab and I are lucky.
“Ten seconds,” Mike warns again, and I don’t think it’s my imagination that his voice has gotten deeper, more serious as the time runs closer and closer. When he greeted me this morning, he almost sounded normal.
At once, a bunch of things happen. Paula’s hair and makeup people leave us alone together on the tiny stage. It gets real quiet, then super loud when someone stands in the crowd, hyping up the audience. They’re all on their feet, and Paula is beaming now, her smile more fake than before, but still beautifuland glaringly white, like she has a perfect row of chicklets in her mouth.
I’m still ogling her teeth when she says, “We’re back with Raeann Gorman! You might not recognize the name, but you’ll sure recognize the face and that cute country twang. That’s right. We’re talking to Miss ‘But I Love Him’ on the show this morning. First, let’s show a clip of the video.”
My stomach twists. Paula gestures toward the TV that’s now rising between us out of a piece of wood furniture. My puffy red face is bigger than I’ve ever seen it, and an ice pack is pressed to my jaw while Tab’s giggle rings through the speaker.
“What did you just say?” she asks.
“Micah Freeman,” I slur.It sounds more like Mi-ah Reeman, especially since my voice is coming at me from all sides in this huge space.
“What about him?”
A leading question if I ever heard one. To hear Tab tell the story, I’d been going on and on for a good five minutes before this, so she finally decided to pull out her phone and take the video.
“We in ’ove,” I state, my face contorting to a scowl the more Tab laughs.
“You’re in love?”
I nod incessantly. “I dunno…” the phone volume muffles for a moment when Tab switches hands, “… you’re ’aughing. We’re married.”
“You’re married to Micah Freeman? The Tennessee Wildcats’ running back?”
“Yes!” I pout, crossing my arms over my chest. “Is nah a ’aughing madder. He ’oves me.”
In the video, Athena licks my face. They pause on that frame where you can clearly see her dressed in my Pet Thread pajama design.
A part of me is pleased. The other part of me that’s vain enough to care that one of my eyes is open and the other is being licked by a dog for millions of people to see is humiliated. You can even see the trail of drool Athena left behind. Damn Tab and her insistence that she always get the latest iPhone for promotional material. All those camera pixels are screwing me right now.
When I return to my body, the audience is laughing. I smile good-naturedly because itisfunny. It’d be funnier if it wasn’t me, but I’ve laughed at a few dental videos myself. This is a higher power getting back at me, for sure.
“They must’ve given you the good stuff,” Paula jokes.
“The best,” I reply, nerves thrumming through my veins.
“You didn’t know what was happening?”
“No clue.”
She laughs again. Genuine, like she’s not laughingatme, which I appreciate.
I cringe at the screen, which garners another round of cheering from the audience. “For the record, I’m not married to Micah Freeman.”
“You don’t say?”
I laugh. “Like I said, the good stuff.”
Paula asks a few questions about my procedure and thegood stuff, and we all have a good chuckle. About the time I think we’re going to move the conversation to Pet Threads, she asks, “Did you ever hear from Micah Freeman? Or his team?”