Troy was a fighter; everyday he went to war. The war against capitalism, pussy and world peace. 

All Rachel ever wanted to be was a reality TV star. Rachel didn’t mind which show she ended up on, as long as she became famous and had at least 3 brand deals behind her. 

Rachel asked Troy if he could fuck her so hard so that he’d blow her brain out. Rachel knew that when she made it to heaven, God would feed her, her favourite candy. To be exact they were Trader Joe's milk chocolate peanut butter cups, and that God would feed her from the palm of his hand. Troy on the other hand didn’t understand why she didn’t want to live anymore, but took it upon himself to fuck her so hard. It had been a while since he had last fucked her and he considered himself a decent man. After all he was a descendant from the fallen city. 

“You’re not fucking me hard enough, I want to feel that big cock of yours, baby”, Rachel whispered in his ear. 

“I’m gonna blow that big brain of yours out, baby, I know that’s what you want” he panted over her. “Baby, that’s so hot, yeah, fuck me harder” Rachel whined. Troy’s mind was elsewhere on other things namely on ways he could destroy Harris’s empire in Worlds of Famine 3. He didn’t get why Rachel couldn’t hurry up and fake her orgasm like usual, he knew he had to finish it, for once and for all. “I’m gonna come, baby, I want to come in your mouth” he said. 

As he came he thought of himself pressing the circle and x button on the controller of his PlayStation 4 whilst detonating a bomb over Harris’s empire in World of Famine 3. 

Rachel could still taste his stale cum in her mouth as she lay next to him, while doom scrolling Instagram. She looked over at him and wished he could be someone else. If only it wasn’t for her desperation she thought maybe then I could be happy, free and single. Maybe he wasn’t her Trojan Troy, but he was still her Troy she thought. 

Rachel and Troy had met a year earlier in aisle 8 at Trader Joe's. She recognised him for his display picture on the Reddit thread, R/TraderJoesFans. They had been together ever since. Rachel knew it was her lucky day when she entered Trader Joe's on west 31st street at 11.11 on 11/11. She had already spent her morning manifesting via angelbabyspirit94’s Tik Tok account. Angelbabyspirt94 instructed her to repeat the following “Today I will meet him and my life will wholeheartedly begin” three times whilst manifesting her ideal lover. Rachel’s ideal lover was tall, dark and handsome with a little bit of nerd thrown in there for good measure .Rachel felt all the darkness release from her chakra, it felt better than her $500 dollar cupping session. 

Troy didn’t feel like they had that much of a connection; he was just horny and guessed Rachel was hot and smart, but kind of annoying. Troy didn’t mind her whiny nasal voice, he knew he could drown her out with the sounds of civilians dying of starvation on Worlds of Famine 3.

“It’s been a year and he still hasn’t taken me to Nobu, he barely wants to fuck me anymore” Rachel moaned to Kesley on the phone.

“Sweetie, he grew up as a Mormon in a trailer” Kelsey said trying to sound sympathetic. “You knew this would happen, Rach.”

“I prayed everyday for him, you know I manifested and stuff”, Rachel retorted back. 

“I was trying to not be judgemental and see people for who they’re trying to be, deep down” Rachel snapped. She knew Kesley had a point she always did.  

“Angelspiritbaby94 guided me to this point, Kels, like how could she be wrong? You know the last time I manifested with her I found $4000 dollars on the street. Angelspiritbaby94 told me I was gonna be rich, and she was right. That’s why I look this good, I spent it all on Botox and filler”.

Kelsey was left speechless, “Rachel, you told me you were going to donate that money to charity, you know, to someone who really needed it”.

“I did donate it. Kels, I donated it to myself. It was free money, you know, I really needed it at that time. It’s besides the point because the next week I met Troy. Angelspiritbaby94’s chants really did work, or at least they were working for me then.” Rachel pouted, whilst waiting for Kelsey to reply, but after 20 seconds of silence she had realised that Kelsey had disconnected the call. 

“Fucking bitch” Rachel muttered. 

Rachel knew that the only way to get the spark back in her and Troy’s relationship was to relive their very first meet cute. She sat on their busted sofa scrolling TikTok past Angelspiritbaby94. Rachel had found herself a love witch with more credentials than Angelspiritbaby94 ever had to begin with. Sexyterrorwitch89 was older, uglier and fatter than Angelspiritbaby94, instead of wearing a baby blue Juicy sweatsuit with her acrylic nails painted in glazed donut shade. Sexyterrorwitch89 had a shaggy black wolf cut, wore a turban and hid her figure in a deep maroon shroud. Sexyterrowitch89 spoke into her front camera whilst a purple mist filled most of the screen, her voice was hypnotising which in turn drew Rachel closer to her iphone. Rachel at that moment wanted her iphone to swallow her whole so she could fully enter Sexyterrorwitch89’s whole world. Troy took his eyes off World of Famine 3 to see Rachel face first cross eyed, her hot pink shellac nails tightly gripping her Iphone. He smiled to himself, pleased to see her occupied for once, whatever keeps her happy he thought.

Sexyterrorwitch89’s love potion was easy, all she had to do was take a lock of Troy’s hair and mix it with the fairy dust she already had in her nightstand drawer. Sexyterrorwitch89 informed her followers that today was the last lucky day for love of the year, now Mercury Retrograde was over. All Rachel’s guardian angel spirit had to do was rip through the roof of Trader Joes and maybe they could get the spark back. 

Convincing Troy to go to Trader Joe’s was easy, she thought. Rachel got on all fours and crawled over to him in the most seductive way she could think of, she pawed at his leg. “Wait a minute, girl. I am just about to detonate this bomb, it’s gonna hit so hard. I can feel it” he said, not taking his eyes off the screen. 

Rachel stood up so she was above him and snapped, “Your bladder is going to perforate like those lame kids in China, then you know you won’t be able to fuck anymore, your dick will be all limp”.

“Whatever, man, I’ll just get a catheter on Amazon, maybe you can be my sexy nurse and all, baby” Troy 89-69 laughed to himself, his eyes not diverting from the screen. 

“Do you think this relationship is a joke, look at how fucking hot I am, fucking look at me, how did I end up with a loser like you” she screamed in his face. She knew she couldn’t look ugly, with all the work she had, had done. She snatched the controller out of his hand and threw it at the screen of the 72” TV. The dull crack of the glass was the only noise that filled the room. 

Troy let out a long moan, “Now we're gonna have to go to CVS, for fucksake, Rachel” he shouted. "Look at what you’ve done. I thought you wanted to go to TJ’s”. 

“I just wanted to try and make this fucking work, but I am not dying of famine, Troy, so you don’t fucking care about me”. 

“I care so fucking much about you, but, baby, I was so close to killing Harris’s empire and saving the fucking world”

 “That’s what I was put on this planet to do” he mumbled. 

“IT’S NOT REAL, THIS IS NOT REAL LIFE. I’M NOT EVEN REAL, I MEAN LOOK AT ME, YOU HAVE TO LOOK AT ME NOW THE TV IS BUSTED. LOOK AT MY FAKE FUCKING FACE”.

“Baby, you’re so hot” Troy let out a sob. “I wanna make this up to you, forget the TV and the famine. I know you’re so hungry”. “Baby, tell me, where you want to go”. Troy didn’t care that he did not recognise the Rachel he had met in aisle 8 of Trader Joe’s. He just didn’t want to be 34 and alone.

“I want to go to fucking Nobu” she pouted at him, her hands on her 24” waist. 

“Baby, you know I did try and book Nobu for your birthday but they couldn’t give me the exact date, that’s why I got you those massage vouchers.”

His phone chirped, “ah fuck, the booking for today it’s in a hour, Rach. I completely fucking forgot, baby, I’ve just been preoccupied. Will you have enough time to get ready? You look nice as you do now.”

“I am in lulu fucking lemon, I can’t go to nobu looking like this”. What the fuck am I going to wear, Rachel thought, as she looked at her closet full of clothes. She pawed through her wardrobe until she found a dress still with its tag attached. That’s cute, she thought to herself, she looked at the Reformation tag hanging from the red and blue daisy printed dress. Remembering that Matt had bought her the dress when they were still fucking, as if Troy would know where the dress would have come from in the first place.

“You look hot, baby, " he kissed her on the cheek as they got into the Uber. 

Rachel instinctively pulled away as he felt the residue of his salvia ruining her perfectly applied contour. 

This is way too fancy, man, Troy thought, as the waiter handed him the menus. 

“I’ll just have an Old Fashioned,” he said to the waiter before he had a chance to look at the menu. 

“You're only drinking?” Rachel said aghast 

“I’ll have a margarita, the salmon sashimi platter and the cucumber maki rolls, to start with, please”, Rachel purred at the waiter thinking she would make Troy jealous.  

“Yeah for now, baby, I just want you to be happy and eat”, Troy said smiling at her. 

He watched Rachel eat a platter of sashimi, the thought of all the raw fish sitting rotting in her guts made him feel sick. At that moment he decided he was going to become a straight edge vegan. 

“I’m going back to my roots, Rachel," he said in all seriousness. 

“What do you mean, babe, are you becoming Mormon again? Because I was thinking about it and I will convert for you. Please don’t try to ruin every special moment between us”. She took a deep breath and smiled the best she could through the Botox and filler. 

“Oh no it wasn’t that, baby, I’m going to become straight edge, you know, vegan and stuff? I’ve been thinking about it a lot whilst playing Worlds of famine 3 and you know life is so unfair. Why do we eat all these animals, man?”  

Rachel could feel the tears welling up, she knew she would still look pretty as the tears rolled down her face. “You’ll still love me if I eat meat and stuff?” she sniffled. 

Troy watched a single tear roll down her face leaving a streak in her contoured face makeup, it landed on a singular piece of salmon. 

“But you are drinking right now, how can you talk about going straight edge whilst you have alcohol flowing through your blood cells, Troy, it just doesn’t make sense”, Rachel said sensing herself becoming more upset. 

“I’ll have to think about it”, Troy muttered 

Rachel could feel the pricked tears in her eyes turn to anger, she felt sick with rage. She thought of how much she had done for Troy and their relationship. How she thought it was a miracle that he had entered her life at 11.11 in aisle 8. And now he was about to walk away from her and exit it at 10.38pm on the 2nd of the 2nd Sexyterrorwitch89’s predictions were wrong. She knew she shouldn’t have trusted her. 

“You know, Troy, I am religious,” she tried to reason with him. “I manifested every goddamn day for you and you’re about to leave me after all I’ve done for you.” 

“Look at me, for gods sake, you don’t even want to fuck me anymore, is it the filler?”

The producers on Love is Blind have rejected me as well, why can’t I just catch a goddamn beat” she wailed.

“Babe, what have I said about taking the lord's name in vain before” he said just as Rachel collapsed face first into her plate of sashimi.

A waiter rushed over lifting Rachel’s face from her plate of sashimi. Her face looked all patchy and more swollen than usual. Troy could hear the hushes from fellow diners. Suddenly he felt out of his depth.

“Man, is she ok?” Troy asked the waiter, he felt panic rise, I’ve got to remain collected for my blood pressure man he thought. Troy put his head in his hands trying to zone back in hearing commotion around him. 

“Don’t worry, sir, the ambulance is on its way” Rachel's medicaid better come through, he thought, or who else is going to fit this bill. 

“Isn’t there a doctor here, I mean, goddamn it, her airways could swell up”. He looked at her already puffy face, it reminded him of one of those small circular silky pillows, with a button pressed in the middle of it. It also reminded him that he was so tired of all of this bullshit, that he just wanted to be in bed.

The waiter gently tapped Troy on the shoulder “Hey, sir, I need to ask you if it’s ok to close out on this tab before you go?” 

Troy looked in shock, and threw a variety of credit cards down. “Take what you want, man” 

Troy watched as Rachel's bloated body was wheeled away on a gurney, her swollen face covered by an oxygen mask. “Sorry, sir, there is no room for you to ride with the patient, can you follow suit in your own vehicle?”, the paramedic asked him. 

“I don't have a car at the moment, it got towed. We came in an uber.” Troy sighed at the paramedic, who looked utterly bored. 

“So, you can follow us in an Uber to Mount Sinai then”, the paramedic replied sarcastically. 

Troy looked down at his phone which showed a 3.8 Uber rating. “You know you could always get the bus”, the paramedic said. “It’s LA, man, you know by the time the bus comes she could be dead”.

“Troy, is that you”, a voice shouted. Troy shielded his eyes from the blue light of the ambulance driving away. 

“Harris, man, what the fuck are you doing here?” 

“I’m so relieved to see you, man, I could cry, but you know I can’t because that would be so emasculating” 

“I just sensed you were in trouble, man, I’m kidding. I had hacked into your emails as you didn’t show up to our 8pm battle. And you know, thank god I did, because it looks like you need my help, buddy”. 

“I mean, yeah, I do, man, they just drove her away. One minute she was eating sashimi and the next she was practically dead, you know, I thought she was faking it at first because I told her I was becoming Mormon again.” 

“Get in the car, I don’t have time to listen to your bullshit, just how Rachel didn’t either”, Harris laughed. 

“Where is she?” “Where is my girlfriend, ma'am?”

“Sir, are you a next of kin, as it’s family members only” the nurse replied in a monotone voice. 

“I’m her fucking boyfriend” Troy pleaded as he saw Rachel in an empty room surrounded by machines. 

“Are you married?” the nurse said this time with next to little to no interest. 

“Of course not, does it look like we are married” Troy shouted exasperated in the nurses face. 

No one wanted to make Troy’s life any easier, he decided. This is like a bad episode of 24 hours in ER, Troy thought to himself. 

At that moment, Troy's phone pinged as he sat slumped on the hard plastic chairs in the waiting room next to Harris.  He looked down to see a message from Kelsey, with a link, clicking on the link, the TikTok app opened to a video of Rachel collapsing in Nobu. 

“Man, they have the whole thing on footage, look at this Harris”. Troy turned his phone in the direction of Harris. 

“She’s gone viral, man, this is a sensation. You know Netflix would probably eat this up, Troy”. 

A faint ringing of alarms grew in the background, which suddenly got louder. “Code blue”, someone announced over the speaker as a dozen medical personnel rushed towards where Rachel's room was. 

“Man, if she dies and I didn’t even get to meet her parents” Troy cried to Harris. 

Harris looked up as Troy's head was buried in his arms to see Rachel being wheeled away yet again. He stroked Troy’s hair so he wouldn’t look up to see what was happening, “Man, I think I'm going to get a coffee, and by the looks of it you need one too”. 

At the coffee machine Harris found the link on TikTok and played it again, he watched Rachel collapse yet again face first into a plate of sashimi, this is comedy gold, he thought. Scrolling the comments, he found an outpour for Rachel's well being, along with the majority of women calling Troy a jerk. What a bunch of uptight feminists, Harris thought as he carried back the half cold filter coffees to the waiting room to find Troy had disappeared. 

Setting the coffees down on the floor, he texted Troy, “Where are you, man? I’ve just got the coffee.” The three dots appeared as Troy was typing a message, “Man, they’ve taken her into ICU, I don’t think her health insurance is gonna cover this.. I’m out the front”. 

”Look, man, the only way we can turn this around is if I message that girl Nicky I used to date, you know the one who was the Netflix producer about this”, Harris told Troy as they sat out the front on a Bench, the sounds of sirens swirled around them. 

“I’m not so sure, man, you know Rachel isn’t even conscious yet, would she even agree to this?”

“You know she would, man, it’s her dying wish to be famous.” Harris said trying his best to conceive Troy this would be a good idea.  

”Let’s just give it a go, what’s the worst it can do” Troy begrudgingly agreed. 

I’m gonna phone Vicky then, then it’s down to her, “Harris, I have been watching TikTok all night. I mean this is serendipity right here, the stars are truly aligning. I can’t believe you out of all people have the exclusive on this and you’re giving it to me” 

“Well, this could be yours if you want it, let me put you on to Troy.”

“Look, Troy, let’s meet at the hospital canteen tomorrow, say 12pm? Me and some guys from my team will come and we can take it from there, rest up, buddy."

The line went dead. 

Look, we are concerned that if we go ahead with this, that she could pass during filming, or even worse just not recover because we have to think of longevity. 

Are we pitching this as a mini docu series or a multi season? 

Troy tuned them out, the chattering amongst themselves was getting too much in his head. Placing his hands on the table he stretched back abruptly getting out of his seat. 

“I just need some air”, Troy could feel the sweat running down his face. 

“Take as long as you need”, they said back to him in unison, but not really caring if he came back or not. 

“This is all getting a bit much, Harris, I haven’t been able to see Rachel in days now, like I don't know what’s going on and these people from Netflix won’t leave me alone. All I want to do is go home and play World of Famine 3 and relax, I can’t take my mind off this stuff”.

“Look, it’s overwhelming, I know, but think how proud Rachel will be of you, when she comes round to find out she got a Netflix deal. You know you’re doing this for her at the end of the day.”

Nicky came up to him, we're going to begin filming tomorrow, you know while she’s still here. Then later we can set the scene and work backwards. Don’t worry, we’ve got you this covered, we just need you to sign some consent forms. 

“I’m not even her next of kin, don’t you need her parents' permission for this?” He felt this was the only way out. 

“We’ve emailed them the forms and they’ve signed on, we’re going to Tennessee to film with them next week. They didn’t want to kick up a fuss by coming here and all. 

At that moment Troy knew he was really the only person who half cared for Rachel apart from Kelsey, of course, but he wasn’t sure if they were still fighting. “I’m gonna make this right, baby”, he muttered. 

Opening his phone he googled celebrity managers, clicking on the first link he found Angela Harson. 

“Look, she is unconscious but you can see the potential”, he got the best selfie Rachel had taken of herself along with her Instagram. 

“I’m sorry, Troy, I don’t think we can take an unconscious person on our books”, Angela said as she adjusted her glasses. 

“But you know she’s going to have this series out, Netflix are involved, surely she can be put forward for hand modelling in the meantime. Her left hand has no IV in it and her nails are still nice, she has very womanly hands.”, Troy pleaded with Angela as if this was his last hope. 

The room was filled with flowers, as if someone had died. “I mean you almost died, Rachel, you’ve been out for the past 6 weeks” Angela informed her. 

“Baby, you’ve been out for so long, you wouldn’t believe what has happened”, Troy whispered to her as he stroked her hand.  

“Who is she?”Rachel said, pointing at Angela. 

“She is your manager, Rachel. From now on we have to think very carefully about where we position you with brand deals and what not, darling”,  Angela said, addressing her. 

“I mean, thank god, she’s come round, for her but also for my own bank balance”, Angela muttered.

“Baby, the beard you’ve grown is upsetting me, how have you let yourself go?” 

“I’m just so happy you’ve come round, I never thought you would be negging me again, I’m just so emotional”, Troy wiped his eyes. 

“If only we could be catching this for the camera, Troy, do you mind doing that again?”, Vicky chimed in. 

Rachel looked dumbfounded, how could this be happening to her, “Can someone tell me what exactly is going on?” 

“Well, you see, Rachel, you went viral on TikTok after you collapsed into your $300 plate of salmon sashimi and it’s been a roller coaster for you ever since then. I guess you’re what you would call famous now, do you understand?” 

“There is no need to patronise her”, Troy snapped at Angela 

“This is so good for the show guys, let’s keep this energy flowing”, Vicky enthusiastically whispered.  

Rachel manoeuvred herself up right using the upright sides of the bed, she looked around feeling slightly disoriented, can you pass me those flowers please she said. Pointing at the pastel blue hydrangeas. The card nestled between them read, ‘Thinking of you, all with fall into place, sending you positive energy in your recovery <3 Angelbabyspirit94’

Rachel dropped the card on the floor as she laid back down in the bed, her head hit the deflated foam pillow as she fainted. A rumble of commotion built around her. She couldn’t believe her luck, Angelbabyspirit94 had been watching over her all of this time and had forgiven her.