Technology is still a new concept to me. Aside from the portable cassette player I was given as a teen, my experience with computers or smartphones was nonexistent before I left home. The burner phone Lydia gives me every couple of months is basic with no internet access. I watch people scroll through their phones in waiting rooms all week long, just as the girl ahead of me in line does. She double-taps photos that seem to be in a never-ending succession, pausing to type a short comment here and there.
I’ve thought about getting a personal cell phone with internet. But what would I do with social media? What do I have to post about? Lydia is my only friend, and she’d never indulge in such a thing. Wilder has a smartphone, but he’s told me their PR team runs his social media accounts.
My brothers were never held at the same standards as me. Maybe they’re online.
Maybe it’s residual anxiety left over from the nightmare that woke me up to complete darkness in the early hours of the morning, but a sudden prickly feeling captures me by the throat. My neck stiffens, and a tingling sensation swells throughout my entire body. The line moves forward, but before I take a step inside the coffee shop, I look over my shoulder, sure to find someone staring back at me. But I’m the last person in line, and I don’t catch the eyes of anyone walking by.
“How did I know you were going to show up here today?” Lydia asks when I arrive in her office twenty minutes later.
I came with a nagging suspicion that I’m being watched, but the edge in Lydia’s tone chases it away, switching it out with hot nervousness. She sits behind a massive desk with a thick acrylic top and gold legs and accents like a glass palace. In any other office, it would swallow the entire space whole. But nothing—not even a fancy office desk—eclipses Lydia’s poise.
“Telekinesis?” I approach her with my peace offering and reveal the cake pops I left hidden behind my back as extra incentive to play along.
She leans into her chair and crosses her legs, framed by a window and view that rivals Talent’s as the most magnificent. “Leave the goods and get out.”
“You’re saying that, but do you mean it?” I ask lightheartedly, sliding the thin paper bag across her desk. “Even after I got you two cake pops? One for now, and one for later. Or two now. Or maybe you can share with me?”
Hazel eyes briefly mull over the sweets before pinning on me like an arrow to a target. “I’m not sharing.”
I stick a straw in Lydia’s cup and set the melting drink in front of her. “Do I have permission to hang around for a while? I promise to stay out of the way.”
“Why am I surprised you’re not above bribery?”
Lowering myself into the chair across from her, I shrug. “That’s because you refuse to admit that I’m like you. I love what you’ve done with the office, by the way.”
She sips on her drink, rotating her chair to face one side of the room to the other. It could be the sugar touching her tongue, but I think it’s pride that darkens the shade of green in her eyes. The space is light, bright, and eclectic—powerful and feminine at the same time. From the art on the walls to the rugs on the floor, every square foot of her office in the sky shouts triumph.
“This is the office Inez dreamed of,” she says.
“Good thing her mafia-like arranged marriage worked out,” I answer, only half-joking.
Cracking a smile around her straw, she takes another drink before setting her cup down. “Talent and I are not married.”
“It’s only a matter of time.”
“What are you doing here, Camilla?”
A pause. And a breath. “I want to help.”
Her stare is unwavering, and her voice is on even ground. “Help with what exactly?”
All of it,I think to myself.Teach me how to do what you do.
“I can file papers or make copies. I don’t know, what do people do in an office like this all day?”
“If your aspirations are to be a glorified office assistant, you’re in the wrong place. But feel free to put in your two-week notice with your current employer.”
On today’s episode ofLydia Talks Me into a New Life,this hits like a dare, deep down and trying me on for size. For reasons such as this, despite living with her and being one of the few people in existence she talks to, I’m constantly held at arm’s length. If ever I make strides forward, leave it up to Lydia Montgomery to slingshot me a mile away.
A knock at the door blows the whistle on our back and forth, and Talent’s voice drifts into the room. “Baby, come to my office when you get a chance. I need to go over some things with you. Oh, hey, Camilla.”
“Hello, Talent.”
She stands up, a shadow in front of the ocean view behind her, and saunters past me. “I have time now.”
I’m no expert on love stories, especially ones as puzzling as Lydia and Talent’s. But I’ve spent the last two and a half years catching up on decades’ worth of romantic movies. Talent doesn’t have anything to go over with Lydia. He made an excuse to be near her because that’s what people do when they care about each other. Lovers, friends… roommates.
Why can’t Lydia see that I only want to be included? Why does she push me away?
