Chapter 6: Seventy-Two Hours

By Wednesday night I was on word nineteen thousand and I had stopped looking at my phone.

I lived at a corner table in the main library with cold brew and index cards.

I had slept four hours in two days.

My phone lay face down by my elbow, buzzing now and then.

At midnight I turned it over.

Quincy: No 'husband' today?

The message sat there with a gray line under it. He had unsent it.

Quincy: Are you busy?

Unsent too.

Quincy: What are you doing?

That one stayed.

I bit down on a grin.

Me: Writing a monster of a thesis. My brain is fried. Don't be mad, husband.

Me: When I hit submit, you're the first person I'm calling.

Quincy: I'm not mad. What department are you in?

Me: Comparative Lit.

Quincy: Okay.

That was all. I put the phone away.

Two of my roommates came through the reading room at one in the morning with takeout. They stopped at my table.

One of them looked at my screen, and then at my phone, and laughed.

"Look at her smiling at it," she said. "Who is she stealing this time?"

"Leave her alone," said the other. "With that face, the internet is all she's got."

I clicked my pen. I stacked my cards, and slid them into my tote.

"You two sure are interested in my love life," I said.

"If you're so jealous, try it. Or are you afraid you couldn't get a guy through a screen?"

The first one's mouth fell open. "You..."

"Good night," I said, and moved to the quiet floor upstairs.

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