As soon as my program is done being signed, I brush against tourists in fanny packs to get back to the subway at Times Square.
“Slow down,” Ben calls from behind. I stop on the crowded corner of 44th Street and Broadway, in the middle of a swarm of people dressed up as off-brand Disney characters and superheroes pandering for tips. An adult-human-size Elmo swathed in faded red fabric waves in my direction.
“What if I don’t want to be your surrogate boyfriend at Serendipity?” Ben asks.
“What does everyone have against Serendipity? I’ve seen pictures and that frozen hot chocolate looks amazing.”
“No, Harper, you’re not hearing me.” Ben takes a step closer. “I want to eat frozen hot chocolate with you. But . . . not as your surrogate boyfriend.”
No, I’m hearing him, but maybe I’m not fully getting him. Why is he looking at me like that?
“I wasn’t in New Hampshire this week,” he says.
This is news. “Well, where were you?”
“Okay, so I went up there, but I left after an hour.” He takes a long pause. Oh no. Did Delilah break up with him? But before I can ask, he says, “I ended things with Delilah. I wanted to do it in person.”
“But her soccer camp was almost over! I thought you were so excited for her to come back!”
“It was inevitable.” He looks so miserable and uncomfortable talking about this, so I take his arm. “In the beginning of the summer, I was really bummed that she didn’t want me visiting her. That she didn’t have time to take my calls. But then I realized that when she did pick up, we didn’t have a lot to talk about. I didn’t miss her as much as a boyfriend should miss a girlfriend. I didn’t miss her as much as I miss you between walks.”
“Oh,” I say, head swirling. Oh. I miss Ben, too, but like you’d miss a friend, right? Things are finally starting to work out with Carter. Maybe I should tell him that we’re finally going on a date, before he says something he regrets, but I stop myself. What if I’m overinterpreting what Ben’s saying? So instead I just ask, “How’d she take it?”
“Not well. She said that we’d outgrown each other anyway. And since this is the school year when she has to impress college coaches, she probably should only surround herself with serious athletes anyway. She said I’m just a fun distraction, but I’m not a serious anything.”
I’d be such a mess if someone said that to me. I want to comfort Ben, but I also don’t want to make things any more weird or ambiguous.
“You have to know that’s not true, right?” I shake my head, horrified by how harsh and flat-out wrong Delilah was. “Anyone who thinks that about you is just, I don’t know, stupid. When did this happen?”
“Exactly a week ago.”
A whole week?
“Ugh, that sucks,” I say. Elmo starts break dancing in front of a crowd for tips. Ben is staring at Elmo so intently that’s it’s like he’s memorizing his moves. “You could have told me. I’m your friend; I would have been there for you.”
“I know you’re my friend, and that’s one of the reasons why I couldn’t be with you right then.” Ben’s lips form into a half smile. “Because I needed to make sure that I was actually feeling what I was feeling. That I wasn’t about to do anything rash.”
“Like what?” I look up at Ben’s face, my eyes squinting because of the bright lights of Times Square. He gently puts one hand on each of my arms and before I fully realize what’s happening, he begins lowering himself down so his lips can meet my lips.
“Ben!” I exclaim, as I step backward toward the dancing Elmo to avoid the kiss. How did I miss this? I’m an idiot!
Ben stumbles back, startled. His eyes wide in what looks a lot like terror. “Oh no. Harper, I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I misread the signs. I thought—”
“It’s just,” I say quickly, trying to explain, “I like Carter . . . but . . . I love our friendship.”
His shoulders droop and he lets out a sigh.
“I didn’t mean for that to come out as lame as it sounded,” I whisper. “But it’s true. I do love it.”
“I thought it wasn’t serious with that guy. You go out with other people,” Ben says.
“That’s my job.” I inch back toward him, patting his arm sympathetically but making sure I don’t linger. How can I make this easier? Because I really do like Ben. But Carter . . .
“Think about it,” I say. “Think. We’re so incompatible. We’re into totally different things. You know I’m not your type. You don’t like me. Not really.”
God, I’m not making this better.
Ben bristles. “Don’t tell me how I feel. You get me and maybe even make me better. You’re the person I want to tell exciting things to. Like, the pug prom, I decided—”
Pug prom. I was so looking forward to it. But all I foresee is a whole lot of awkwardness and making Ben miserable in front of a bunch of dogs in formal wear.
“Maybe I shouldn’t go to pug prom?” I leave it as a question. I so want to go, I so want things not to be weird between us, but I feel like he should be the one to decide.
Ben’s face looks like he dropped all the leashes and the dogs are running in all different directions. He’s trying to wrangle them in but isn’t sure where to start.
“Maybe you shouldn’t,” he replies, not even looking me in the eyes. “Maybe we shouldn’t hang out for a while. I should go.”
“Ben—” I start to speak, but he’s already lost in the crowd.
I don’t feel like a confident, above-it-all Shift Girl right now. In the land of the hypothetical, my favorite mental vacation spot, I always assumed that having the opportunity to reject a guy would feel empowering. But now that it’s actually happened, it kind of just sucks. A part of me wishes that Ben hadn’t felt what he felt in the first place, so I wouldn’t be in this position. But then I just feel guilty for feeling that.
Kristina always knows what to do, but for the first time in a long time, her phone is off when I call her for late-night counsel.
29
I SLEEPWALK OUT OF BED monday morning and can’t even blame my restless night on Princess, who is now snore-free.
I’m scared to go into work today without a blog post. There’s no way I can write about surrogate boyfriends and platonic dates now. Ben reads my articles. It would be wrong.
“You’re half an hour late!” Jamie, who looks like she could use a nap and a hairbrush, reprimands when I get to the office.
“Don’t worry, I covered for you,” Brie says with a smile before lowering her voice to a whisper and adding, “I said you were in the bathroom fixing an eyeliner emergency. McKayla understood.”
Before I can thank Brie, a very frazzled Jamie cuts her off. “No one should be making excuses for you.” She turns to face me. “It’s the end of the month, which means we have traffic goals to meet. You should be writing, not rolling in late. You can’t just expect other people to pick up your slack!”
Whoa.
What the hell have I just walked into? The atmosphere is completely tense.
“Didn’t mean to cause any issues, Jamie,” I say.
Jamie takes a deep breath. “Didn’t mean to explode like that,” she says, giving us a glimmer of the saner Jamie from the beginning of the summer. “I’m just stressed because I have to meet my click quota.”
“A click quota?” I ask. “What does that even mean?”
“Everyone on the viral team has to write enough ‘clicky’ stories that we meet our monthly traffic goals,” Jamie says. “But McKayla said we all have to do more. Including you guys.”
The Shift staff has noticeably thinned since the beginning of the summer, either because people have cracked under the pressure and quit, or because they’ve cracked under the pressure and been kicked down to the thirteenth floor so that Skirt Suit in HR could fire them on McKayla’s orders.
And there’s no question of who’s on the verge of cracking next. Jamie has been working beyond overtime to get hired. A
nd it shows. She was intense before, but in the beginning of the summer she seemed happy. Mostly nice. Now she’s always jittery and on edge. Everyone has noticed. Abigail wants to stage an intervention for Jamie’s espresso dependency. (“She got busy writing a string of stories last Friday and started getting the shakes when she hadn’t had caffeine in ninety minutes. Classic symptom of withdrawal.”) Brie’s concern mainly lies in her tired eyes. (“Just give me five minutes with her in the makeup station, and I’ll get rid of those bags immediately. It’s not even a favor. Her tired serial killer look is freaking me out.”)
I wonder how I’ll look when I’m done telling McKayla that I don’t have a story ready.
But when I walk into her office, McKayla takes over before I even open my mouth.
“I don’t care what you were planning to write about this week,” she says. “I’m canning it.”
There is a God.
“I downloaded MatchBook this weekend and I’m obsessed. I don’t know why I was holding out for so long to get on a dating app.”
McKayla holds up her iPhone and shows me Scott, 29, smiling at the camera.
“Not only is he on partner track at his law firm, but he also has a CrossFit bod.” McKayla scrolls to a picture of Scott at the gym. “I mean, how cute is he?”
“Cute!” I reply, eager to please.
But McKayla quickly reveals that she isn’t showing me her dating prospects for bonding purposes. “You are writing about dating apps this week. MatchBook has such great blog-material potential.”
I look up from McKayla’s iPhone screen. “But, isn’t MatchBook for old people?”
McKayla’s eyes widen. “I use MatchBook. Am I old?”
“No! Of course not!”
Backtrack, backtrack, must backtrack.
“But, is it safe for people my age?” I ask.
“Look at this press release. MatchBook Teen: It’s for people your age; no one over eighteen can be on it. Brand new and crying out for a blog post. My only question is why aren’t you telling me about it? Your job is to know about these things.”
“I don’t know,” I say. “Dating apps seem kind of—”
“I TOLD YOU YOU’RE WRITING ABOUT IT, SO WRITE ABOUT IT!” she shouts. “Be edgy. Be bold. And close the door on your way out.”
It’s not like I have a better alternative for this week, anyway.
* * *
I bribe the other Shift Girls with the promise of buying them Ladurée macarons (“They’re gluten-free!” I tell Gigi.) to download MatchBook Teen with me and check it out after work.
Gigi agrees happily, saying she’s in need of other entertainment after spending most of the weekend binge watching Gossip Girl. “I’m obsessed. I’m already in season two. But it’s weird, I don’t even know if I’m having fun watching it anymore, I’ve gone through so many episodes. But I’m incapable of stopping.”
“That’s what I call purge-watching,” I say. “It’s not about enjoyment anymore. You just have to finish and get it out of your system.”
“I love that,” Gigi says. “I’m definitely stealing it.”
Everyone joins us on our dating expedition except for Jamie. We decide to explore the app in Battery Park, by the water.
“That way I can get a good Instagram of the sunset over the Hudson River,” Sunny says.
“Gross,” Gigi squeals, interrupting our conversation on where we think we’ll get the best view of the sunset. Obviously she’s not talking about the night sky.
She raises her phone and shows me the picture of Albert, 17, making a kiss face at a bathroom mirror—toilet visible—while he lifts up his ribbed white tank top to expose a nipple piercing. His description area reads: “Say hello to my little friend.”
We immediately explode with laughter. Of the snorting variety. People are turning around and staring.
“Bathroom mirror selfie? That is gross!” I say, in between gasps for air because I’m laughing so hard.
“Definitely swiping no,” Gigi says. A lit match appears when she touches the screen and it follows her finger. As she swipes to the left to reject Albert, 17, and his “little friend,” the flame extinguishes. When she finishes the swipe, “BURNOUT” spans across the screen. (If you swipe right for yes, graphics make it look like the match has lit the entire screen on fire under the declaration “HOT HOT HOT.” Once you’re paired in a couple, the app encourages you to send a message and thus, “KEEP THE FLAME ALIVE!”) It doesn’t take us long to become completely consumed with MatchBook’s ever-updating stream of guys.
This one’s first picture is of him taking a hike, to show he’s outdoorsy.
That one’s on a private jet to Monte Carlo to show he’s richer than you.
And here is yet another shirtless, bathroom mirror selfie. Why do guys think girls like this?
It’s a fascinating character study, and we find ourselves way more excited to go through profiles than to get a match. Sure, the positive affirmation of mutual attraction is nice, but we’re not here to date as much as we are to play.
This is a game.
I have my blog.
MATCHBOOK BINGO: THE BEST GAME ON YOUR PHONE IS ACTUALLY A DATING APP
I downloaded a new teen dating app, but I didn’t use it for dating.
I’ve always thought of app dating as a thing only old people do. But after MatchBook launched its teen-only edition, I decided to check it out. In order to stay #relevant, I convinced my fellow Shift interns (and fellow dating app virgins) to download it and see what all the fuss is about.
What I found were bathroom mirror selfies and a whole lot of really creepy messages—don’t worry, I won’t subject you to the visuals.
Okay, so maybe not everyone was terrible. But we were way more interested in looking at how guys represent themselves on dating apps than dating strangers we met on our phones.
So to make MatchBook Teen more enjoyable, we started turning all the app dating clichés we kept seeing into a game.
May I introduce MatchBook Bingo.
Whoever makes a row (or blacks out) the bingo board first by matching with guys who fit the below descriptions wins. And, remember, a match is only made when a guy likes you back, so work on that duck-face selfie.
All’s fair in love and app dating. Let the games begin.
Carpe that Effing Bingo!
Harper
30
“BONUS POINTS IF HE’S CLOSING his eyes while playing a musical instrument?” McKayla reads from my blog post. “This is hilarious. Good job, Harper.”
This is the nicest McKayla has been to me after setting one of my articles live. Things are starting to look up.
“You’re smiling?” Gigi says when I walk back to the intern area. “That must mean McKayla’s in a good mood. I’d better tell her a story idea I have now, before it passes.”
McKayla has always been emotionally erratic, but with the website end-of-month traffic goals looming, her mood swings have been amplified by a thousand. One second she’s praising a reporter for her “Genius! Genius! Genius!” story idea. The next, she’s making her cry for not executing it to perfection. Publicly.
Gigi sprints to McKayla’s office so quickly that even Treadmill Desk looks up.
All the other interns are furiously typing away. Sunny and Brie, who are usually in the fashion and makeup closets or running errands for their editors, are looking for stories to write up to help Shift meet its traffic goals.
“What should we do for lunch?” Sunny asks. “Sushi?”
“Salmonella outbreak,” Abigail warns.
“Do you have an off button?” Sunny responds. “Kidding. Kind of.”
“Well, if there’s nothing good in the open kitchen, I just e-mailed y’all the menu of a new salad place,” Brie says. We have spent a lot of hours of this internship scouting out lunch spots.
I take a break searching through a paparazzi photo database for pictures of actors making out in public—I was assigned to compile a phot
o slide show about celebrity PDA—and check my e-mail.
Sandwiched between Brie’s message about lunch and a bunch of spam from PR people is an e-mail from Carter, sent only a couple of minutes ago.
It’s four simple words and a link: “Congratulations. You’ve been aggregated.”
“What does ‘aggregated’ mean?” I ask the Shift Girls.
“It’s when one website basically rewrites another website’s article,” Jamie says. “Like if I got an exclusive about Curmudgeon cat”—she gets a look of ecstasy at the thought—“and then a bunch of other websites write about my exclusive, to piggyback on my clickiness.”
I click the link in Carter’s e-mail, which takes me to deviant’s website. And there, spanning across the screen, is a headline that reads: “This Girl’s Turning Your Crappy Dating App Profiles Into a Game.”
Below the headline is a big picture of me wearing my “Fries Over Guys” shirt next to Carter in the Hamptons.
Below that picture is a copy of my MatchBook Bingo board and a link to my article.
Holy shit.
“Helloooooo, earth to Harper.” Brie is waving her right hand in my direction. “I asked what you want to order.”
“What’s going on?” Gigi says, back from her meeting with McKayla.
I continue to stare at my screen.
Gigi looks over my shoulder, sees the article, and lights up. “You guys, deviant wrote up Harper’s blog. You’re famous!”
Sure, people have tweeted about some of my stories before, they’ve talked about them in the article’s comment section, but that’s been the extent of my blog’s notoriety. None of my blog posts have ever been picked up by another publication before.
At first I’m too nervous to read the article. After all, deviant isn’t known for being especially nice. Whenever the New York Times writes a trend piece on something that deviant thinks isn’t really trendy, they completely tear it to shreds in a vicious but deliciously entertaining way. But this isn’t a takedown piece—they actually liked my blog. And it’s exhilarating. I feel like I just drank three Diet Cokes in a row.
Little Black Dresses, Little White Lies Page 18
