what does it mean to be loved by death?

And me.

it's a pretty pervasive element of the romance novels I have sampled, the man being obsessed with his love interest, often long before she admits interest (even to herself), and sometimes to an intensity level we are not fully privy to - especially in Ali's case, where she has only recently started dabbling in dual POV. if we're not inside his head, we're not going to see how crazy he's going for her. but as genre-aware readers, we can often pick it up from the woman's narration, even when she's dismissing it. that's what we're going to look at today, with Levi and Bee from love on the brain.

for some overview - Levi and Bee knew each other several years ago in grad school, and are now working together again on a project. Levi was in love with her at the time and still is; she believed he hated her and is now gradually warming to him.

here, Levi is remembering, to the letter, something that bee said at least five years ago, and likely not to him. normal! at this point in the narrative we don't know Levi's specific feelings for her, but again, we are genre aware readers. we know. bee is able to remain blissfully ignorant, while we get the titillation of obliquely acknowledging his crush.

again, same thing. Levi is Noticing Things King, and bee finds a way to brush it off. I think for the reader, this is a really good way to give into the pleasure of being seen and understood without having to face it head on. it's exciting to think about a guy who has memorized every aspect of you, right? well, it is if he's built and 6'4 and sensitive and smart and you're in his car and it's almost nighttime and he wants you to come over to his house because you lost your keys and actually you don't really know this guy that well and. um. is it exciting? or could it be a little bit scary? hold on, gotta make a pit stop and address this:

okay! no, no worries everyone, the guy who's obsessed with you isn't creepy. we feel a pervasive and inexplicable sense of safety around him, it's all good. more than that, he is very concerned about the possibility of seeming creepy. this is such a fascinating choice to me. for a book that is very much about the realities of sexism in the workplace (featuring explicitly gendered violence), it makes sense to address this head-on. personally I would say this passage is not really getting into why bee feels safe around Levi specifically, but in the book at large id say there's two reasons. watsonian: at this point in the novel, Levi has physically saved bee multiple times (from fainting+cemetery entrapment) and defended her in workplace settings. he's proven himself to be A Good One, altho in my opinion that doesn't necessarily lessen the threat of being alone at night (!) with a man you don't know that well (!) in his house (!!!). but then there's our doylist explanation: Ali writes soulmates, emphasis on the mate. it doesn't enter the narrative explicitly until her fourth adult novel (love on the brain is her second), but it's all over her fanfic and her most influential texts (twilight, psy-changeling). our main pair are drawn together, instantly attracted, obsessed with each others' scent, etc etc. that's not, as the Goodreads reviewers often allege, lazy writing. it's the point. the fantasy is a man who is not only Erotically Obsessed with her, he can't help it. and neither can she, and that's okay, because she feels safe around him. in order for this fantasy to work for someone who does not already have this specific fantasy, I think conversations like this are necessary - we have to be reassured that he's not, like, scary. in her view or ours. no 🚩🚩🚩 to be seen.

so they're soulmates, even though we're not going to acknowledge that on page (in this book). but I do like the button of this scene, in which we get some groundwork laid for the reversal of the dynamic. "he fell first, she fell harder" does not really apply for most Ali pairings, but I like that bee here is laying out for us the ways in which she will be falling for Levi once she realizes hes not married/doesnt hate her/etc.