Page 18 of Flipping the Script

NEW WAVE

T he morning light streaming through Quinn's living room windows felt harsh against Solen's swollen eyes.

She'd barely moved from the couch since Quinn brought her home the night before, still wearing yesterday's wrinkled dress, her phone clutched in trembling fingers as she watched her life dissected by strangers.

Another notification. Another screenshot of Tasha's Instagram Live session making the rounds on Twitter, complete with commentary from people who thought they understood her entire relationship history based on twenty minutes of calculated cruelty.

"She's obviously using Quinn for career rehab."

"The fake crying was SO obvious."

"Tasha dodged a bullet with this one."

Quinn's bare feet whispered across the hardwood as she emerged from the kitchen, two steaming mugs balanced in her hands. Steam curled between them, carrying the rich scent of the good coffee—not Quinn's usual efficient instant, but something that required actual care to prepare.

"You made real coffee." Solen's voice came out rougher than she'd expected.

"Seemed like a real coffee kind of morning." Quinn settled beside her, close enough that their knees almost touched. The couch dipped under her weight, tilting Solen slightly toward her. "Though I should warn you, my coffee-making skills are purely theoretical."

The first sip proved Quinn's self-assessment accurate—slightly bitter, a touch too strong—but the warmth spread through Solen's chest anyway. Someone had tried to take care of her. Someone had noticed she needed caring for.

"I should have seen this coming." Solen touched the compass at her throat, the brass warm from her skin.

"Tasha doesn't handle being ignored well.

She posted our private photos when I broke up with her, and now she's back to finish what she started with a new wave of attacks, clearly aiming for complete annihilation. "

Quinn's hand moved to cover hers, stilling the anxious fidgeting. "May I?"

Solen blinked, confused, until Quinn gestured to the phone. Her first instinct was to clutch it tighter—what if something worse appeared while she wasn't watching? What if missing one comment meant missing some crucial development?

But Quinn's green eyes held steady patience, and Solen found herself loosening her grip. The phone disappeared into Quinn's pocket with a decisive motion.

"You don't need to watch the world dissect your private life in real-time," Quinn said. "That's not staying informed. That's self-harm with notifications."

"But what if?—"

"Iris is monitoring everything. If there's something that requires our attention, she'll handle it." Quinn tucked her legs underneath her, angling to face Solen fully. "Right now, the only thing that requires your attention is you."

The simple statement hit harder than it should have. When was the last time someone had suggested Solen's own wellbeing was the priority? Even during the Tasha situation six months ago, everyone's focus had been damage control, career protection, public perception management.

"I keep choosing people who can't fully commit to me.

" The words spilled out before Solen could stop them.

"Foster care taught me that everyone leaves eventually, so I learned to pick people who were already halfway out the door.

Safer that way. If they're emotionally unavailable from the start, their leaving doesn't count as rejection. "

Quinn's thumb traced over Solen's knuckles, an unconscious gesture that sent warmth racing up her arm.

"Tasha was perfect for that pattern. Influencer, always performing, incapable of genuine intimacy. I could love her without risking... this." Solen gestured vaguely at her current state of emotional wreckage. "Without risking someone seeing all of me and deciding I'm too much trouble."

"You're not too much trouble." Quinn's voice carried the same certainty she used when discussing story structure or character motivation.

"You say that now, but you've never had someone weaponize your vulnerabilities on social media. You've never had your private photos shared without consent, or your sexual history turned into entertainment for strangers."

Quinn was quiet for so long that Solen finally looked up, expecting to see judgment or discomfort. Instead, she found Quinn's analytical expression—the look she wore when working through a particularly complex plot problem.

"We could withdraw from the remaining events," Quinn said suddenly.

Solen stared. "What?"

"The Golden Horizon Awards, the final interviews. Iris mentioned having backup plans for various scenarios." Quinn's fingers tightened around hers. "Your mental health is more important than any publicity timeline."

The offer knocked Solen sideways. Quinn, whose entire career hung on this project's success, whose perfectionist nature demanded following plans to completion, was suggesting they abandon their carefully orchestrated strategy to protect Solen's emotional wellbeing.

"You'd really do that?" Solen whispered. "Tank your own project to protect me from gossip?"

"It wouldn't be tanking anything. It would be prioritizing what actually matters." Quinn's cheeks flushed pink, but her voice stayed steady. "Which is you. Your healing. Your choice about how much public scrutiny you can handle."

Something cracked open in Solen's chest—not breaking, but opening like a door she'd kept locked for years. This was what genuine care looked like. Not performance, not strategy, not even romance necessarily. Just another human being saying your wellbeing matters more than any external goal.

"I need food," Solen said, because suddenly she couldn't breathe around the intensity of Quinn's offer. "Emotional devastation makes me hungry."

Quinn's smile carried relief at the subject change. "I have... let's see, yogurt that might be expired, half a sleeve of crackers, and coffee beans."

"That's tragic even by my standards." Solen pulled up the pizza place Quinn had mentioned before. "Pepperoni and mushroom?"

"You remember my pizza preferences?"

"I remember everything about you." The admission slipped out too honest, too raw, but Quinn's resulting blush made it worth the vulnerability.

While they waited for food, they spread Quinn's script across the dining table—not the clean copy bound for production, but Quinn's personal version, marked with color-coded notes and increasingly frequent margin scribbles in Solen's handwriting.

"Look at this," Quinn said, pointing to a page where Solen had suggested changing a monologue into dialogue. "Three weeks ago, I would have hidden this script before letting you see it. Now it's more yours than mine."

"Collaboration looks good on you." Solen traced one of her own notes with her finger. "Your brilliant structure, my instinctive character work. We make things better together."

They'd fallen into comfortable work rhythm when the pizza arrived, spreading boxes across script pages and arguing good-naturedly about whether the romantic lead would realistically own a dog. Quinn argued for character consistency; Solen insisted dogs made everyone more sympathetic on screen.

"Besides," Solen said around a bite of pizza, "the dog could be a rescue. Matches her commitment issues—she saves something that needs healing while avoiding anything too emotionally demanding."

Quinn paused, pen hovering over the script. "That's... actually brilliant character development."

"I have my moments."

"You have a lot of moments." Quinn's voice carried something warmer than professional appreciation. "I was wrong about your script suggestions being random. You see character psychology in ways I miss."

Evening settled around them in golden gradients, Quinn's usually pristine space transformed by scattered takeout containers, script pages, and Solen's belongings claiming space on every surface.

The organized chaos would have horrified Quinn weeks ago; now it felt like watching her apartment exhale after holding its breath for years.

"Tell me about the compass," Quinn said as they cleaned up, nodding toward the necklace Solen touched whenever anxiety spiked.

Solen's hand moved to the brass circle automatically.

"Last gift from my first foster mother. Margaret.

I was twelve, aging out of her placement because she could only take short-term kids.

" The memory still carried edges sharp enough to cut.

"She said everyone needs something to help them find their true north. "

"Did you think she was right?"

"I thought true north was a fantasy." Solen settled back on the couch, closer to Quinn this time, drawn by the steady warmth she radiated.

"In foster care, you learn that home is temporary.

People leave, get reassigned, decide you're too difficult.

So you stop looking for permanent belonging and start looking for temporary safety instead. "

Quinn's hand found hers again, fingers interlacing with shocking naturalness. "What changed?"

"You." The word emerged without permission, carrying more truth than Solen had planned to reveal. "This morning, when you offered to withdraw from our publicity schedule to protect my mental health, I realized I've been looking for stability in all the wrong places."

Quinn's breath caught, barely audible.

"I've spent years choosing people who couldn't fully commit because their emotional unavailability felt familiar.

Safe. I knew how to love someone who was already leaving.

" Solen turned Quinn's hand over, studying the precise lines of her palm.

"But you're not leaving. Even when staying means risking your career, your project, everything you've worked toward. "

"Solen—"

"I'm terrified," Solen continued, needing to finish before courage abandoned her. "Everything in my history tells me that staying means eventual abandonment. That if I let myself depend on your steadiness, you'll decide I'm too much trouble and disappear."

Quinn shifted to face her fully, their knees bumping together. "I'm terrified too. Every relationship I've had ended because I couldn't relinquish enough control to let someone really know me. I thought vulnerability meant weakness until you showed me it could mean connection instead."

The apartment fell quiet except for the distant hum of traffic and their synchronized breathing. Solen could feel the moment balancing on a knife's edge—they could retreat to safer topics, or they could step into the terrifying space where honesty lived.

"I want to try," Solen whispered. "Not the performance version we've been doing for cameras, but the real thing. Even though it scares me more than any scandal or public humiliation."

"The real thing," Quinn repeated, testing the words.

"I want to choose you. Choose us. Choose staying instead of running when emotions get intense." Solen's thumb traced across Quinn's knuckles. "I know our timing is complicated with contracts and publicity schedules, but?—"

Quinn's kiss cut off her words, soft and certain and tasting like coffee and possibility. When they broke apart, foreheads touching, Solen felt her internal compass finally settle on something that felt like true north.

"We'll figure out the complicated parts," Quinn murmured against her lips. "Together."