The cashier shrugged like Your call, struggling to pick up the receipt I’d signed. It had adhered to the counter like a sticker from all my sweat. He got it, finally, but not before tearing it some.

•

I sent editor bae the latest iteration of my Walk Book early on a Friday, mid-November last year.

Edited down from 120 to 75K words, over the six previous, addied up and anguished months, since I’d first sent it.

I’d been working on a query for days and had homed in on three agents who seemed like they might fuck with it. Who represented authors I fucked with. Like, for example, the writer Sheila Heti’s agent.

I’d been up all that previous Thursday night, and shot it out at around 7 a.m.

Then, at 8 a.m., on an impulsive whim, I sent it to editor bae too, even though we hadn’t spoken since last we’d hung, last spring.

Since she’d abruptly ghosted.

So was surprised when she got back to me right away, saying Just read over your chapter and query and can you send the whole thing?

She was an editorial assistant at an NYC literary agency.

Sure! I said, sending it.

The next afternoon, Saturday, she emailed me saying she read the whole thing, and loved it, and was I free to talk next steps tomorrow night.

The next night, Sunday, she called around 9.

Side bae was over, tryna Netflix and chill. We were like 5 minutes into the SNL ep she was tryna watch.

Ended up talking to editor bae, out on the stoop, for like an hour.

She first went over the things she liked. How she felt like she was right there with me, the whole walk. How my self-deprecation about my eventual failure made her laugh, and made my story unique. That my depiction of all the Bible Belt Midwesterners I encountered was so relevant to today’s political climate.

I straight up almost started crying.

I couldn’t believe someone had not only read, but had gotten it. This thing I’d toiled over so long and hadn’t shown a soul.

No I definitely started crying.

I remember bc she stopped what she was saying, listened, and said Uhhhh—are you crying?!

Nah bro I’m not crying, I said quickly, wiping my face and putting an abrupt end to the crying.

She asked what other agents I’d sent it to.

I told her.

She asked if I wouldn’t mind withdrawing them; she wanted to edit this with me and submit it to her agent-boss.

If it was accepted and did well, she said, this could be big for both of us.

I was speechless.

“I mean…” I said. “OK!”

I loved her so much right then.

“So. What next?”

“Well,” she said, her tone shifting. “There are a couple parts we gotta cut.”

“Cut?”

“Rework, let’s say.”

I was all ears.