by Anna Todd
Ha, you think to yourself. Like those fourteen-year-old superfans are going to fall for that.
Eventually, though, you hear him taking his final few questions and getting ready to say good-bye. Once you’re sure the camera is switched off, you work up the courage to head back into the living room, where you find Dan closing down his laptop.
“How’d it go?”
The sound of your voice makes him jolt in his seat, the laptop slipping sideways from his lap. “Christ, you scared me.” He clutches his chest.
“Sorry, I kind of crept up on you.”
“Don’t worry.” He shakes his head. He gives the laptop the once-over, but his catching it in time seems to have averted any potential damage. “I thought I’d spent too long in somebody else’s company without embarrassing myself. I was well overdue.”
You laugh. “Could’ve happened on the live show.”
“Very true.” He nods. “It did go pretty well. There weren’t too many freak-outs at the mention of Phil’s name, and I didn’t fall off my chair. Hard not to consider that a success.”
“Nice one.”
“Thanks for letting me hijack the Wi-Fi.” He leaves you wondering if it’s a normal reaction for your heart to jolt when his gaze meets yours. “Seriously, I owe you one. If there’s anything I can do to return the favor, let me know. I mean, I’d offer you free use of ours, but it seems like you’ve got a better deal going on here than Phil and I.”
You wave him off. “Don’t worry about it. If sitting in my apartment for thirty minutes is going to get thousands of fangirls off your case, then it’s the least I can do.”
“Well, thank you anyway.” He reaches up to push his bangs back into place. “I’m still going to say I owe you.”
The packing up of his laptop is what jolts you. Since you’ve given him pretty much all you had to offer, Dan is seconds away from heading back to his own apartment. Only then are you struck by the realization that you don’t want him to leave quite yet; after all, it’s the first opportunity you’ve had to have a real conversation, and you might feel like less of a creep watching his videos if you were actually on first-name terms.
“Did you want tea?” you blurt out before you can stop yourself. “I mean, I was just about to boil the kettle, and if you don’t have to rush back . . .”
You can’t tell whether Dan looks surprised by the offer; his lopsided smile refuses to give too much away. After a couple of seconds—each of which you spend cursing yourself for sounding so awkward—he nods. “Yeah, okay. Tea would be great.”
Heading back to the kitchen, you wonder why you suddenly feel so self-conscious. Maybe it’s because Dan’s need to remain in the apartment—and with you—is over, and anything else falls down to personal choice. As you boil the kettle, you tell yourself to get a grip. You should not be working yourself up over Dan Howell, of all people. As cute as he may be, the guy’s practically the definition of awkward. If there’s anybody you can handle, it’s him.
“Thanks,” Dan says when you set the mug in front of him a couple of minutes later. “I feel like you’re just adding to the list of things I owe you for now.”
“Seriously, it’s fine.” You settle into the opposite armchair. “Just let me play the friendly neighbor for a while.”
“Friendly neighbor?” He quirks an eyebrow. “Or . . . closet fangirl?”
“Oh my God, just forget about the password.” Burying your face in your hands, you hope the flush now creeping up your neck isn’t too obvious. “It was a teenage obsession, okay? Please don’t go thinking you’ve got a crazy stalker living next door.”
“Okay, okay. I believe you.” He holds his hands up in surrender, but it doesn’t seem over; you have a feeling the whole thing will come back to haunt you sooner or later. Why couldn’t you have thought to change the password to something less embarrassing? That should’ve been your first priority on finding out he was your next-door neighbor. Then again, it’s not like you ever expected him to come knocking on your door.
Dan shoots you a sideways glance. “So . . . did you ever try your hand at making YouTube videos yourself?”
“Uh . . .” The sensible option would be denial, but you have a feeling the look on your face has already given too much away. “I may have attempted it many years ago.”
“Knew it! Should I try looking up your channel?”
He moves to open his laptop, but you’re out of your seat and slamming it shut before he can even get a word out.
“Don’t you dare,” you threaten, your face hovering above his for a moment before you return to your seat.
But Dan just grins, seeming to enjoy the exchange a little too much. “I’m just kidding. Believe me, I know better than anyone that we’ve all got embarrassing moments on the internet. Mine . . . well, let’s just say mine tend to be found a lot more easily.”
You roll your eyes, taking a sip of your tea. “That probably comes with the territory of having an army of teenage internet stalkers at your command.”
He laughs. “Yeah, that’s true. It definitely took some getting used to.”
“I’ve seen the girls hanging around the door to the apartment block.” You shake your head in mild disbelief. “You can’t say they’re not persistent. They must be really desperate to meet you.”
Maybe you’re imagining it, but the mention of this seems to embarrass him, and he reaches up to scratch the back of his neck nervously. “Yeah, I can’t deny that they go to some crazy lengths. I’m still not really sure why. It seems a little bizarre to me. . . . I’m just some ridiculously awkward guy on the internet. Not exactly Channing Tatum, put it that way.”
“Oh, I don’t know.” The look on your face seems to make him laugh. “The nerdy-guy thing has its charms.”
“I mean, thank God.” That tugs your smile even wider. “Otherwise I’d be kind of screwed. And Phil, for that matter.”
“Just be grateful for YouTube, right?”
“Oh, yeah. Making nerds like us desirable since 2005.” Dan shoots you a look over the top of his mug, before setting it back down on the table. “Still, I can’t quite believe how long this thing has been going. That so many people are interested, I mean. A lot of the time I wonder when they’ll finally realize I don’t have anything earth-shattering to say and leave me to it.”
“I hardly think that’s likely.”
“Isn’t it?”
You shake your head, perhaps more sure of yourself than you should be. “Of course not. Watching your channel . . . it’s kind of endearing, you know? These people have been watching you for years.”
He pauses, stopping just long enough for you to notice the mischievous glint in his eye. “Like you?”
“God, you’re never going to let that go.” You roll your eyes, though you can’t help wondering if you should be reading more into it. “I just keep up with your videos, that’s all. Not as obsessed as when I was fifteen, but . . . more like up-to-date.”
He smiles, more to himself than anything else, and you realize that you’d give anything to read what’s running through his mind. “Well, it’s nice to know. I’m flattered. Just . . . you know, don’t set up a webcam through the wall and live-stream my bathroom routine, or something.”
Your laugh rings out across the room, and you find the confidence to shoot him a wink. “Can’t make any promises there, I’m afraid.”
He goes to say something, but a vibration from his pocket interrupts you both, and he pulls out his phone to read the message on-screen. “Crap, is that the time?” His glance at the clock makes you realize how long you’ve spent together. “I should probably be heading back—I completely forgot I was supposed to be filming a gaming video with Phil tonight.”
He picks up his laptop from the sofa and tucks it under his arm, already gathering to his feet. “Thanks again for everything. Like I said, I owe you one.”
“And like I said, it’s fine.” You rise to your feet, following his footsteps back toward
the front door. “Letting you use my Wi-Fi was hardly the biggest inconvenience of my evening.”
“But my company might’ve been,” he jokes.
You roll your eyes. “Sure. It’s not like there aren’t five million people who would kill to be in my shoes right now.”
“It’s like you’re trying to inflate my ego.” As he readjusts the laptop under his arm, his dark-eyed gaze is punctuated by an unexpected flutter in your stomach. “Thanks, though. At least I know where to come next time Phil’s downloading more of the world’s longest and most pointless videos.”
“Anytime.”
“I’ll see you around.”
“Sure,” you say, as he reaches for the handle and pulls open the door, letting a cool blast of air into the apartment. “See you later, Dan.”
You linger as he crosses the hall, heading for his own apartment. Only once your door has closed behind you do you lean back against it, taking the deep breath you feel like you’ve needed for the past hour. The whole situation still feels surreal; though you had been hoping for a proper introduction to your neighbor, you’d also thought it might come with more preparation than the three seconds it had taken to answer the door. Maybe, when it came to Dan Howell, you had to be grateful for anything.
Still, as your mind runs back over the exchange that’s still fresh in your mind, you can’t halt the smile that’s now creeping onto your face. A tiny spark of excitement runs through you, fueled by the anticipation of the next time you bump into each other.
There’s no way of knowing where things might lead, but that’s not going to stop you from hoping Dan’s Wi-Fi might cut out again soon.
Your Bourne Identity Crisis
Dmitri Ragano
Imagine . . .
The Metrolink train is pulling into Union Station when you notice him in the back of the quiet car. There he is slouched in the window seat. Is he actually trying to blend in with the crowd of staid Orange County commuters? Maybe the other sleepy suburbanites are oblivious, but you for one are not fooled. You can see this guy is exceptional. He is not the kind who spends his weekdays on salary in a cubicle and his weekends running errands at Costco and Home Depot with the wife.
His loose-fitting bomber jacket can barely conceal a massive chest and bulging biceps. The Ray-Bans stretched across his face might reflect the 7:00 a.m. sunrise, but they can’t conceal the bruise across the cheekbone of his ruggedly handsome face. And his long sleeves might hide the Tag Heuer watch from the other commuters, but you spotted it right away.
And he is staring at you through the sunglasses. You can feel it, channeling that animal instinct you get when a predator has you in its crosshairs. It must be my overactive imagination, you think, maybe a bad ingredient in that murky cup of coffee I bought before getting on the train. What possible reason could this suave, intimidating stranger have to size you up?
And why does everything about him feel so familiar?
YOU WEAVE YOUR WAY through the throng of commuters in the west hall of the station, queuing at the first Starbucks you see. Maybe a second coffee might counteract the apparent hallucinatory effects of the first. Waiting in line, you watch hundreds of people pass through the main hall of the station, hailing from towns like Glendale, Buena Park, and Riverside en route to their service jobs in the office towers, restaurants, and retail stores of downtown. This is the Los Angeles that you know, the part they never show on Entourage or TMZ, the city of everyday citizens who go their whole lives without getting invited to a Hollywood party or having someone ask them for an autograph.
No one in this sea of strangers has any cause to stare at you because you are one of them, the tribe that will never be envied or admired. Yet there he is again, staring back at you from behind the corner of the Wetzel’s Pretzels stand. Why would he be standing there? Wetzel’s doesn’t even open until lunch, and judging from his physique, he is hardly the type who snacks on doughy, oversize pretzels.
You decide it’s time for a diversionary tactic, trying to recall the details of countless film scenes where the hero realizes he’s being followed. You toss your coffee into the trash. Then instead of taking your normal route down the escalator to the Red Line railway, you pivot, pacing briskly out of the station, through the old lobby, past the travertine walls, over the terra-cotta floors. When you reach the Alameda Street exit, you jump the line and hail the first cab in the loading area.
“You’re in a hurry,” the driver says, stating the obvious.
You give him the directions to your office on Seventh Street.
When the cab turns south on Alameda Street, you finally summon the courage to glance back. There he is standing on the sidewalk, getting smaller as you drive away but still larger-than-life.
Then you realize why the man seems so familiar.
Matt Damon, you think, the man looks just like Matt Damon.
LATER THAT AFTERNOON, you are sitting at your desk in a vast sea of cubicles. You stare at your computer screen, listening on your headset to another mind-numbingly tedious conference call.
“Remember our purpose here, folks,” someone says, but it’s too late for that. You forgot the purpose a long time ago. Out the window, you notice coworkers strolling along the sidewalk down below toward the food court on Figueroa. One of them told you once that deciding where to eat lunch was the high point of her workday. The conference call drones on.
And there he is. Again. Parked on Seventh Street, waiting in a vintage Mini Cooper.
You’ve seen him too many times now for it to be a fluke. There’s a rule of thumb in LA: The first couple times you spot a celebrity, it’s probably just someone who looks like the person. But the third time, it’s the real deal.
You think to yourself, I am being stalked by Matt Damon.
YOU RETURN TO YOUR HOUSE in the suburbs and go through the usual “How was your day?” routine with your wife. You realize you forgot to pay the water bill last month. Your son’s school is having another PTA fund-raiser. The neighbor keeps throwing his dog’s waste bags in your bin when you leave it out for trash day.
“Did you talk to the neighbor?” your wife asks.
Through your living-room window you spot the Mini Cooper on the street in front of your lawn.
“Honey, there’s something I need to tell you,” you say. “You know I love you, right?”
“Yes, of course.”
“You’re the best thing that ever happened to me. You remember that first date? How you told me your favorite movie was Good Will Hunting?”
She looks at you, puzzled. “Of course. But what’s the matter?”
“I think I’m in danger.”
“What kind of danger? Not another round of layoffs, is it? It’s probably better if you found something in Orange County, anyway.”
“Someone is following me.”
“What? Following you? That doesn’t make any sense. Why would someone be interested in you? I mean, besides me of course.”
NEXT THING YOU KNOW you are on the phone with your wife’s friend, a licensed psychologist. She books you for the earliest available appointment.
“I’m glad your wife called me,” she says at your first meeting. “I want you to know there is no shame in this and no cause for alarm. These symptoms are very common and very treatable.”
“What symptoms?”
“These sorts of paranoid fantasies.”
“It’s not a fantasy,” you insist.
“You really believe that a movie star is stalking you?”
“Seeing is believing.”
“Not always. You’re at a transitional stage in life.”
You laugh nervously. “So it’s part of some identity crisis?” But you see she’s not laughing back. “That doesn’t make sense. I’m content. Great marriage and family. My job’s a little dry, but so what, the people are nice and it pays the bills.”
The therapist looks at you with a tilted head. “Many people have a good life by objective standards. Yet there
can still be unresolved tensions under the surface, feelings that have lingered for decades.”
“Why exactly would that cause me to have visions of Matt Damon?” you ask sarcastically. You were always suspicious of psychologists in the first place.
“Maybe it’s a symbol from your subconscious. Your wife tells me that you met and bonded over the movie Good Will Hunting. Back then you had your own dreams of making movies.”
“That’s right.”
“But Damon went on to win an Oscar and become a superstar while your film aspirations went unfulfilled.”
“The chance of success is slim. Everyone knows that going in.”
“Let’s go back even earlier. During high school, there was a lot of pressure to be a high achiever, wasn’t there? You wanted to go to an Ivy League school but you couldn’t get in.”
You don’t really love where this is going. “So . . . ?”
“You know that Matt Damon went to Harvard.”
“A lot of people went to Harvard.”
“Going back even earlier in your childhood years, your wife told me you always had a negative body image. You were too skinny and could never gain muscle in your upper body no matter how you tried.”
“Okay. Okay, I get your theory,” you say impatiently. The pretense of doctor-patient civility is starting to unravel as quickly as the doctor-patient confidentiality apparently already has.
“Many people still harbor internal doubts and unfulfilled dreams from their formative years. On top of that, we live in a celebrity culture. Fame and wealth seem like the ultimate antidote to our problems. You’ve got to understand that your obsession with Matt Damon—”
“I am not obsessed with him!” you shout in exasperation. “He’s obsessed with me. So what if I need to stand in line at the DMV like everybody else? So what if I wasn’t invited to George Clooney’s wedding? That doesn’t mean I’ve lost my grip on reality.”