My bedroom door squeaked open and Kim's face, topped by her massive bun, popped through. "Hey, I'm gonna head out now. You're out of paper towels."

I dropped my pen onto the notebook in my lap, frowning at her.

“I told you not to clean."

I expected her to make some churlish comment, but her expression flickered with indecisiveness. She had something to say that had nothing to do with paper towels.

I sighed and chuckled. "Just say whatever you want to say."

Kim smiled guiltily and entered the room, slinking over to my bed and sitting down on the edge of it. She picked up my notebook and looked at it approvingly.

"You're doing school work," she noted.

"I've been doing school work all week. I'm ahead of where I'm supposed to be now."

She nodded and dropped the book back in my lap. "I guess I just wanted to check in with you. You've been pretty quiet this week, and I'm having trouble gauging where you're at emotionally."

Fair enough. I'd been hiding in my room most of the time since I got home from the trip, but at least the past few days had been more congruous to a healthy and happy life. Catching up on my school work was a great way to distract myself from my feelings, and from the realization that I was going to have to go back to dancing next week.

"I'm good, Kim. I really am. I mean..." I grimaced. "That Chad and Lori thing. That was a bummer for sure, and I won't pretend like I'm not hurt, but there's no point in dwelling on it, right?"

"Right." She nodded.

I changed the topic as deftly as I could. "I just can't believe I have to go back to work next week. Bummer of the century."

Kim rubbed my back. "You could take more time off if you need."

"No, no," I quickly assured. "I don't mean it like that. I just mean that the trip put a few things in perspective for me, and one of them is that I need to work on getting myself out of there. For all his faults, Chad found his passion and pursued it—even when the people closest to him were hoping that he'd fail. I want to find that for myself. I've got a new appreciation for what I want my life to be, and all I want to do is get out there and explore the world."

"You will. For now, at least dancing pays the bills."

I chuckled. "That it does."

Kim slapped her knee. "I should be hitting the road. You sure you're good?"

"Better than good."

I tried on a smile that I hoped would seem as enthusiastic as I didn't feel. It must've worked because Kim left me to my school work without further issue.

As soon as I heard the front door slam, a craving that had been sleeping most of the day woke up and began gnawing on my stomach with a vengeance. I tried to ignore it, wrinkled my forehead in concentration and everything, but it persisted like a bad cold.

I knew I would give in in the end. I always gave in. So why fight it?

I fought it, I reminded myself, because I knew that I should. Because I knew that it was the right thing for my sanity and that I'd never be able to get over Chad if I didn't let him go fully.

Still, I found myself giving a longing look to the laptop at the end of the bed. And, like an addict seeking their fix, I snatched it up.

Chad's YouTube channel had become my obsession. My addiction. No matter how much I told myself that it was wrong, how much I reminded myself that it would only make this longer overall, I couldn't stop torturing myself. Part of it was a morbid curiosity about what he and his new/old girlfriend were up to. Part of it was because the comments were like free therapy sessions.

Chad's fans hated Lori. On their most recent video, in which Chad was just as dead-eyed as he'd been in the one before, enough people had commented asking where I was that somebody had photoshopped my face and the words "missing persons" onto a picture of a milk carton and made it into a meme. Everyone had some sort of theory for my disappearance, and they ranged from realistic to hilariously outrageous. The general consensus, whatever the case, was that Lori was a cow and Chad had made a mistake getting back together with her.

I scrolled through these comments for half an hour, smiling like a nut job the entire time. It only hurt when I stopped to think about the permanence of my dismissal, so I didn't stop to think. I just read and enjoyed, delighting in the creative insults the fans concocted for their numero uno persona non grata.

It was a cruel and spiteful way to spend my days, and it probably blackened my soul a little bit each time, but in a way it made me feel better. At least that was what the addict side of myself reasoned. During these moments, it didn't matter that as soon as I closed the page, I'd feel like a hollowed out pumpkin, viciously scraped from the inside. For a few minutes I got retribution, and it tasted like heaven.

My phone trilled beside me, and I jumped. I'd been hiding this dark side of myself from Kim, and I half expected it to be her calling, having somehow figured out what I was doing. It was a number I didn't recognize with a New York area code. Strange.

"Hello?" I answered.

"Hello, my name is Ted Branson from Kleingarden Model Management. Is this Brianne Reed?”

My jaw dropped. "Uh, yes, this is."

"Hello, Ms. Reed. Have you heard of our firm?”

Heard of it? It was only one of the biggest modeling agencies on the east coast.

I answered with a cool, “ I think so.”

“That’s great news. I wanted to speak to you regarding a potential offer of representation at our firm. Would you have time for a video conference sometime next week?”

All the heat drained from my face and I could have sworn my heart stopped beating. “Is this some sort of practical joke?”

Ted chuckled. “I can assure you it’s not. You've gotten a lot of attention recently from your work with Chad Harlan, and we think you have a great look. We'd love to take you on and see what we can do with that."

I was speechless—so much so, that Ted had to prompt me for an answer a moment later.

"Ms. Reed?"

"I'm so sorry!" I sputtered. "I just—what I mean is—yes! I absolutely have time next week."

We arranged a time for our conference, and I gave him my email so he could send me more details. Ted wished me a good day, and I hung up the phone, still not entirely sure that what had happened was real.

I pinched myself. Hard. It hurt like hell, which I took to mean that I was currently living in reality and that, in fact, a modeling agency had just called to speak to me about representation. My heart was racing so fast that I thought I might keel over and die, which would be just my luck. Finally, breakthrough in the modeling industry only to fall over dead before my first interview.

I was so awestruck that at first, I didn't notice that the page had refreshed and Chad's channel was showing a new video. When I did notice, I furrowed my brow in confusion and, with a shaking hand, clicked the play button on the untitled video.

The video loaded and began to play. Surprisingly, there was no music, no intro, just Chad's face in front of a plain white background. He was staring right at the camera, bereft of his usual carefree grin.

"Hey guys," he began. "This is going to be my last video for a while. Maybe even forever." He ground his teeth and looked down for a moment like he was gathering the words in his palms. When he looked back up, the sincerity in his eyes startled me. "Many of you have noticed that there's been a lot of change going on in my life right now. Many of you have also shared your feelings about these changes, and the result has been interesting for sure. It's not always easy to make the right decision in life, especially when things are so..." He chuckled, shaking his head. "Fucked up, for lack of a better word. I've always prided myself on living a life with no regrets, so much so that I think somewhere along the line I forgot how much regret can hurt. I've got one regret right now that's just killing me, and I'll never forgive myself if I don't say this one thing."

As he spoke the next words, it felt like he was staring right through the camera into my soul. I knew he couldn't see me, and that he'd probably recorded this hours ago, but at that moment I felt a connection to him that defied all logic.

"Brin," he said, voice laden with emotion. "I need you to know that what we had was real."

The image cut to footage of Chad and I on the beach. I recognized it as our first day, right after we'd been snorkeling. I'd never seen this video before, and I hadn't realized Martin was even filming at this point. We looked so happy, chatting and laughing with each other while the sun melted into the horizon.

My eyes misted with tears. I knew what came next.

On-screen Brin threw all inhibitions to the wind and kissed Chad. I'd had my eyes closed at the time so couldn't see his face, but the video captured his expression of surprise perfectly. His eyes flared open for less than a second, body stiffening like he didn't know what he was supposed to do. Then he relaxed, and his eyes closed tight as he pulled me against him and made the kiss his own.

The memory made my chest flutter. It was such a perfect moment, one that even the shitstorm that followed couldn't spoil the memory of. I could still feel his strong arms around me, the heat of his mouth against mine and the way he held me like if he didn't, I'd float off into the universe.

The video ended.

I sucked in a breath and fell back against the pillows, mind reeling. What did this mean? What was he trying to say? My thoughts spun mercilessly around my skull, and I was so overwhelmed that I wanted to laugh and cry at the same time.

I needed to see him. Even if it was just goodbye, I needed to see him. But how the hell was I supposed to do that?

My phone rang. I held it up to my face and stared at the caller ID suspiciously. Not a New York number, but not a familiar one either. Who the hell was it going to be now? I considered not answering it, based on the fact that I'd just received a mindfuck of a video message and needed to process, but the curiosity ultimately got to me in the end.

"Hello?" I answered.

"Did you see the video?"

I scowled. This was a voice I never expected to hear again. Never wanted to hear again.

"Yeah. I just saw it. What do you want?"

Silence from the other end, and then, "We need to talk."