By the time I reach my desk, so many people have smiled, congratulated, and said overly-positive hellos to me I genuinely start to wonder if I’ve forgotten my own birthday.
I sit down slowly and without even turning on my screen start to run through the events of yesterday. There was the fight with Carl…then Owen talked me down and took me somewhere for a drink…then we were in the studio…I got a ride home…am I forgetting something?
“Hey, catwoman.”
It’s the last voice I want to hear right now. Brad. Another ex-boyfriend, and possibly one of the most objectively awful people I’ve ever met (noticing the pattern, yet?). He’s got the orange tan, broad torso, and wavy-blonde hair of a surfer, but the maturity and class of a spoiled toddler after a disappointing Christmas. Every time I see him I struggle even harder to figure out why we dated in the first place, and why it took so long for me to realize we actually had nothing in common other than the desire to establish our writing careers.
I suppose I should be at least a little grateful, since he’s part of the reason I’m working at TrendBlend, having recommended me to Tillie in HR for a mailroom job a few years ago. Although ever since I became a lead writer and broke up with him, he’s been trying to reverse that act of kindness and get me fired.
“Not now, Brad. I’m late and I really need to catch up on this article,” I say, refusing to look at him as I turn on my screen.
He leans a little further over me, and I feel the air go cold.
“You know,” he continues, through a big shit-eating grin, “I always said you’d turn into one of those crazy cat ladies, didn’t I?”
Suddenly, the memory of what happened yesterday slams into me like a packed commuter bus. The tequila. The studio. The cats.
“Hang on a second,” Brad says, as he turns to speak to a passing coworker, as if I’m genuinely interested in participating in this asinine conversation.
I steal the moment to skim through my social media accounts, almost gasp when I see how many views the video I appeared in has, then drop my head into my hands when I see that I’ve become a hashtag.
“So how does it feel to be an overnight celebrity?” Brad says in that smarmy voice of his, once again leaning over my monitor.
“Not now, Brad, please.” My voice is tense, and I hate my inability to hide that he’s getting to me right now.
“What?” he says, with mock-humility. “I only came by to congratulate you—you’ve finally found your niche! I mean, wow…you spent all those years writing your cute little pieces about ‘politics’ and ‘art’ when your real calling all along was acting like a dumbass in front of the camera!”
“Well acting like a dumbass off camera hasn’t worked so well for you, Brad.”
“Ooh!” Brad says, laughing and chewing his gum loudly. “That little ‘sassy bitch’ routine you have is hard to take seriously when you’ve just humiliated yourself in front of millions of people, Margo. Might be a good time to drop it, mmkay?”
Brad winks and I struggle to keep my hands from his neck.
“Isn’t there an idea you should be stealing somewhere, Brad? Maybe a college intern you should be getting rejected by? Don’t let me keep you.”
“You know, my favorite part,” Brad goes on, rolling his gum as he relishes the moment for all that it’s worth, “is the bit where you say ‘I want this kitten to be my boyfriend.’ It’s funny ‘cause it’s true! You really would be better off with a cat rather than a man.”
“Well I’ve dated dogs before, so why not?” I say, glaring at him.
Brad’s in too good of a mood to get as annoyed as he usually does when I give as good as I get. He looks down at my monitor, noticing that I’m on my social media account.
“Oh! You should check out my feed. I spent all morning trying to make you into a meme. I bet that shit’s gonna go viral any minute now.”
“Shame nobody follows you though,” Owen says loudly, as he draws close behind me and moves into his seat. “Doubt it’ll get picked up. Your feed’s like the internet equivalent of a mausoleum. Even I only saw it by accident.”
Brad’s happiness drops a few levels, from annoyingly smug to defensively sly at Owen’s presence. He’s the kind of guy who’ll mock a woman for hours but shrink like a violet when another man is around, calling other guys ‘bro’ like it’s the only way he can be sure of his continuing membership in the man club.
“Well at least I’m not a national embarrassment,” Brad hisses in my direction.
“And you never will be, dude,” Owen says casually as he clicks on his laptop, “because nobody will ever notice you exist. What did that video about the World Cup get? Five hundred views, maybe? Shit. That’s an achievement. Biggest competition on the planet, one of the biggest entertainment sites on the planet, and still nobody cares what you have to say…I mean, it’s embarrassing, but I guess it’s not on a national level, so you’ve at least got that going for you.”
I can almost feel the heat radiating away from Brad’s shiny skin.
“I don’t even like sports. That’s why,” he says, on the back foot now, his sore spot struck. “I’m only covering it until something else opens up here.”
Owen turns away from his computer and wheels his chair closer to me, looking at Brad.
“Dude, I keep telling you: I’ll take the sports section from you in a second. I’d fucking kill it doing sports. I could hardly do any worse than you, could I?”
Brad purses his lips and glances from me to Owen, vein throbbing on his forehead as he searches his infantile mind for a comeback.
“Whatever,” is all he can manage, waving a palm in Owen’s direction to dismiss him before pointing a finger at me. “I’m gonna enjoy this. And I would tell you to do the same. This is the biggest thing you’re ever gonna do here.”
Once he’s put on his gum-chewing, open-mouthed grin again, he turns away and walks off, leaving me and Owen alone.
I turn back to my article, frowning deeply, and Owen says, “I know I always ask this, but why the hell did you ever date that guy?”
I turn and stare at him, waiting for him to hang his head and apologize profusely for somehow thinking ‘helping me through a breakup’ and ‘turning me into an internet meme’ were the same thing.
Instead, he interprets my angry silence as actual emotional pain over Brad’s douchebaggery and says, “Hey, don’t get mushy on me. I hate that guy as much as you do. No need to thank me.”
My mouth drops open. A few seconds later I can finally speak, and my voice comes out full of venom.
“Are you fucking kidding me? Are you for real, Owen?”
“What?”
Too overwhelmed to speak I turn and jab a hand at the screen, still scrolling with live comments on my video.
“I…fuck…he’s right! I’m a national embarrassment!”
Owen looks at the screen, then back at me. There’s a smile playing on his lips that gets my rage going all over again.