The gist of her one-sided conversation was as follows: I was being taken off Ronan’s campaign. It didn’t matter what I looked like or how I dressed; she valued my brain. However, it was important that I understood non-summery colors suited my complexion best. Yellow was a complete disaster.

…I am being taken off Ronan’s campaign.

My brain hurt.

“Wait! Wait a minute, just—just stop talking,” I shouted at the phone and the inside of my apartment. I was greeted by Joan’s sudden silence as I closed my eyes and rubbed the center of my chest with my fingertips, trying to find the right way to ask my next question.

I decided there was no right way to ask the question, so I demanded, “Why am I being taken off the Fitzpatrick account?”

I heard Joan clear her throat, could see her in my mind’s eye straighten her spine and purse her lips. She didn’t like it when people were demanding.

At length, no longer able to handle the suspense of her cool silence, I added in a much calmer tone, “I’m sorry, Joan. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have…shouted. I apologize. I’m just very surprised that I’ve been removed from Ronan’s team. I’ve worked very hard on this account, and I would like to know why I’m being excluded.”

Her softened, measured tenor surprised me as she explained, “Mr. Fitzpatrick called this morning. He asked that you be removed from his team. Furthermore, he requested that the relationship we’ve doctored for the media end immediately.”

“He…he did what?” Now my brain and my heart hurt.

“Obviously, I told him that he is making a mistake. You are the best in this business, I told him. Your ideal image sketch has become a reality much faster than we could have foreseen, largely due to your timing strategy, the social media campaign, and your involvement as his faux love interest. Public perception is just as you’ve designed. I further explained that we couldn’t just end things between the two of you. We’ll have to phase you out of the public eye and phase someone else in who is equally relatable and likable. Otherwise, we risk making him look flighty and unfeeling. Side note here, I’d like your input as to appropriate candidates.”

“Phase me out?” I choked. “Candidates?”

“He eventually ceded that point. You’re off the account, Annie. But you’re still on girlfriend duty for the next four to six weeks—but don’t worry, it’s just a few public appearances. Becky has been sketching out the schedule since I got off the phone with Mr. Fitzpatrick. She’ll send you the draft this evening.”

“The schedule?”

“Of obligatory public appearances.”

I was mostly quiet for several long moments, but I abruptly became aware that I was breathing heavily and clutching my forehead with stiff fingers.

Ronan wanted me gone.

He wanted me gone.

He didn’t want me.

He didn’t even want to see me.

I’d left last night, and I’d ruined everything; and I had no idea how to make things right. Maybe there was no way to make things right. Maybe I’d left one too many times.

“Annie? Are you…are you all right?”

“No,” I blurted, shaking my head and obviously feeling more afraid than sane, because I blurted, “I’m not all right. I’m all wrong. I’ve ruined everything. I’m in love with him, and I didn’t tell him. Instead, I ran away when I found out something that I didn’t know. I didn’t know that he knew who I was. And when I found out that he knew, that he knew about who I was all along but loved me anyway, wanted me anyway, forgave me anyway, I panicked and left because his love felt like a manipulation. But it isn’t, and his emails were the only way he had of telling me how he felt without me freaking out like a ‘Freakout Francine!’ And instead of admitting the truth and owning my part and accepting his feelings and trusting him, I turned and fled like a spineless asshole.”

“Oh, dear.”

“Yes. ‘Oh, dear’ is right. I’m totally fucked, aren’t I?”

“Uh….”

“It’s okay, you can say it. You can say, ‘Annie, you are fucked.’ I mean, what kind of person falls in love with Ronan Fitzpatrick but is too much of a hypocrite and coward to own up to those feelings, especially when I know—I know for a fact—that they’re reciprocated! I know it, Joan! But not anymore because he wants me off the account!”

I might have been slightly hysterical at this point. I wasn’t crying, but I was screaming at my boss.

“Annie, calm down.”

“I can’t! I can’t calm down, Joan. I can no longer keep my shit together. You are the closest thing I have to a real-life friend, and you intimidate the crap out of me. I have no one. I had someone, but I threw him away, twice. Two times. I thought I didn’t need anyone. I was wrong. I’m so very wrong…I’m a spineless asshole.”

I was pacing the apartment, making contingency plans, because I was pretty sure I was about to be fired. My blog could support me, pay all my bills…assuming I wasn’t about to be outed as The Socialmedialite by the dunghead who’d stolen my laptop. Then I would become a true hermit. A shut-in, finding photos for my blog from other sources. Maybe I would get a ferret. A cat just felt too benign. My kind of crazy deserved an ambiguously cute rodent with a penchant for biting.

Really, I had more money than I needed. Years of spending funds only on takeout, tea, and pastries had yielded a significant savings. Being miserly with my finances and feelings was about to pay off in the most tragic way possible.

“Listen to me—”

“I’m fired, aren’t I? It’s okay if I am; just tell me now. If I’m going to lose my shit, I might as well lose all of it at once and have a shit storm of shittiness.”

“Annie, shut up and listen.”

I snapped my mouth shut and sat down heavily on my couch, released a resigned exhalation, and bit my bottom lip to keep from saying anything else.

“Now….” Joan cleared her throat, and I heard some movement in the background. I thought I heard her snapping her fingers. She often snapped her fingers at people when she wanted their attention.

I prepared myself for what would undoubtedly come next, and tangentially I decided that I should have invested in a therapist years ago. Then I could have called her or him rather than committing professional suicide. Therapists always struck me as a hire-a-friend service. Therapists are to mental and emotional purging what prostitutes are to physical urges.

Amidst my meanderings about prostitutes and therapists and ferrets, Joan surprised the cuss out of me.

Of note, she didn’t fire me.

Instead, she said, “Put on some tea. I’m coming over. And don’t even think about having another childish fit and leaving the apartment. You might have given Ronan Fitzpatrick the slip, but I will hunt you down and make your life very uncomfortable until I am satisfied that you’ve learned your lesson. You can’t run away from people who care about you and are invested in your success and happiness. It’s a dick move, Annie. Don’t be a dick.”

Also of note, she used the word “dick.”

“Uh….” What?

Before I could say anything, Joan abruptly hung up, leaving me staring at my apartment, wondering into what bizarre universe I’d just stumbled.

***

I didn’t run away. Instead, I did as I was instructed and put the tea kettle on, prepared two cups of Earl Grey, and changed into a black T-shirt and black yoga pants.

Joan arrived no less than twenty minutes later; she must’ve rushed, taken the company car. Maybe she flew on her broom…. Whether she was a good witch or a bad witch had never quite been settled. For now, I assumed she was a good witch with ruthless tendencies.

I opened the door and stepped back, my eyes wide as she strolled in—giving me the once-over as she passed.

“First of all, you’re not fired, so you can wipe that look of panic off your face.”

I shut the door and followed my boss into my apartment. She looked somehow shorter here. Maybe it was the lighting.

She continued as she scanned my place, inspecting books on my shelves and frowning at my desk in the living room. “I do not excel at this type of thing, so I’ll just tell you what I think. Then we can sit on the couch and drink tea and do whatever it is that women friends do when one of them is having a crisis. Here is what I think: you’re having a colossal overreaction. Mr. Fitzpatrick is on his way to New York as we speak. He took the first flight out of Ireland this morning—I imagine he did so once he discovered you’d left. When he called me, he sounded angry, yes. But he also sounded concerned about you, about your being forced into taking on his account, forced into a relationship for the sake of his career.”

This news should have been a relief. Instead, it just made me feel more like a spineless asshole. “But he’s not the problem. I’m the coward. I’m the one who left. I’m the one that overreacted when I found out…when he told me about the thing with the thing.”

“The thing with the thing? Are you having a seizure? Suffering from aphasia?”

“No,” I huffed, pulling my hand through my hair and scratching my scalp. “He found out who I really am.”