I was still lying in bed, phone in hand, staring at the message I just sent like it might explode.
Good morning babe with a little heart at the end.
God, what the hell was I thinking?
My face was warm—not in a charming, morning-glow kind of way, but in a did I just doom myself and my career in three words or less? kind of way.
I pulled the blanket over my face and groaned into it.
"Babe." I whispered like a criminal confessing in the dark. "I actually wrote babe."
And then she sent back heart emojis.
A dozen of them. Maybe more. Just a chaotic burst of red hearts like her entire soul had short-circuited and emojis were the only language left.
I should have felt reassured. Instead, I curled tighter in bed like a human cinnamon roll of anxiety.
This was bad.
Like, textbook scandal bad.
Like, maybe-the-next-lesson-I-teach-will-be-from-a-prison-cell bad.
