Writer's Block
by sylvie wang
Hannah G and Dylan Barbour were engaged and twenty-four years old. They had met on the Bachelor spin-off reality show “Bachelor in Paradise”. Dylan had been immediately obsessed with Hannah. Hannah had sort of just given in. It wasn’t that she didn’t like Dylan – he was like a sweet and dumb little dog but he also wasn’t that different from any of her past boyfriends who all proposed to her. They all gave her little shoulder kisses and inhaled the scent of her hair like it was oxygen, like they were trying to consume her. But it seemed like America approved of their relationship - her Instagram following had jumped up by eighteen percent since they had gotten engaged and that was important.
They had recently taken a trip to Paris.
“City of love,” Dylan had said pointedly. He was being sincere, she knew. He had said in the past that he loved her sense of humor, how goofy she was. Maybe he was different than the rest of them. Maybe he could handle the truth, and really see her.
“I have to tell you something,” Hannah said in their hotel room where they had a perfect view of the Eiffel Tower. It was nighttime and the city was a-sparkle.
“What’s wrong?” Dylan asked, his idiot face scrunched up in concern.
“I’m a succubus,” Hannah confessed.
“Succu-what? What’s that, like you can’t eat plants?” Dylan said.
“I’m a demon. I possessed the body of a blown-out Barbie doll and I can only feed off attention,” Hannah said.
“Hannah, why are you saying this?”
“Because I can’t stop. I can’t rest. I can only feed,” Hannah said. She started towards Dylan, her mouth getting bigger and bigger until –
Hannah G woke up with a start. She had fallen asleep on the couch, her head resting on Dylan’s shoulder. There was a movie playing in the background.
"Babe, you okay?” Dylan asked.
“Yeah. Just a bad dream,” Hannah said. “What are you watching?”
“This movie called Jennifer’s Body. Megan Fox is in it. She’s so hot. Not as hot as you though,” Dylan said quickly.
Hannah laughed. “Babe, no worries. Megan Fox is very hot.”
“You’re so cool. You’re like the coolest girl in the world,” Dylan said. “I can’t wait to get married.”
Chris Harrison had recently e-mailed them about televising their wedding. It was bound to bring in millions of viewers. If she was being honest, getting married made her nervous. But it was what the general public wanted, so she had to give them what she wanted. She couldn’t lose Instagram followers. Hannah started to break out in a cold sweat and breathing deeply – could she really go through with this? This huge commitment, with her whole family there –
Sylvie woke up with a start. She had fallen asleep in front of her laptop while trying to write but instead had fallen in a K-hole online of reading articles about the ten-year anniversary of the movie Jennifer’s Body and how it wasn’t appreciated at the time. She had been watching an interview between Diablo Cody and Megan Fox before she had passed out.
She didn’t even know why she claimed to be a writer or tried to have writing goals. It was always such a struggle, like pulling teeth. Whatever. She didn’t care. Except she did. She banged out the rest of her story and sent it to Patrick.
In the body of the e-mail she had written - What do you think lol
She waited anxiously for his response. He responded a few minutes later -
Kind of derivative but overall good!
Derivative??? How dare he!!! Wait, she’d take it. Overall good was better than nothing. Or was it? Sylvie started to spiral when –
Leonardo DiCaprio woke up with a start. He had fallen asleep while watching the movie Inception on his yacht off the coast of Southern France. He liked to reaffirm his own talent by re-watching his movies. His Oscar for The Revenant was cradled in his arms.
It was time for a break though. He was going to go upstairs and bang one of the 19-year-old models partying on his boat.
All was well.