The Fire Between High & Lo (Elements 2)

“Oh yes!” Her voice cracked before she broke into her gasping giggles. “The best part is that it’s real!”

I felt my brows crease in confusion as a smile pulled at the corner of my lips. “What? I can barely understand you.”

No matter what, the loud gasping screeches of Koko’s laugh amused me without fail.

Okay. I pulled the phone from my ear with a rueful smile. It’s a decent prank, but it’s not that funny. I shook my head.

“Hello?” I called out, hoping to get her back on track. “What are you talking about?” My stomach plummeted when the realization hit me. “Did you steal this from work? Kumiko! I know I gave you shit about it, but this really is a great opportunity for your career. Don’t get fired over this.”

For whatever reason, my warning just made her gasps turn into a wheezing, choking sound.

I rolled my eyes, trying not to be amused by her. I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing. “Koko.”

“No, I didn’t steal it. The letter is real!” She explained between pants as she calmed down.

I froze. The word ‘real’ echoed in my head as I struggled to pull what she meant from it. Part of me knew, but I needed confirmation. “Real? What do you mean it’s real?”

“My goal was to submit a packet for you to be a contestant and then post the response letter up at Breakers to get everyone in on the joke. Just being on the set this early, I already know they send out ‘thanks but no thanks’ letters and confidentiality agreements. I should’ve waited for you to get back so I could’ve seen your face! But I had waited too long already for this day so I had the package forwarded to your parents’ house as soon as it arrived here.”

“So you’re saying that the package is real?” I jumped out of the chair and marched out of the bedroom toward the living room. “No, no, no. You’re bullshitting me right now. There’s no way. The paperwork said that I passed the background check. There’s no way it could’ve gone that far without…”

My sentence trailed off.

Over the course of our seven-year friendship, Koko and I told each other everything. We shared our L.A. apartment and we stored all of our personal information in the same safe. Koko knew almost everything about me. She could’ve easily filled out the necessary paperwork.

Gripping the thick stack of papers, I returned to the bedroom. The door closed with a louder bang than I anticipated. “You illegally acces

sed my personal information and forged documents in order to submit an application for me to compete on a show that I don’t watch and don’t believe in to get me back for joking on you?”

The question was met with immediate silence.

After thirty seconds, Koko cleared her throat. “Too far?”

“Hell yes!”

“Are you mad?”

“I’m mad that I’m now associated with this crappy show and there’s a paper trail and electronic proof floating around. I’m mad that if I want to get elected to the Supreme Court, someone is going to pull out the list of applicants to The One and I will lose my bid because this clearly displays poor judgment.”

“But are you mad?”

“Am I mad that you’re a diabolical bitch? No.”

I had to hand it to her. She waited two months for her prank to come full circle. That’s a hell of a commitment.

“I wish I could’ve seen your face when you got the letter. I can almost visualize you noticing the title and then climbing on your soapbox about the sexist undertones of the show and then the shock of realizing that you applied to be on it. Are you going to write a strongly worded letter about the selection process?” Koko joked.

“Ha ha,” I replied without any inflection in my voice. My eyes kept scanning the paperwork.

“Thousands of women enter and only twelve get selected to participate on the show. Well technically twenty-four but twelve are eliminated before the big cocktail party with the eligible bachelor. And there was less than a one percent chance that you’d get selected because of how many people apply so I felt like you were safe from actually being too attached to the show. They may not even keep it on file. I just wanted a letter or email that had your name and that you applied to be on The One.”

“Like I said, diabolical.” I looked at the congratulatory letter once more before dropping the stack of papers on the desk and pressing my fingertips into my forehead. “But there’s just one little problem with your plan though.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m not going on this bullshit show and I’m going to burn all evidence that could link me to it.”

“No!” Koko shouted, making my ear ring. “I’ve waited two months for this! I earned this Zoe Elise Jordan! And I heard that at the bottom of the letter, they actually say ‘Our bachelor is looking for the one Zoe…and it’s not you.’ Please, please tell me it says that. Please.”