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Could Valeria and I have the same trajectory?

“But if it works…”

Wyatt shrugs, smiling.

It would be incredible.

“Wyatt Rosenthal saying gay rights. Never thought I’d see the day,” Romy says.

I turn to Romy. She still looks a little wound up.

“You’re on board too?” I ask.

She sips more water, eyes on her glass. “It’s worth a shot while she’s around the office.” She sways a little. “And let’s be friends with her.”

A tiny shot of soberness falls over me. I pull out my phone. “Guess I’m telling Alice I’m still committed.”

“You cool with that?” Romy asks, a line forming between her brows.

I think about seeing Valeria again. Making her smile again. Talking about art with her and maybe even working with her. She liked my phone background. What would she think if I could show her my actual cinematography? What if I got to the point where I could film her?

“Worth the risk.”

So I type the message to Alice. She lets me know she received it and adds: only if ur on ur best behavior xx

chapter five

Somehow, sitting in bed for two days straight didn’t quite get my energy back up after the hangover of a lifetime Saturday morning. Yet it takes maybe five minutes at work Monday morning to get me totally wired. I’m reading Romy’s play to get a sense of the “outdoor” scenes that I’ll have to film. Alice is yakking to one of her big clients, her conversation such a familiar buzz in my ear that I figure why take off the headset. After all, I’m a committed assistant now, and committed assistants wear headsets and iron their blouses.

It’s while Alice waxes poetic about some producer and I read a soliloquy from a gay detective prodigy that I first spot Valeria.

She’s wearing a suit.

Which, okay, doesn’t quite describe it enough. It’s one of those stylized suits where the pants stop midcalf, with those designer slipper shoes and a cream blouse that has a loose tie accent in the front that flows a bit past her waistline.

She’s wearing a suit and she’s leaning against the wall behind Wyatt’s desk, a half smile on her face.

“Hey, floater,” she says, her voice a few notches lower than her usual higher-pitched SoCal accent. She’s from Pasadena. My reading is syncing with the person in front of me. Either way, it makes me shiver.

I slip the headset off. Minimize Romy’s play. Turn to her. My heart’s already hammering after one second of exposure.

I force down a sip of my iced coffee, the best means to cool myself off. “Your suit’s really cute.”

The crooked smile shifts to a purer joy. She tucks a blond lock behind her ear. A silver ring shines from her index finger. I wonder what the weight of her hair is, how it’d feel to move that piece myself. “Thank you.”

I glance at Steven’s office. He’s on the phone. “Is he keeping you waiting again?”

“I think the meeting today is important, but who knows how the fairer sex lives?”

I laugh, but the real jolt of dopamine comes as her eyes light up watching me laugh. But I shouldn’t be watching her microexpressions like this.

When I quickly glance over at Wyatt’s desk, I realize that’s empty too. Apparently I’ve been too preoccupied to notice. “Wyatt’s getting you coffee, right?”

“There’s”—she narrows her eyes—“a decent chance.” She looks at me, and I swear it’s like she’s burning a hole right into my chest. “Could you spare a Post-it?”

I rip off a Post-it, my hand quivering as much as my heart.

As she grips the other end of the Post-it, there’s a moment when the balance is perfect, this quasi-touch connection blinking in a sea of Things That Don’t Actually Mean Anything. Then I lift my finger, and Valeria retreats back to her wall, snagging a pen of Wyatt’s as she goes. His U.S.C. pen. I become a prouder alumna, seeing the U.S.C. logo between Valeria’s knuckles.