“Fifty-odd worshippers in various stages of puberty: girls in braces, girls in wheelchairs, girls in heat. Wide-eyed and smitten and on the verge of combustion. It was at once beautiful and desperate. And it pained me to realize that Isabelle was now part of this tribe. This motley crew searching for happiness in five boys from Britain whom they did not know, could never know, and who would never return the adulation.”

Solène attends the band meet-and-greet in Las Vegas with her daughter Isabelle and observes the August Moon fandom. Solène uses the words “beautiful” and “desperate” to capture the positive and negative aspects of fandom. Throughout the novel, Robinne Lee explores The Complexities of Celebrity and its ability to inspire violent acts of adoration out of a desperate need for connection. This quotation also reveals Solène’s protectiveness of her daughter.

“He said nothing as he slid his fingers in between mine, squeezing my hand. The intimacy of the gesture threw me. I had not held a man’s hand since Daniel’s, and Hayes’s felt foreign. Large, smooth, capable; the coolness of an unexpected ring.”

On their first date, Solène and Hayes meet for lunch and feel a deep sense of connection. Hayes’s act of holding Solène’s hand surprises her and signals the intimacy that develops in their relationship almost instantaneously. This sentence is the first that sets up Hayes in direct contrast to Daniel, and the sensual physical description of Hayes’s hand prefigures the tumultuous, passionate relationship that will follow. 

“For a moment, he held my gaze and I felt that distinct rush. The realization that this attraction had ceased to be just physical. That somewhere I’d crossed over. That I liked him.”

In New York, Solène meets up with Hayes at his hotel and recognizes that her attraction to Hayes is both emotional and sexual. Despite her attempts to keep their relationship casual, early on, Solène struggles with her intense connection with Hayes. As they relationship progresses, Solène grapples with the intensity of her feelings and with her responsibilities as a business owner and mother.