Chapter 1: Going Viral

The day Marcus Lin and his assistant got together, I wasted no time—I went online and posted a blog:

"Urgently seeking a new husband: must be handsome, sweet-talking, self-disciplined, and score full marks in husband material. $15,000 allowance per month, full benefits, first come, first served."

My notifications blew up so fast, I thought my phone might actually catch fire.

On Twitter, it was trending before midnight—#HusbandWanted and #MarcusAndRachel lit up the feed. Memes of my face, wild reaction gifs, think pieces from podcast hosts, even a TikTok filter and a Reddit thread speculating who’d snag the gig. I scrolled past a meme of my face photoshopped onto The Bachelorette, nearly spit out my LaCroix.

Suddenly, an Oscar-winning actor was fake-campaigning for the job—cracking jokes about fighting for social security and arm-wrestling Abercrombie models. A-list screenwriters and directors posted bruised selfies with captions like, "Hustling for pocket money!"

It was beautiful chaos. The kind of viral spiral that made LA publicists call their clients at 2 a.m. just to say, "Don’t comment, whatever you do."