Tangled Web

by S. A. Ozment

  I immediately stopped typing. Shit! Okay, now was my chance to say something cool and impress him. I couldn’t have him thinking I was some loser who lived on the Internet worshiping his favorite celebrity—even though I was. Okay, what sounded good? What did he like? Finally a thought came to me.

  Ashley: Well… I go to the gym every day to work out and jog at night.

  I couldn’t believe I had just lied like a dog to him. What was wrong with me? It was like my fingers suddenly had a mind of their own.

  Imsebastiangray: That sounds pretty intense. But why jog at night? Is it safe to jog alone, or do you jog with a partner?

  Ashley: Alone… but it’s okay, I’m not scared. Why?

  Imsebastiangray: Oh no reason. It’s just that I wouldn’t think it’s too safe for a girl to go jogging by herself at night.

  Girl? I sat straight up in my chair, almost sobering at this word. Girl? He thinks I’m a girl? What the hell? Oh shit, never mind. It’s that damn name of mine that my crazy mother stuck on me. Crap! Now what do I say? I guess I should tell him the truth. But what if he only contacted me because he thought I was a girl? He obviously likes knowing that he’s chatting with a girl! Fucking straight guy! Think, Ash, think….

  Imsebastiangray: Ashley, are you still there?

  Ashley: Yeah, I’m here. I spilled my drink.

  And the lies keep flowing…. Who knew I could lie like a sailor without blinking an eye? First I tell him I’m working out when in actuality the last time I saw a gym was at my nephew’s basketball game—in middle school! And secondly, I tell him I jog? Jog? Ha! I only jog to the nearest Krispy Kreme, and that’s only when they have their Hot-Now sign on. Crap! Should I tell him the truth and risk that he won’t talk to me anymore?

  Tapping my fingers on the keyboard, my muddled brain refused to give in. Do I really want to lose this little connection I have with him? What does it matter if he thinks I’m a girl? After all, what are the chances I’ll ever meet him?

  So as a hundred red flags flew up all around me, with a little help from the bottle of wine, I decided to lie—as in lie-my-ass-off. Clicking on my Facebook messenger, I typed the words that would seal my fate.

  Ashley: You’re absolutely right. It’s not safe for girls to jog alone. Next time I’ll ask my friend to come along with me.

  Imsebastiangray: Well that’s good to hear. Okay, Ashley, I have to sign off, but thank you again, and tomorrow I’ll find a few pics. When can I find you here on the Internet?

  What? He wants to chat again… so soon? OMG. Pulling at my hair in extreme nervousness, I tried to force myself to calm down.

  Ashley: I should be here around seven—my time. Oh, I’m in Georgia, so that’s Eastern Standard Time.

  Imsebastiangray: Okay, Ashley, I’ll see you around seven tomorrow. And thanks again for everything. Good night.

  As I watched Sebastian click to end our instant connection, I felt a sadness creep over me. Was it really him, or had I imagined the entire thing? Would he really show up again tomorrow? Would I ever get to speak to him again? My heart was flipping between incredible happiness and an emptiness that threatened to take over my soul. Get a damn grip, man. He said he would be back, and he will. But for now you have his official sites!

  Realizing that I had left Patricia on hold forever, I clicked back in her box.

  Ashley: Patricia…. OMG, you will never guess what happened!

  Patricia: What, Ashley? Was it him? Was it Sebastian?

  Ashley: YES, and you are now talking to the official person who runs his social media sites and meet the new me…. Ashley, the girl.

  I went on to explain everything that had just taken place with Sebastian, and after being chastised by Patricia for lying, I got offline and put my drunk ass to bed. Tomorrow was a new day and one I hoped would lead to a wonderful online relationship with the man of my dreams.

  Chapter 2

  THE NEXT morning I could barely get myself out of bed between my wine hangover and the thought of how irresponsible I had been. Not only did I drink an entire bottle of wine on a work night, but I also misled the one person I adored. Seriously, dude? Misled? You flat-out lied. Regardless of the magnitude of my untruth, I could hardly sleep last night for worrying. In order to ensure my beauty sleep, I would have to tell Sebastian the truth. I’m not a girl. I’m a full-blooded man in love with him—okay, maybe I’ll leave that last part out—but the truth must be told tonight. Now, I had to get to work.

  The first thing I did upon arriving at the hospital was visit the pediatric unit. After stepping off the elevator, I followed the walls covered with painted elephants and tigers. Turning right down the hallway and the walls now covered with floating teddy bears, I found the room with my little patient. As I walked into her room, I could see she was awake. Even though I worked as a nurse, it was always hard to walk into a room and see a child hooked up to all the monitors. A young woman, who I assumed was her mother, sat beside her bed holding her hand. I had asked around last night and found out someone at the restaurant had tackled the father after he pulled the gun. The tackle had made the gun go off, and while the mother was not hurt, the little girl had been in the line of fire. But fortunately she was going to make a full recovery.

  Walking over to her bedside, I said hello to her mother and smiled down at my smallest patient. “Hello, little one, my name’s Ashley. I helped take care of you when you came into the emergency room, so I wanted to come by and see how you were doing.”

  The little girl looked up at me and bravely gave me a small smile. Quietly she said, “Hey, you have the same name as me.”

  That made me laugh. Just last night I was cursing my girlie name, and today it made me happy to have it. “That’s pretty cool, Ashley. I think that means we are meant to be friends.”

  Little Ashley smiled again and whispered, “Thank you for helping me last night.”

  My heart melted for the second time in twenty-four hours. Smiling down at her, I responded, “I’ll come back later and check on you again. Would that be okay?”

  She reached up with her tiny hand to grab mine. “Okay.”

  I squeezed her hand before walking out of her room on a cloud, knowing that this was the reason I had decided to become a nurse.

  On my way back to the ER, I stopped by the nurses’ station for some headache medicine. That bottle of wine I had slammed down was pounding me back with a passion. I walked into the restroom to take the medicine and splash my face, hoping that would wake me up. Looking into the mirror with water dripping down my cheeks, I saw my normal hazel-green eyes now had red, crinkly lines, giving them that lovely bloodshot look, thanks to the alcohol’s effect. My hair, which was floppy—for lack of a better word—and generally unruly, was all over the place. Pulling the longer part of my hair up and inspecting the roots, I also realized it was time for a new highlight job. I was a blond, but I did need a little help from my friends at Revlon. Checking myself out one last time to make sure I was presentable, I walked down to the ER to clock in. It was going to be a very long day before I could get home to see if my celebrity crush would contact me again. That is, if it really was him. Maybe in my drunken state, I imagined the entire thing. Ugh, a very long day indeed.

  Chapter 3

  AS I flew through my front door at exactly 6:57 p.m., I dropped my Chinese takeout on the kitchen counter and ran over to my desk. I pulled my laptop over, then threw open the top and turned it on. While it booted up, I rushed back into the kitchen. I glanced at the clock and saw that I had exactly one minute before I needed to be online. Sebastian had said seven o’clock, so I would be on Facebook come hell or high water. I opened the dishwasher and reached in, grabbing a clean fork. Then I picked up my food and looked around for something to drink. Over on the counter littered with takeout boxes, I spotted my empty wine bottle from last night. I knew I had another chardonnay under the sink, but I decided it would be in my best interest to forgo the wine and have a large bottle of water instead. I
opened the refrigerator, grabbed the water, and then darted toward the living room.

  I rushed over, pulled back my nice leather chair, sat down, and positioned myself in front of the computer screen. I carefully placed my food and water down on the desk, clicked on the Facebook logo, and waited for my chat list to come up. My heart dropped. Imsebastiangray wasn’t showing online yet. Oh well, I’ll relax a minute and eat. Hopefully, he’ll show up soon.

  I had barely gotten the first bite in my mouth when a ding alerted me to a new chat message. It was Celeste, or Seb4life as she liked to call herself.

  Seb4life: Hey Ashley!

  Groaning to myself, I knew I had to respond. It wasn’t that I didn’t like Celeste—I did—but she had a habit of always popping up when I didn’t have time to talk to her. I took another bite of my Chinese food as I typed, Hey there Celeste.

  Seb4life: I just wanted to make sure you knew they were running a repeat of Can’t Take It With You, you know, Seb’s first movie. It’s on tonight on Showtime.

  Ashley: Yeah, I know. I recorded it last week when it was on, but if you want to post the information on the fan page, go ahead.

  Seb4life: Cool! I’ll do that.

  I glanced over and saw that Imsebastiangray had just signed on. My heart literally stopped for a second, and my stomach lurched as I quickly swallowed my food.

  Ashley: Celeste, I need to go. Thanks for posting that for me. I quickly wrote.

  Seb4life: No prob… talk to you soon.

  Oh, I’m sure I will… daily, I thought as I clicked out of her chat window.

  I think I held my breath until I saw a new chat window pop open, letting me know that Sebastian wanted to chat with me.

  Imsebastiangray: Hey, Ashley, you busy?

  Never too busy for you, you gorgeous sexy man, I thought as I fumbled around trying to get comfortable. Typing quickly, I wrote, No, not at all. How’s it going?

  Imsebastiangray: It’s good. I have those photos I was going to share with you, if you think you can use them.

  Ashley: Of course! I’ll post them tonight on the fan page. Actually, I’m pretty excited to be able to say that you sent them to us. That’s okay to say, right?

  Imsebastiangray: Sure! I’m e-mailing them to your Gmail account as I talk to you, okay?

  Reading those words made my heart soar. For years I had wanted to chat with Sebastian, and it was hard to believe it was actually happening right at this very minute. I forced myself to remain cool and collected and chatted to him as if I were chatting to Patricia or any of my friends.

  Ashley: Okay. So, how was your day today? Anything exciting happen?

  Imsebastiangray: Not much other than I had an audition for a new movie.

  My eyes and ears perked up. I typed really quickly.

  Ashley: A new movie? That sounds great! What’s it about?

  Imsebastiangray: I can’t talk about it yet, but I’ll tell you about it as soon as something’s official, okay?

  Ashley: Oh sure, I totally get that.

  Imsebastiangray: How was your day?

  Telling myself to just treat him like anyone else, I responded, It was good. I work in an emergency room, and yesterday we had a shooting victim, a little girl, come into the ER, and I went to visit her today. She’s going to be fine, so yeah… it was a good day. Sometimes we’re not that lucky.

  Imsebastiangray: Wow… that’s great that she’s going to be okay.

  Ashley: Yeah, I was worried about her for a while because the bullet was lodged in her stomach. But fortunately, we have a great team of surgeons who were able to get the bullet out and fix her up.

  Imsebastiangray: How did the little girl get shot?

  Ashley: Her mother and father are divorcing, and he found out where they were—a freakin’ McDonalds of all places—and he took a gun. From what I heard on the news, he was trying to make the mother let him have the little girl, but when he pulled the gun, another patron stepped in and tackled him. He fell, and the gun went off, shooting the little girl.

  Imsebastiangray: Damn! People can be crazy. But I’m glad she’s going to be okay. Sounds like you have a really interesting job.

  Ashley: It has its good and bad days. That’s why I like working on the sites for you, it’s something fun, and it’s a great stress relief for me.

  Imsebastiangray: I’ve never been that into social media. I’m not one to talk a lot about myself.

  Ashley: Oh I know.

  Imsebastiangray: What do you mean?

  Oops, there I go again, inserting my foot into my mouth. Trying to explain my last statement, I typed,I just meant that I knew you weren’t into social media, which is why I started trying to help you by promoting you this way.

  Imsebastiangray: Oh yeah, it’s pretty cool that you do this. Do you work on sites for other people or just mine?

  Ashley: Just yours. ☺

  Imsebastiangray: Well I’m honored. Thank you.

  Okay, I was not going to lie. My heart soared at those last words. If the man never contacted me again, I had those words out there—on the Internet—saved forever. Changing the subject, I continued typing.

  Ashley: Can I just say I’m very excited you might be in a new movie?

  Imsebastiangray: Yeah, I kind of got off on the television track, but my manager thinks now is a good time to get back into making movies.

  Ashley: Well, I for one will be front row and center on opening night.

  Imsebastiangray: LOL! I think we should probably wait to see if I get the role.

  Ashley: Oh you will. I have complete confidence in your talent.

  Imsebastiangray: Thanks, Ashley. I appreciate that. I’ll let you know as soon as I know.

  My heart skipped a beat. It was as if all my dreams were coming true.

  Ashley: Sebastian, it’s true. I do think you are very talented. And the fact that you trust me to officially work on your sites means a lot to me.

  Imsebastiangray: You know… it’s strange. I know we only just met, but I feel like we’ll work well together. To be honest, I was slightly worried about stepping out into the world of social media.

  Ashley: Why?

  Imsebastiangray: Let’s just say I’m a private person, and it’s difficult for me to put myself out there.

  Ashley: Well you never have to worry about personal information on my sites. I don’t allow it, and besides, I think that’s for the best. A bit of mystery is always a good thing.

  Imsebastiangray: LOL! Yes, I think you are right. Ashley, I’m sorry, but I have to leave now. I’m meeting someone for dinner.

  All my joyful feelings dropped like a brick. Really, Sebastian? Didn’t I just say a bit of mystery is good? Geez, he could have typed all night and not ruined it by telling me that he had a date. Before I could stop myself, I typed, Oh, you have a date?

  As soon as I typed the words, I realized I might have crossed some sort of imaginary boundary. Quickly I added, I’m sorry, Sebastian. That is absolutely none of my business. I just couldn’t stop my fingers from typing….

  Imsebastiangray: No, it’s okay. Yeah, it is a date, but nothing special. But of course, that’s just for you to know.

  Ashley: Oh definitely! ☺ I would never share anything you say to me.

  Imsebastiangray: So, now that I’ve told a secret… what about you? Are you dating anyone? A boyfriend maybe?

  Okay, he was obviously asking if I had a boyfriend because he thought I was a girl. How did my life get so complicated so fast? I knew now was the time to come clean, but dammit, I had just gotten him to open up a tiny bit. Why ruin it? I’ll tell him later. Who’s it going to hurt anyway?

  Ashley: No… no boyfriend.

  I prided myself on telling the truth even if it was misleading.

  Imsebastiangray: Okay, I didn’t mean to pry either. Well, I guess I’d better go. But I’ll talk to you again soon, okay?

  It was all I could do not to beg him to stay. But keeping my self-respect intact, I simply wrote, Okay, good n
ight Sebastian. Oh and thank you for the photos! I’ll post them right after we sign off.

  Imsebastiangray: No, thank you, Ashley, and have a great night. Hugs to you.

  My jaw hit the floor as I read the word “hug” over and over. Sebastian Gray sent me a hug! I was practically giddy as I closed out of the Facebook chat. After signing into my e-mail account, I found all the photos Sebastian had sent. As I loaded them onto his fan page, I wondered how in the hell I had let my lie go this far. The next time we spoke, I had to tell him I was a man and let the chips fall where they may.

  Chapter 4

  Two months later—July 4th

  IN MY quaint southern town of Savannah, Georgia, the Fourth of July meant the River Street Celebration, which included fireworks, music, and all kinds of food. Every year I could be found lounging on a blanket right at the riverfront so I wouldn’t miss the fireworks spectacular. But this year, I had other plans. For the past two months, my days consisted of working at the hospital and rushing home after work to meet Sebastian online. And tonight would be no different, so no fireworks for me. We usually spent our nights laughing and having a blast as we found we had a lot in common. Over a month ago, he had gotten the movie role, and even though filming was taking place in Germany, he had still managed to find me online at night. The time difference of six hours was troublesome, so we had worked out the system that I would come online the minute I got home from work, and we chatted until time for him to get some sleep. We had funny chats, and we had a few serious chats. There was even one time that we both were drunk-instant messaging each other. I guess you could say that our relationship, for lack of a better word, had crossed from fan/celebrity to perhaps a bit more like friends. My life would be nearly perfect except for one tiny problem. I still hadn’t found a way to tell Sebastian that I wasn’t a girl. Every time I would start to ease down that path of self-respecting full-on honesty, I would stop myself out of fear of being rejected by him. But the longer I waited, the larger the issue became. Now my fear was that he would stop talking to me because I had waited so long to tell him the truth. I just knew he would never forgive me.