Alicia
The coffee shop gave me exactly what I needed—a sense of normalcy. I’d woken up that day and put on my favorite yoga pants and sweatshirt, pulled my hair into a ponytail, and headed out to get my daily jolt of caffeine and clear my thoughts.
After setting up my computer at a small table in the corner, I got a mocha with tons of whipped cream. It reminded me of that morning I’d gone shopping with Tammy, Reena, and Lori and the crazy drinks they had ordered. I shook my head and opened my laptop. Then I took a long sip of coffee, the warmth settling through me, easing away the fatigue.
I rubbed my eyes and stretched my neck. Ever since getting back from the lodge trip a few days ago, I’d been having the worst time sleeping. Every time I closed my eyes, images from the trip, memories of conversation snippets with Tammy, Lori, and Reena, rushed through my mind at warp speed. I kept obsessing about how I could have spent more time with Ryan. Most of all, I tried to wrap my head around how on earth Tammy could have found out about our secret.
I needed to write a blog post about the lodge weekend with the oh-so-secretive Diamond Club, which was long overdue. But first, I needed to take a few minutes to check my email. All of the comments people wrote on my blog were forwarded to my inbox. I really loved this feature because I enjoyed reading each comment and responding personally.
Up until now, I’d never had a problem staying caught up, but since I started the Diamond Club Diaries, a blog within my blog, I’d been getting tons of comments and shares. The comments were great; they meant that real people were out there reading my work on a regular basis. The shares, though, were invaluable for an entirely different reason. Each share was an opportunity to get shared again, which could lead to the shares growing exponentially. And that was how some blogs went viral. To become a blogging phenomenon, it only took a single post and a few loyal readers.
I began to click through my emails, reading and smiling at some of the comments. The readers were rabid for more adventures from the Diamond Club Diaries cast, so I really needed to buckle down and write the next installment. After all, if I could keep people reading and sharing, someone with connections at a magazine might happen on one of my blogs. If they were impressed enough, they might reach out and offer me a job or at least some freelancing assignments.
Hey, it happened sometimes, right?
My agent had found me through some of my short story publications. I’d written a couple of full-length manuscripts for her, but I hadn’t been able to write a book in two years, since the last one flopped with every editor at publishing houses both big and small. The comments had all been the same: Great plot, great characters. But the writer’s holding something back. This book is not fearless, it’s just not break-out material. This writer has some growing and maturing to do, blah blah blah. My face burned, just remembering the rejections my agent had forwarded.
With the back of my hand, I swiped at a tear that had sneaked out the corner of my eye. Maybe I wasn’t cut out for a book. Maybe my success would lie in shorter features, like articles and blog posts. Or, possibly—
The last email I hadn’t checked. It was another one from my agent. She was familiar with my blog, but she’d never commented on it or anything. I didn’t even think she read it. But the subject line read: Now You’re Cooking.
I opened the message. Alicia, this is everything your other books were lacking. THIS is what the editors were saying. All that honestly, that vulnerability, it’s there, in your blog. Keep going with this, and maybe think about some ways to expand it into a lengthier work. Give me a call anytime if you want to brainstorm on the phone.
Smiling, I closed the message from my agent and began to compose a new blog post. I titled it “Devil’s Lair,” because Ryan’s nickname had been Damien ever since the day I first wrote about him. I began to describe everything, from Ryan’s invitation, to me instigating a game of strip poker, the shopping trip, and our camping excursion. I talked about Tammy—Rich Bitch—and I described her spending habits in detail. I talked about how she and the other girls spent money like it grew on trees, and how they laughed at me for not buying anything more than a pair of sunglasses and some lingerie. I admitted that Damien had given me his credit card, but also highlighted that I felt weird about using it, which was true. Not that it had stopped me.
As I did in every entry, I included a few details about the Diamond Club itself. In this post, the guys’ white-water rafting trip was written about in detail since it was the whole point of the weekend. I also spent a lot of time describing the other members of the Diamond Club as individuals and how they were as couples. I explained that each guy had to have a girlfriend, and that lady had to fit in with the others.
And you definitely do not fit in, a voice said very loudly and very clearly in my head, prompting me to sigh heavily in response. No need to restate the obvious.
Of course, as tempting as it was, I never used anyone’s real name. I wasn’t interested in getting sued now or in the future, and if I ever got called out on anything I wrote, I would just say I made it all up. Things had gotten so crazy, it was actually beginning to feel like I was imagining the whole thing. Even though I had been there, I could barely believe the weekend I was describing was real; it sounded like something out of a daytime soap opera or telenovela.
Rich Bitch is hell bent on ruining my chances with Damien. No matter what I do, I can’t seem to get her on my side. I’ve completely given up on her liking me, and now all I want her to do is tolerate my existence.
I wanted to write something about her finding out that Ryan was paying me, that I’m essentially a prostitute, but I couldn’t find the words. It was so absolutely pathetic. But it was true, and the truth must be written.
Even so, a small part of me wondered what I was doing with this blog. Waiting in My Tower was supposed to be a stress-reliever. It was supposed to just be for fun, to keep me writing when I couldn’t work on a novel for my agent. It was supposed to help me find the truth and stop pulling punches, as the editors had said I was doing. Was it supposed to be about harshing on other people?
I shook my head. It didn’t matter. They weren’t really my friends—they were a job. And I wasn’t about to let them get in the way of my dreams. I continued typing, my fingers hitting the keys in fast, angry taps.
Rich Bitch found out a big secret between Damien and me: that for our first date he paid me to pretend to be his girlfriend. What started out as one simple date led to my entrance into this secret club, and since then I’ve been chasing my tail trying to fit in with the women in the group—without much success—and trying to be able to fit in with a rich crowd, undetected. Have you ever been in a place or situation where you felt like the total odd woman out? Like people were watching you, waiting for you to slip up? Right now, that’s my world. Stay tuned.
I posted the entry and clicked my laptop closed, suddenly feeling absolutely exhausted. I knew I needed to contact Ryan to fill him in on what Tammy had told me, and that she was saying it to the other people in the club. It was only a matter of time before the secret slipped out into the open, and I couldn’t let that happen without Ryan being aware. We needed to come up with a plan.