1
Emma
He trusted me again and yet I know that I don't deserve that trust. I ran after him when I thought that I was going to lose him again. I've been after him to ask him why he had lied about D. B. Carter and then he told me the truth. He pulled out his phone and showed me the draft of all of these books. Then we kissed.
That kiss made me believe again. Not just in him, but in us. Even if it's just the possibility of us.
I know that I don't deserve his trust. I know that we have both been not particularly honest with each other. I shouldn’t have sent Shelby my notes.
I shouldn’t have even written any of them down. That's the first step to getting exposed. I just wanted to remember. I'm a journalist at heart and I wanted to keep track of every detail. Somehow, it feels like if you put your thoughts on paper, then they’re more real.
Writers have felt like this for centuries. That's why we write. We put pen to paper or keys to the keyboard and we record our innermost thoughts for posterity.
Is it really that though?
Is it really to be remembered or is it just to remember right now?
I have often sat down to write without knowing exactly what I was going to say. Somehow the process of organizing my thoughts into phrases, then sentences, then paragraphs, and then pages of text makes everything make sense.
When I was first presented with this mystery about the true identity of D. B. Carter, I had no idea where I was going to start. I had no idea that I wanted to include myself in the story, but why not? I was the one investigating it. It was my eyes that everything was getting filtered through.
Little did I know that D. B. Carter would end up being someone who I couldn’t stop thinking about.
Little did I know that D. B. Carter would end up being someone who would be there for me in my darkest hour.
I used to think that he was a distraction. I still think that he is just a rebound that might help me get over Alex. We are all tempted to do that, aren't we? Get out of a serious, long-term relationship that might have been a little too toxic and jump right into something else? Why? Why did I do that? Why does anyone?
To make myself feel better.
Then I realized that something else was happening. I saw myself becoming someone else. I like the person that I was between them. She was finally outgoing and fearless, maybe not entirely fearless, but a lot less fearful than she was with Alex.
Things with Liam were not planned out. In fact, most of the time I felt like the ground was shifting under my feet, but in a good way. It was exciting. Enticing.
He was somebody who took my mind off the pain that I felt with Alex and yet he was somebody who reminded me that Alex and I were never good together. He was always a liar and a cheat. I didn't know the truth about everything that he was doing and my world came crashing down that day, but looking back, I start seeing all the cracks.
Things with Liam are also complicated. He has secrets. I have uncovered some, but the more that I uncover, the more I know that there are others. He told me a lot about his life and the vast majority of it is true. Except of course for the little details like his name, where he was born, and what his family is like.
I'm kidding of course. Only partly.
Mostly because I'm just writing this to try to make sense of my life right now and how vastly complicated it got so quickly.
My thoughts wander back to our kiss or rather the montage of the kisses that we have shared. We have had so many start and stops that it’s difficult to think of one particular moment instead of a slew of images.
There he is brushing his fingers along my jaw. There he is with his hair falling into his eyes. There he is pressing his body hard against mine. There he is opening my mouth with his.
It's almost as if he has a magnetic pull on me. I've never felt this way with anyone before. I wanted to be with Alex and, of course, I have had boyfriends before him. None were particularly toxic, but none were particularly interesting either. Then he came into my life and suddenly every interaction that we have had since sends shivers down my spine. It's almost as if there are sparks that go off whenever we share the same air.
When I get back to the office, I walk along the perimeter, trying to avoid Corrin and Shelby who are talking by the water cooler. I slip by and they don't notice me. I hide in my cubicle, nursing a cup of hot tea in my thermos. I have a lot of work to do and I still have to talk to her about not publishing the article. Frankly, I don't know how to do this.
To waste some time, I check my email and that's when I see it.
They have printed it. It's basically the notes that I have given her, with a little bit added, but mostly printed as is. I stare at the screen and then reload the website over and over again, hoping that this isn't true. Maybe this is just some sort of mistake. A trial run.
No, no, no. I shake my head and swing my arm around, knocking the thermos onto the floor. The top pops open and hot liquid spills out everywhere. I pull some tissues from the box on the table and throw them on top of the carpet, letting it soak in, but my tension returns to the screen.
With my heartbeat elevated, I scan the article, reading and not reading at the same time. The highlights are clear. She has included everything that I sent her, even the fact that I have spoken with him.
Journalism ethics have come under attack in recent years since the explosion of online content with little regard to the truth. This is a magazine article that is not just true but is also salacious. The fact that the writer had a sexual relationship with the subject is probably something that just added to the general interest of the story.
For someone who is trying to get herself taken seriously, I know that this is a nail in the coffin of my career.
Suddenly, my thoughts return to Liam. Has he seen this yet?
I look at the time, but I can't remember what time it was when we separated. I haven't heard from him, but that doesn't mean anything. I want to call him, but I'm afraid. If he doesn't know, then I can't hide this from him. If he does, what does this mean for us?
My head starts to spin. I don't know what to do. I don't know where to go. I need to make this go away, but how?
With blood rushing between my temples, I rise to my feet and force myself to put one foot in front of the other until I get to Corrin's office.
“Why?” I ask.
She looks up from her screen. I clear my throat and ask her why again, but this time my voice is lower and it's more of a demand.
She opens her mouth to say something, but Shelby comes in from behind.
“Emma, I'm sorry,” Shelby says, throwing her manicured fingers up in the air in a sign of surrender, but it's clearly not a surrender.
If this is anything, then it's a declaration of war. “What you wrote, your notes, they were so detailed and so wonderful. I just had to share it with Corrin.”
“They are notes. They weren't the story. They weren’t an article.”
“That's where you're wrong,” Corrin says, keeping her tone neutral and detached. “There was a lot of life in that piece that you call your notes. It had your reactions, your shock, and your interactions with the subject.”
“The subject? You mean D. B. Carter? You mean Liam? How can you call him that?” I demand to know.