This Time It's Real

by Ann Liang

@jiminswife:

help this is me

“Except we’ve never even spoken to anyone from SYS before. We have no connections whatsoever.”

the IRONY

“Oh, look,” he says finally, his mouth curving into something too muted to qualify as a smile. “It’s my nonfan.”

i can already tell i’m gonna eat this up

“This.” He nods at the laptop. “S.M.B.R.O.A.H.F.O.R.C. Though I really think we could come up with a better name.” “Really?” He pauses. Leans closer, until there is nothing between us but the dark, thin air, the green-apple scent of his shampoo. I instinctively take a step backward. “Yes, Eliza,” he says, his voice somber. “I really do think we need a better name.”

i love him already

Then, without a word of warning, Caz reaches for my hand, his long, slender fingers brushing against my own, and I honestly can’t explain what happens next. It’s like my body goes into defense mode. Without thinking—without even registering what I’m doing—I jerk away and slap his wrist.

omg this is so rachel and joey coded

I guess my point is that I do believe in love. Really. I’m just not convinced that kind of love could ever happen to me.

Refocus. I’m not here to make friends, to get my hopes up about people only to be let down over and over again. Especially not when it comes to Caz Song, who makes a literal living off pretending to feel things he doesn’t. Nothing else.

I expect shock. Confusion. Maybe even awe. What I don’t expect is for my family to burst out laughing.

Caz bends down slightly until they’re the same height. Smiles. It’s a different smile from the one he wears on TV, or around people in our year level; it’s gentle, kind.

An embarrassing, residual note of bitterness from the ti jianzi game tinges my voice. It’s not like it’s Caz’s fault that he’s so universally adored. That whatever it is I’m deficient in—charm, looks, the ability to draw people in, to make them stay—he has in excess. Not his fault at all.

“Eliza. If it weren’t for the matter of practicality, you could literally come dressed in a trash bag and I wouldn’t care.”

“I don’t want to fall off,” I protest, but I loosen my hold just a little, enough to let him breathe. “You won’t fall,” he says, like the notion itself is ridiculous. “I won’t let you.”

By the time I get to the last crane, my alarm clock is flashing. Six a.m. I’m exhausted and nearly out of ideas, and maybe it’s because of this that I let the truth slip out onto the page. I hope you remember to miss me when all this is over.

Just the other night, when I was drafting a blog post, I’d gone to listen to our Spotify playlist, only to find that the name had been changed from “zoe + eliza g8 hits” to “recs for divya.”

do y’all hear deja vu playing in the background or is that just me?

Well, it doesn’t so much unravel as completely implode: starting with the notification that pops up on my phone first thing in the morning. I kNew You were Lying.

i stg if it was zoe…

Great. Just wonderful. The one time I decide to engage in voluntary physical activity and my body gives up on me. In an instant, all the humor falls away from Caz’s face, replaced by concern. “You evidently can’t.” “I’m just tired from the running, that’s all. I’ll be okay soon.” He casts me a long, doubtful look. Then: “Let me carry you,” he says simply.

can yall hear me swooning

“You must know that’s not what I care about.” Cold creeps into my veins. My teeth chatter. “What—what do you care about, then?” “You,” he says quietly. “I want you, Eliza.” The words hang in the misty gray air, and I’m glad he can’t see my face. You already have me, I’m tempted to tell him. More than I was ever planning to give.

She laughs, lifts her hand to wave at me, and it’s only then that I catch sight of the frayed blue string around her wrist. A bracelet identical to my own. She’s kept it all along.

just told her you weren’t here anymore. That you’d left. To get water is what I meant, but I can see how she may have mistaken here for, ah, the general physical realm of the living, instead of this specific space—and maybe I shouldn’t have used Mandarin …”

HELP

“Hey, your face isn’t injured or anything, right?” He stills, confused. “No, why—” “Good,” I tell him, smiling, and I press my lips to his.

“Caz, I’d love to be inconvenienced by you. I wouldn’t mind being inconvenienced by you for the rest of my life.”