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The talk show circuit was nothing new for the Mary-Janes. They’d been touring the country for six months in anticipation of their upcoming album, ‘American Dreamboat’—which was slated for release in a few short weeks—and doing interviews at every stop along the way with television personalities, podcasters, music bloggers, and the occasional well-connected fan club representative. Media attention had only ramped up over the past month, as the first single off said album catapulted toward the platinum threshold, which brought the band to their current appearance on New York’s premier morning program.
Gwen shifted and tugged at the bottom hem of her hoodie, trying to get comfortable. They were all stuffed onto a bright teal couch shaped like a very aesthetically pleasing but not particularly ergonomic half-circle. Gwen and Glory were seated together on one side while MJ and Betty were side-by-side on the other, with Delia Drew, longtime soap opera star and overall American treasure, right in the middle. MJ cut Gwen a sharp look from behind their host’s shoulder and she stilled, offering an apologetic grimace in response.
“So, MJ,” Delia said, her smile sly under her trendy blonde bob and her eyebrows high as she leaned in toward MJ, who was seated to her left. “Quite a few publications have recently reported spotting you in the company of one Peter Parker, lead guitarist of up and coming folk-punk band, The Lizardmen. Tell me, is there romance on the horizon?”
Gwen managed to choke down her own bark of laughter, but the others weren’t so fortunate. Glory, who had ducked her head to take a sip of water from the coffee mug in front of her, nearly sprayed it everywhere, while Betty clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle the giggling. MJ herself didn’t bother trying to hide her amusement, throwing her head back with a delighted laugh.
Delia cast an uncertain glance to the lot of them and then honed back in on MJ, smile broad but tight.
“No, Delia,” MJ assured her, patting her on the shoulder with a familiar, placating hand that seemed to soothe some of the tension that had sprung through Delia’s frame. “Peter’s just a very good friend.” She gestured to the other girls and added, “We actually went to school with Pete and Harry.”
“Midtown High, represent,” Gwen provided.
Betty opened her mouth and stuck her tongue out, effecting rock-and-roll horns with her hands, while Glory wiped her chin off with her sleeve and added dryly, “Go Tigers.”
“It’s a small world, isn’t it?” Delia laughed, big and exaggerated. She schooled her expression to something subtler and tilted her head, crossing her hands at the wrists and resting them on her thigh as she pressed, “So there’s nobody special in your life at the moment?”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” MJ demurred, with a glossy little flip of her hair. She waved a hand to Betty, who was seated to her left, and Gwen and Glory on Delia’s other side. “I think these ladies are pretty special.”
Gwen rolled her eyes, giving her head an affectionate little shake. She couldn’t quite manage to fight back a smile, and MJ grinned at her past Delia’s sleek blonde coiffure.
Delia laughed again, the same canned, practiced titter from before, and swatted playfully at MJ’s knee. “Oh, yes, of course,” she agreed. “Very special. The success of your new single is proof enough of that. But there’s no boyfriend? No handsome suitors currently banging down your door?”
MJ smiled, but it was tight and didn’t quite touch her eyes. “Nope,” she said easily, popping the ‘p’ sound. “No boyfriend.”
Her gaze found Gwen’s and her expression softened, eyes sparkling. Gwen ducked her head, biting her lip as her cheeks flared hot so she didn’t give herself away grinning like a besotted idiot.
Delia, thankfully oblivious to this entire exchange, pursed her lips in a disappointed pout. “That is a shame,” she said somberly, “seeing as you were voted this year’s Most Eligible Bachelorette in Moda magazine.”
The screen at the back of the room flared to life, featuring an oversized image of the Moda magazine cover. On it, MJ was wearing a boxy, long-sleeved shirt with a big floppy collar in a busy geometric pattern. It was unbuttoned to her sternum and had been tucked into the waistband of a pair of pleated linen pants that were cinched tight with a braided belt in tobacco brown leather. Her hair, which was crimped and parted far to one side, had been teased to about three times its normal size, and a gigantic pair of gold earrings glittered in the fiery spill, giving her the look of a 1980s pop star.
There were coordinating portraits of all of them, done for the cover of their upcoming album, but MJ’s had seen the most traffic by far thanks to that stupid eligibility article. This was the sixth or seventh consecutive interview to have mentioned the damn thing, and it was obvious from the way MJ was clenching her jaw that the shine had well and truly worn off that particular penny.
Betty snickered, and MJ reached back to smack her, swift but soft.
“Yeah,” MJ agreed, smiling just on the bright side of brittle. “That was a pretty big surprise, and, of course, a huge honor.”
“With that kind of advertising, I doubt you’ll stay single for long,” Delia grinned and flashed a showy wink, leaning in close and overly familiar to nudge her shoulder against MJ’s, like they were old friends sharing a private joke.
Gwen actually saw the moment MJ snapped.
As Delia was leaning back, MJ tipped her head to one side, eyes going dark as her smile sharpened at the corners, and said in a thin, viciously saccharine tone of breezy laissez-faire, “You know, I’ve actually been meaning to reach out to Moda to get them to recant that title.”
Gwen’s eyes went wide, throat tightening. She tried to catch MJ’s attention, giving her head a sharp, warning shake, but MJ either didn’t see or, more likely, ignored her, that borderline diva-status temper she’d been struggling with since they were teenagers having already caught fire and ignited beyond control.
“Oh?” Delia blinked and leaned away, clearly taken aback. She raised her hand to her chest like a Victorian governess clutching her pearls and offered, “But you said - ”
“I said I didn’t have a boyfriend,” MJ cut in with an agreeable dip of her chin as she crossed her legs and folded her hands demurely over her knee. “But I’m not sure how my girlfriend of a year and a half feels about seeing me slapped up on screens across the country like a piece of meat on sale to the highest bidder.”
Delia’s mouth dropped open into a perfect, pink ‘O’ while Gwen slumped forward and buried her face in her hands with a deeply unflattering noise that made it sound like she was being strangled. She was relieved to see, through a sliver of space between her fingers, that Glory was doing virtually the same thing next to her, while Betty had collapsed back against the sofa in a fit of barely contained giggling on MJ’s other side.
MJ, who was sitting there with all the regal assuredness of a reigning monarch, smiled prim and lovely and close-mouthed as Delia spluttered and grabbed desperately toward the stack of flashcards on the coffee table where she had her notes and pre-written talking points all laid out.
“I - ” Delia started. “Um. That is - I mean, wow!” She mustered a passably natural smile, all gleaming white teeth and bright orchid lipstick, and scrambled the cards into some semblance of neatness, clutching them in front of her like she’d just been flung overboard into a tempestuous sea and they were the only buoy around for miles. “Girlfriend!”
“Mmmhm,” MJ hummed, with a supremely self-satisfied nod.
“Is that - ” Delia cleared her throat, tapped the stack of cards against her knees a couple of times, and then tucked her hair behind her ear and tried again. “You said you’ve been together for over a year?”
“A year and seven months, next Wednesday,” MJ confirmed.
Shit. Gwen sat back up and did some quick mental math. They should still be in New York next week, which meant she had plenty of time to make a dinner reservation at the little hole-in-the-wall Thai joint MJ liked over on Ludlow Street. As soon as they were finished dealing with the fallout of the major media scandal MJ was in the process of inciting, of course. With any luck, she would think that Gwen had remembered the date all on her own.
“Care to give us any hints as to your mystery woman’s identity?” Delia asked. She’d recovered admirably from the sudden shock and was watching MJ like MJ was her next meal ticket, eyebrows rising in high, hopeful arcs.
MJ rolled her gaze toward the ceiling and hummed thoughtfully for a moment. “We’ve known each other for a while,” she said eventually, slow and careful as she looked back at Delia. She laughed right after she said it, small and genuine and slightly self-deprecating. “I mean, we’ve been dating for more than a year, of course we’ve known each other for a while. I don’t know. She’s great. Things are going well. She probably would have wanted to be here with me to make this announcement, but - ”
She shrugged and splayed her hands out, pulling a rueful face. She darted a quick, apologetic glance at Gwen, face flushed pink with the first stirrings of embarrassment.
Gwen twisted her mouth against a grin, shaking her head, but from the obvious relief that rolled through MJ’s body she hadn’t been particularly successful in looking anything but pleased. It was hard not to be, when you had a woman like MJ declaring her love for you on national television, even if she didn’t address you by name.
They managed to muddle their way through the rest of the interview, giving an anemic overview of their upcoming album and losing Betty to periodic laughing fits as she remembered what had happened. It wasn’t a total disaster, all told, but when they were safely ensconced back in their dressing room, Glory slugged MJ in the shoulder and said, “That was stupid.”
“I know!” MJ was quick to assure her, hands up for mercy. “I know I shouldn’t have done it, I just - ” She huffed a frustrated sigh through her nose and shook her head, crossing her arms over chest. “It’s like every time we do one of these, they want to trot me out like a show horse. I hate it.”
Gwen sidled up next to MJ and tugged at the hand she had tucked into her elbow until she managed to wiggle it free and slot their fingers together. “It was stupid,” she allowed, leaning in to press a quick kiss to MJ’s cheek, “but also kind of sweet.”
MJ flashed her a tiny, pleased smile, head ducked so she could peer at Gwen from under the sweeping arc of her eyelashes. “Yeah?”
“Totally,” Gwen nodded. “Bullheaded, and extremely ill-advised, but sweet.”
MJ rolled her eyes, but she squeezed Gwen’s hand as she did so.
Gwen squeezed back, brushing her thumb along the side of MJ’s hand for good measure.
“You know Jen’s gonna murder you, right?” she asked, and MJ groaned and brought her free hand up to cover her face.
Their agent was pretty willing to roll with the punches for the most part, and she’d been supportive of Gwen and MJ’s relationship since they looped her in a few weeks after they made it official, but she would absolutely have something to say about MJ firebombing the carefully crafted media plan they had agreed to enact if they ever wanted to come out properly just because Delia Drew had gotten under her skin.
Out of nowhere, Betty started cackling again, and the other three girls whipped around toward her, curious to see what had caused the commotion. She was leaning back against the wall as her body shook, eyes wet and face red with her phone clutched loosely in her hand.
Glory sighed, long-suffering, and snatched for it, scrolling down the screen for a few seconds as her eyebrows climbed steadily toward her hair. With a broad, shit-eating grin, she held the phone out to MJ and announced, “You’re trending on Twitter.”
“Fuck me,” MJ moaned, and took it. Gwen abandoned her hold on MJ’s hand in favor of hooking her chin over MJ’s shoulder so she could read along. She had to push up onto her toes to manage it comfortably, but it was worth it for the sweet, familiar scent of MJ’s perfume and the heat of her all pressed along Gwen’s front.
This particular string of tweets was mostly supportive, but it had devolved halfway through into a spirited discussion as to the identity of MJ’s girlfriend. There were quite a few hypotheses—Gwen was pleased to see herself named a handful of times, along with Glory and Betty, which probably shouldn’t be surprising—but the greater public far and away seemed to favor -
“Janet Van Dyne?” MJ screeched. She turned her big, wounded eyes on Gwen and pouted, “We’ve hung out like twice at New York Fashion Week!”
Gwen pointed to a photo someone had shared of MJ and Jan walking down the street together, laughing over takeaway coffees and looking casually elegant, as always. “You make a cute couple,” she offered, and brought her arms up to wrap them around MJ’s shoulders.
“I don’t know what I see in you,” MJ muttered, leaning back into her and slouching down a little so Gwen could stand normally.
“Clearly,” Gwen agreed, pressing a kiss to her cheek. “Why else would you be dating Jan?”
MJ made a disgusted sound and handed Betty’s phone back to Glory, who couriered it to the other side of the room, where Betty was still reliant on the wall to keep her vertical, though her laughter had settled to a sort of high, giddy wheezing.
“Hey,” Gwen said, perking up, “does this mean Jan’s on the hook to plan our anniversary dinner?”
MJ rolled her eyes and reached up to grab Gwen’s hand, which she guided to her mouth so she could press a soft, sweet kiss to Gwen’s knuckles.
“Not a chance, wildcat.”
Ah, well, Gwen thought, resting her temple against MJ’s with a contented sigh. Worth a try.