Seven Days in June

The State of the Black Author event is packed with high and low literati. Eva feels comfortable with Cece as the moderator and converses with the other panelists, especially a mansplainer with a doctorate. In the middle of the event, Cece spots Shane standing at the back of the room. She invites him on stage, and the crowd cheers him on. Eva is caught off guard—she isn’t ready to see him again, let alone in the flesh and next to her on stage. She hasn’t seen him since the 12th grade. 

Now on stage with the panelists, Shane introduces himself to Eva, complimenting her work. She is frozen, unsure why he is back in New York. As Shane starts taking questions from the crowd, all the attention fixates on him, and the other panelists fall into the background. A young woman asks him about his novel Eight. She wants to know about his experience of being a man writing from a female point of view, and she mentions that some critics believe he’s unqualified to do so. He responds casually that it’s no big deal and that writers need to challenge themselves.

Suddenly, Eva is angry. She’s put blood, sweat, and tears into preparing for this panel, and here Shane is acting completely blasé. Her efforts have been painstaking in managing her public image, and she feels it’s almost a miracle she was even invited to the panel—yet Shane has bumbled through his whole career, avoiding the press and neglecting to cultivate anything resembling charisma, and he still gets rewarded. He has an enraptured audience. Incensed, Eva pipes up that she agrees with the critics who say Shane is presumptuous in writing from a female perspective. She points out that he has romanticized female mental illness. He agrees but then points out that while she is neither a vampire nor a witch, she still writes such characters. Additionally, he says, her character Sebastian is a realistic and vivid portrayal of masculinity. Eva is stunned; as Shane continues describing Eva’s portrayal of masculinity, his remarks indicate that he’s read every word of her series. When a fan asks if he has a Sebastian “S” pin, he admits it is sold out every time he has visited Eva’s website. Eva feels like “a wreck.” 

After the panel, Eva and Shane steal glances back and forth. Suddenly, her phone dings with a reminder from Audre about the supplies for her portrait due this Friday (Audre is painting a portrait of Lizette for school). Then, her phone dings again, alerting her to an update on a Facebook fan group: One of her biggest fans wrote a post about the panel that just took place, noting that Shane has a G for Gia carved into his arm and has bronze eyes, just like Sebastian. Ashamed that her life has become a public soap opera, Eva approaches Shane for the first time. A little awkward at first, they agree to meet in private. Before Eva leaves, she tells him to stop writing about her, and he responds, “You first.”

The narrative again jumps back to 2004, where Genevieve is at school, her head still pounding after her run-in with Lizette’s boyfriend. It’s the first Monday in June, and though it’s near the end of the school year, this is also her first day at a new school because she transferred. It’s awkward enough being the new kid at the end of her senior year, but to make things harder, she’s never been great at making friends. Her senior year was already in a downward spiral. After her migraines reached a new level of pain, she began to skip class; her 4.0 GPA fell to D minuses, and Princeton rescinded her offer. Earlier that morning, she decided she needed to make a friend.

She now sees a boy across the yard on the bleachers, reading like he is “living in the words” (73), which is also how Genevieve reads books. She decides to approach him—and as she approaches, his appearance strikes her as unusual. His eyes are bronze, and she finds him beautiful. As she gets closer, however, she sees that he has a scab on his nose, significant bruising on his knuckles, a cast on his left arm, and abnormally dilated pupils. She’s beginning to suspect he’s not as inviting as she assumed, but she can’t stop now. She goes to sit by him, and while he isn’t friendly at first, they soon begin to talk. Genevieve feels like she is supposed to know him. She pulls out her vial of peppermint and lavender essential oil, explaining her migraines. He explains that he keeps breaking his arm on purpose. Genevieve says she can’t imagine doing that, and he eyes the cuts on her shoulder. This makes Genevieve uncomfortable, since she usually tries to hide the injuries from her self-harm. Before he leaves, he introduces himself: Shane.

In class, a girl wearing Apple Bottom jeans starts to tease Genevieve, and it escalates, with Apple Bottom grabbing Genevieve’s hair and cutting off her ponytail. Enraged, Genevieve stands up, but Shane cuts her off, offering to fight the girl’s boyfriend. Apple Bottom’s boyfriend throws a weak punch, and when he thinks he almost has Shane, Shane smacks him across the face with his cast. Then the girl punches Genevieve, knocking her out.

Genevieve wakes up in a cot next to Shane in the emergency room. Her head is in agonizing pain. Shane pulls out a baggie of pills—seemingly a personal stash—and offers her an OxyContin. She’s in too much pain to do much, so he grinds up one of the pills and brings the powder to her so she can inhale it. The relief is euphoric; also, she’s high. Nevertheless, she’s able to move around now. Shane suggests they leave, and the pair run out of the hospital together. She doesn’t know where Shane is taking her, and she doesn’t care.