Hopeful II
1349 Words
We stood there in her living room, me crying and her holding me, until the buzzer rang with our food delivery.
Natalie ordered me to wash my face while she got the food. By the time I came out of the bathroom with puffy eyes and splotchy cheeks, she had everything laid out on her coffee table. Pad thai, spring rolls, and curry that smelled amazing.
I wasn’t hungry, but I forced myself to eat. Natalie was right, I needed to keep my strength up.
“Marcus wants to meet with you,” Natalie said, spooning curry onto her plate. “He has questions about people in your life. Anyone who might have access to photos of you, anyone with technical skills, anyone who might have a motive.”
“When?”
“This weekend if you’re free. Saturday maybe?”
I nodded, pushing noodles around my plate. “Did you hear back from Ethan? About meeting for coffee?”
Natalie’s expression tightened. “Yeah. He said no.”
“Of course he did.”
“He was actually kind of rude about it. Said he had nothing to say to me and I should stop defending a cheater.”
The words shouldn’t have hurt anymore. I should have been numb to it by now. But they still landed like tiny knives.
“He really hates me,” I said quietly.
“He’s an idiot.” Natalie stabbed at her food angrily. “A blind, stubborn i***t who threw away the best thing that ever happened to him.”
“He thinks I threw it away.”
“Because he didn’t give you a chance to explain. Because he saw those photos and decided that was the whole truth instead of asking questions. That’s on him, not you.”
I wanted to believe her. Wanted to believe that Ethan was the one in the wrong, not me. But part of me, the part that had loved him for seven years, still wondered if maybe I could have done something different. Said something that would have made him listen.
“How was your first day at the new job?” Natalie asked, clearly trying to change the subject to something less painful.
“It was good, actually. Everyone seems nice. The work is interesting.” My mind slowly recalling the events at the office today.
“That’s great! See, things are starting to turn around.”
I thought about Adrian calling me to his office. About the way he looked at me. About agreeing to have dinner with him on Friday.
“There’s something I need to tell you,” I said.
“Okay?”
“You know that guy from the bar? The one I… the one night stand?”
Natalie nodded, setting down her fork.
“He owns the company. Rhode Enterprises. He’s the CEO.”
Her eyes went wide. “You’re kidding.”
“I wish I was. I had no idea when I applied. Didn’t even know his last name. Then I showed up for the interview and there he was.”
“Oh my God, Ivy. That’s so awkward.”
“It gets worse. He asked me to dinner.”
“He what?”
“Friday night. I said yes.”
Natalie just stared at me for a long moment. Then she started laughing. Not mean laughter, just genuine surprised amusement.
“What?” I asked, defensive.
“Nothing, it’s just… your life is insane right now. Like absolutely insane. You get framed with deepfake porn, lose your entire family, sleep with a random billionaire, and then accidentally get hired at his company. It’s like a soap opera.”
“It’s not funny.”
“It kind of is. In a tragic, horrible way.” She sobered up. “But seriously, are you sure about this dinner? He’s your boss.”
“He’s not my direct boss. And he said if I want nothing to do with him after Friday, he’ll keep things professional.”
“Do you believe him?”
I thought about the way Adrian had looked at me in his office. The intensity in his eyes. “I don’t know. But I think I want to find out.”
“Okay. Just be careful. The last thing you need right now is more complications.”
“I know.”
We ate in silence for a while, both of us lost in our own thoughts. Finally Natalie spoke again.
“I’m going to keep digging into the photos, into who might have made them. Marcus said deepfakes require source material, photos and videos of your face from different angles. Someone would have needed access to a lot of images of you.”
“That could be anyone. I have social media. Wedding photos all over the internet. Years of pictures from family events.”
“But creating convincing deepfakes takes skill. Technical knowledge. It’s not something just anyone could do. We need to think about who in your life has that kind of expertise.”
I ran through everyone I knew in my head. “I don’t know anyone who works in AI or tech like that. Ethan’s in finance. You’re in PR. Most of our friends are in similar fields.”
“What about people from college? Old coworkers? Anyone who might have had access to your photos and also have the skills?”
“I don’t know, Nat. I can’t think of anyone who would hate me enough to do this.”
“People don’t always need a big reason to be cruel. Sometimes jealousy is enough. Sometimes they’re just broken inside and want to break others.”
I thought about that. About all the people I’d known over the years. Classmates, coworkers, acquaintances. Had I wronged someone without realizing it? Made an enemy I didn’t even know about?
“Make a list,” Natalie said. “Everyone you can think of who might have both motive and means. We’ll look into each one.”
“This feels hopeless.”
“It’s not hopeless. Someone did this to you, which means there’s evidence somewhere. A trail. We just have to find it.”
I nodded, not really believing her but appreciating the effort.
We spent the rest of the evening brainstorming names. By the time I left for home around ten, we had a list of fifteen people. Most of them felt like reaches, people I barely knew or hadn’t talked to in years. But it was something.
The subway ride back to Queens was quiet, the car mostly empty at this hour. I stared at my reflection in the dark window and tried to see what Adrian saw. What made him want to know me, to take me to dinner, and to care about what had broken me.
All I saw was someone tired. Someone who’d been fighting for weeks and was running out of strength.
My apartment felt extra empty when I got home. I changed into pajamas and lay down on my IKEA bed, staring at the ceiling.
Tomorrow I’d go back to work. Keep my head down. Do my job. Try to build some kind of normal life from the wreckage.
Friday I’d have dinner with Adrian and probably make everything more complicated.
Saturday I’d meet with Marcus and go through my list of potential suspects.
And somewhere in all of that, I’d try to figure out who hated me enough to destroy my life.
My phone buzzed with a text.
ADRIAN: Hope you got home safe. Looking forward to Friday.
I stared at the message for a long time before typing back.
ME: Me too.
It was the truth. Despite everything, despite all the chaos and pain and uncertainty, I was looking forward to Friday. To sitting across from someone who looked at me like I was worth knowing.
To feeling like maybe, just maybe, I could be more than the broken, abandoned woman everyone else saw.
I fell asleep with my phone still in my hand, dreaming of AI-generated lies and a billionaire’s dark eyes.
- Writer
