First Draft Romance

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

The following week inches by slowly. As I see less and less of an edits-obsessed Rosalind, my writing productivity comes to a halt. I'm stuck right before the end of my act two—where Short-Haired Girl is going to ruin things with Slightly Older Girl, then nearly makes the mistake of getting back together with the formerly wonderful Curvy Girl, before realizing that Slightly Older Girl is her super sexy soulmate—but I can't figure out where things are going for the overall ending.

Is Slightly Older Girl a good match for Short-Haired Girl, or is it just wishful thinking? She seems like she's way too cool. And there's, like, maybe a slight power imbalance or whatever. But Curvy Girl isn't exactly a match for her either. I mean, after all that shit with the closet and whatnot? Not exactly "happily ever after" material.

This is what I get for not plotting the book in advance. If I'd have known where I was going with it, maybe I wouldn't have burnt myself out trying to figure it out as I went along.

So, as Roz sequesters herself away, communicating my tasks to me through a combination of texts or email, I find myself giving into the mind-numbingness of my job. I make sure her apartment stays clean; I gain complete access to her email and calendar, so I can respond to emails and set up her meetings for her; and I try my best to stay out of her way, even if there's this weird tug in my gut that keeps urging me to talk to her, see her, get to know her better.

Instead of bothering Roz, I spend the rest of my unstructured hours doom-scrolling. It was hard the first few days, when I kept getting all this aspirational writing content, but now, I've somehow migrated to Personal ChefTok. Which is, of course, how I set Rosalind's oven on fire.

It was a complete and total accident, to be fair. There was a viral recipe for these weird, puffy British bread things, but it had Lord of the Rings music in the background, and I know Roz loves LOTR because any Rosalind Lindbergh fan worth their salt knows this, and so then I was like, ooh, maybe I'll make her a stew for a fun end-of-week lunch. Yeah. A really nice, hearty stew, with the weird puffy bread things, and—

And I go and set the oven on fire.

The fire alarm goes off before I notice, of course. I'm so scared shitless that it nearly knocks me off the couch. But then, I'm scrambling up off the white sofa and nearly tripping over myself to get to the kitchen, because I can't immediately see what's wrong. Until I see the smoke seeping through Roz's stovetop and have the sense to look at the oven itself.

Which, holy shit.

Through the oven's glass door, I can see flames leaping up from off the bottom of the oven, a tauntingly bright orange that licks up the entire height of the oven's interior. Which, just, fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. What do I do?

I whip out my phone and Google "what to do if oven on fire."

The fire alarm is loud in my ears as I wait for my phone screen to load. Why didn't I learn about this in high school? I feel like home fire safety should have been a higher priority than pre-calc. My heartbeat is racing double-time the alarm. I'm going to throw up.

Finally. My phone's loading screen finally stops, and the solution is at my fingertips: turn off the oven and keep the door closed. Starve out the fire, deprive it of oxygen.

The internet is so smart.

After shutting off the oven, I whirl around to go open the living room windows and turn on the living room ceiling fan and my face full-on smacks into another face—Roz's of course. Because who else could it be?

I hate my life.

"Fuck," she mutters, rubbing her forehead while I tenderly touch my chin. "What's going on? Is everything okay? The alarm—"