Page 27 of Jesse's Girl
Ada’s eyes widen in some unspoken message to me. I can’t pretend to read her mind, but what the fucking fuck is probably a fair guess.
“Jesse, this is… Rochelle.”
I open my mouth to say hello but Rochelle is so engrossed in her phone she doesn’t notice.
“I see Andre in the chat! Hiiii, Andre!” she drawls, waving at the phone screen.
She is filming. She’s filming… live? Jesus.
Ada taps her on the arm and asks quietly, “Uh, do you think you could turn that off? Just while we do the walk-through?”
“Are you kidding? I’m almost at ten thousand followers!” Rochelle intones, blowing kisses at the camera. She taps the screen a few times and makes a peace sign, sticking her tongue out the side of her mouth.
What in the Miley Cyrus is going on right now?
Ada looks at me again like she’s imploring me to do something. Do what? I’m frozen in place, mind reeling about this latest train wreck to enter the apartment. And I thought the last guy couldn’t have been worse. I was wrong.
Who livestreams an apartment tour? I guess literally anything can be content these days.
“Oh, my God, this lighting is so tragic,” Rochelle whines. “Could you get that fixed?” She gives a limp-wristed wave toward the dim yellow ceiling light.
Ada takes a beat to respond. “I don’t really… uh, the landlord would usually…”
I so rarely see Ada at a loss for words. This is new—and it’s both painful and hilarious.
Ada seems to catch herself mumbling and gestures with her thumb over her shoulder. “Did you want to check out the bedroom?”
When they return, Rochelle does another quick perusal of the kitchen, then pans her phone’s camera around the space in a panoramic sweep.
I turn away, not wanting to be featured on anyone’s social media feed. When I can assure myself I’m no longer on camera, I turn back around.
“I dunno… what do y’all think?” Rochelle taps the screen and primps in front of the camera, oozing phoniness from every pore. “Should I take it?”
Oh, fuck, this is hard to watch.
Ada and I share another uncomfortable glance.
Rochelle squints at the screen, presumably reading the live chat messages.
“Oh, wow, that’s such a great point, Delilah96! Is there only one bathroom?” She directs this last part at Ada, who nods in confirmation. Rochelle pouts into the camera. “I don’t think there is gonna be room in there for me to host my makeup tutorials. Like… not if we’re sharing, I mean.”
Ada mumbles something about the one bathroom being listed in the ad, but Rochelle, of course, remains oblivious, having returned her attention to her loyal followers.
In news that surprises no one, Rochelle decides the apartment won’t work for her budding influencer career and swishes out to reign bubbly terror on other potential subletters.
After another bewildered interval where Ada and I try to process what we just experienced—applicant number three enters the apartment.
It takes only a second before I’ve got my guard up about the guy. He follows Ada in from the front door, staring at her ass the entire time.
Not cool, man.
When he sees me, he doesn’t even have the decency to pretend he wasn’t ogling her—just smirks and lifts his chin as if we share some kind of silent bro communication I want no part in.
Unlike the first two who came through, though, the guy has decent social skills. He isn’t livestreaming or accompanied by an overprotective parent, and he isn’t overtly a nightmare. He shakes my hand and introduces himself as Travis, sizing me up cautiously like he isn’t sure of my relationship to Ada. I’m more than happy to leave him guessing.
“Just pretend you’re my jealous boyfriend or something.” Ada’s words from earlier have me suddenly scrambling for how to pull that off. Because this guy is the only one of the set to make me wonder if I’ll need to.
As Ada shows Travis the room, I stay in the kitchen area but casually move into her line of sight so she knows I can see them both. She throws me a small smile, which Travis evidently catches, because he lowers his voice so I can’t hear what he’s saying. Dick. When he takes a half step closer to Ada, there’s a perceptible shift in her body language and she crosses her arms in front of her chest. She looks fucking uncomfortable.