Page 6 of Tap My TOKTIK

Caffeine. It’s the caffeine. Definitely that.

I try to sleep. Try.

I don’t get up before the sun, instead I ignore the knock for breakfast and curl myself deeper into the fluffy duvet on the giant king-size bed. If I sleep then it won’t be Friday, it’ll be Saturday and I won’t have to meet a stranger in a bar and get kidnapped. Because we all know Asher is too stupid to stop someone from stealing me.

This is a breakdown. I know it is. I acknowledge it. Take that, Holland. I just haven’t the slightest clue how to stop the spiral today.

Around noon, I sit up in the bed, flip my phone off airplane mode and dial Holland’s office.

I need help. Jesus, if my friends saw me like this they would completely disown me. I’m a basket case.

“Olivia.” Her voice alone is soothing. How does she do that? “Are you okay?”

“No, I think I’m having a breakdown. Or something. I don’t know. I came to the hotel to write, and I have this date for research. And I can’t fucking breathe, or think.”

“We have been here before, haven’t we?” She reminds me this isn’t my first rodeo with crazy. “Talk to me.”

“I’m stuck on this damn book, and my friends are all just out there living their best lives, being normal. I’m stuck in my head with these idiots who won’t tell me their goddamned story, and I have a blind date which is making me think about shit, like why I’m alone? And why I like it so much that way? Then I thought, what if I die, no one will know until I don’t show up for wine night or my neighbors smell my corpse.” I take a breath. “If my date is a murderer and kidnaps me, no one is going to realize it because they know I’m hiding in a hotel and they don’t expect to hear from me for at least a few weeks. Am I crazy, Dr Holland? Have I lost my mind? For real this time, I wouldn’t see you if I wasn’t at least a small bit crazy.”

“You are not crazy, Olivia. We have spoken about negative self-talk.” Holland tries to calm the cataclysmic storm of emotion I can feel trying to get out. “Let’s go over this one problem at a time.”

She is so logical, I wish I could be logical. “Can your deadline be extended?”

“Not again.” I’ve already moved it out twice. “I have a month to finish this book.”

“Okay, is that possible?”

“Yes, I’ve done it before. I just feel trapped with this story.”

“So change the story. Can you do that?” I could, I just don’t want to. It means deleting what I already have, and that just adds anxiety to my anxiety.

“I could, but—”

“No but, just do it. If you know that’s what you need to do, stop stalling.” She just puts it straight, which isn’t always easy to hear, but absolutely necessary. “Now this date, why are you so overwhelmed? You’ve dated before, I know you have.”

“I don’t know, my anxiety has me all over the pace. What if I like him? Then he’ll want to date, and I don’t have time to date. I have a deadline, and a goldfish.”

“You don’t have to date him, Olivia, it’s one night. A meal, some drinks. Get to know a person who isn’t your friends or your goldfish. We spoke about going out, being around. You’re making this more than it is. Breathe. You deserve to have fun, deadline or no deadline, you’re human.” Fuck her and her logic calming me down. It’s some juju, voodoo, mind magic but it works. Every damn time. Which is probably why I pay her so much money to talk me off the ledge on the regular. “Go downstairs to the spa and the salon, get ready for your date. For tonight, you are Olivia the person, not Olivia the author. We can check in tomorrow and reassess the work stuff, okay?”

“Okay,” I say reluctantly. If I’m going on this date, I’d better get out of bed. I’m not crazy, just stressed. “Thank you.”

“It’s what I do,” she says, and hangs up.

I listen to her. Because I pay good money for her advice and it usually works. I get my mad red hair tamed, and enjoy a massage before I change into in a little black dress. Not too sexy, but just enough that it’ll turn a few heads. I stand there with heels in one hand and flats in the other, trying to choose between looking sexy and being comfortable.

Comfort wins, because I also might fall and break a wrist if I wear heels. I stop by the reception desk to let them know I’m expecting a guest at the bar in case he goes there first. You never know. Boys are dumb.

“Hello, Olivia.” Asher greets me with his player smile, and a very nice looking pink gin and tonic with berries in it. “I heard you have a date.” He doesn’t look impressed, the shit.

“I do, imagine that. I’m an actual person who goes on dates.”

“Here I thought you just sat up there in your tower killing imaginary people and drinking your body weight in gin every night. This is a surprise.”

“You know you’re an asshole, right? That’s why I have a date and you don’t.”

“Hey, I go on plenty of dates.”

“I’m sure you do, manwhore.” I like play-fighting with him, we do this often when I stay here. “I bet you have a line of ladies ready to use that pretty-boy body then run from from your dashing personality. Singers come with a warning, Asher. All girls know they are idiots who will break their hearts.”

He clutches his chest. “You wound me Olivia.”

“Good. Maybe you’ll change your whorish ways.”

“Not likely to happen.” That I already knew. “I’m TikTok famous now though, after my escape from suburbia. The ladies just can’t stay away.” I roll my eyes at his juvenile idea of fame.

“This is my date.” I show him the picture Amelia sent me five minutes ago. “When you see him, tell me so I can make sure my face doesn’t say things my mouth keeps in.”

“Who set you up? A blind person?”

“I’m beginning to think so, yes.”

“You need new friends.” He shakes his head and moves to the other end of the bar to fill up another guest’s drink. “I mean, if you want I could set you up?” he offers, coming back to me.

“I would rather not catch an STD and stupidity, but thanks. Your friends are probably a bit young for me any way.”

“You could totally be a cougar Olivia.”

“I could, but I prefer my pets house-trained.” Asher laughs at me. I wipe my sweaty palms on my dress, and hope that no one can see how much I’m sweating right now. It’s ick, but I’m nervous, and when I’m nervous I talk and I sweat. I can’t control either of those things.