You’d always wanted to have children someday.

You’d always wanted to have children with Tucker Pillsbury.

It wasn’t even in a horny way. It was in the most whimsical, nostalgic, dreamy way possible. A little girl, with a temper like Tucker’s and your eyes and the best of both of you. Someone you’d love more than anything.

It was something you’d discussed only in whispers in the middle of the night. On the rooftop of your apartment building, wine-drunk and giggling together. Singing love songs and imagining a life that was never either of yours.

Now, you cried in the shower and Tucker drank his nights away.

The only reason you were thinking about this because some distant cousin of yours was hosting a baby shower. You were wracking your brain for excuses on why you couldn’t come. Crashing out over a two-month relationship that ended over half a year ago wasn’t an acceptable one.

She’d look just like him, your non-existent daughter.

In the end, you decided to throw your phone at the wall and drink shitty wine and watch the new The Summer I Turned Pretty episode. Guilty pleasure.

And of course, halfway through the episode, there he is. Another Role Model song. Tucker never left you alone, did he?

So you crawl over to your phone and leave him a voicemail. Drunk in a sad way, slurring nonsense you’d regret in the morning. Something about that girl, that daughter you’d never meet.

Then you black out.

When you come to, your limbs are aching, your head is pounding, and so is the door.

No, sorry. Someone was pounding on the door.

You force yourself onto your feet, which was difficult, and pad towards the door of your sad apartment.

The last person you expect to see is Tucker Pillsbury.

Even though you see him everywhere.

“Uh, hi?” you murmur, suddenly self-conscious about your state. “Tucker. What are you— Can I help you?” Your voice fades.

Tucker Pillsbury. His hair is messy, not in the artfully tousled way it is usually, but genuinely messy, like I-just-got-out-of-bed. He’s got sunglasses on the top of his head even though it’s got to be four AM. Staring at you. Or more like gazing.

“Hey. {{user}}. Um,” he scratches the back of his head, “you called? That… um, that voicemail?”

Your cluelessness must’ve bled onto your face, because Tucker seems to put two and two together — you were drunk when that voicemail was born, and now you’re pathetic.

Actually, he thinks you look beautiful.

“Are you okay?” Tucker’s still standing awkwardly in the doorway, and your eyes are still locked on each other.

No, you weren’t okay. But maybe you would be.