3. Daphne

Chapter 3

Daphne

“Where have you been?” Juniper answers on the first ring as I stare out the taxi window.

“Hellooooo,” I sing. It’s almost 5:00 a.m. My sister usually rolls in around this time. “I’m on my way home. Are you there already?”

“No, got tapped to work a double today,” she says. I glance at the cab driver, who’s focused on the road. “So, where are you?”

“I had a one-night stand!” I whisper into the phone.

“I figured from your sleeping elsewhere, am safe, cucumber emoji text message.”

“Damn, I was sure I sent the eggplant!”

She giggles. “Spill. Did the geriatric pianist finally put the moves on you?”

My sister and I have been going to the St. Claridge Hotel piano bar since she started working the graveyard shift at UCSF Medical Center. It’s our weekly tradition to get two shakes before she goes to work. I usually stay for an hour or two after she leaves, but no one has ever talked to me, except the occasional person asking me what I’m knitting.

“Thomas is a very polite gentleman, and he would never act indecently toward a lady,” I tease.

“Oh, come on,” she groans. “Give me more.”

“You won’t believe it, but I had two orgasms. One against a window! I thought I was going to have to call you to instruct my one-night stand on resuscitation.” I clasp my hand over my mouth before relaxing. This cab driver has probably seen and heard worse.

Once I got out of the shower and was waiting for my ride, Goose was gone. My curious fingers snooped around the hotel room and found it scrubbed of any clues as to my mystery man’s identity. Apart from his smell in my hair, it was as if he were a ghost.

“What was his name?”

“I have no idea, the whole thing felt so adventurous—”

“What do you mean?” she gasps, and I sigh, ready for her protector speech. “What if he was a murderer? A criminal? A white-collar crime is still a crime!”

Oh no. It would be just my luck to hook up with a crooked politician or oil billionaire’s son.

“Okay, big sis, I need my friend right now. Not my bodyguard.”

She’s quiet, which means she’s either screaming internally or she’s fallen asleep. Neither would surprise me. “Fine.” I practically hear her teeth clenching. “But did you use protection? Did you pee after?”

“Yes and no. Should I have? Am I going to die? I honestly don’t think I could feel my vagina after what his thing did to me.”

“No, you won’t die, but we wouldn’t want the high from your Yes Year to come crashing down because of a UTI. We’d hate for your groin to be screaming for help all the way from the UK.”

That’s right, the last thing my move to London in a month needs is a UTI. I’ve been planning this adventure for months, and now it’s just a matter of hopping on a plane. I’ve packed all my knitting and filming gear, mapped out a new schedule for my YouTube videos, and luckily I’ve been to London before—no tourist traps for me. Dual citizenship for the win! With my YouTube streaming revenue and pattern income saved up, I’m feeling pretty prepared. Especially since my apartment is rent-free.

My mom, Prim, bought the apartment back when she was a young artist in London. She was born there, and it was originally artist housing, but now most of the units have been gobbled up by some private company. No biggie, though! We kept it because Prim, being the stubborn woman she is, refused to sell and let go of all those memories. The other tenants are supposed to be really nice, though we have no idea who they are.

“Noted for next time, Dr. Quinn.”

“So you really didn’t get his name?”

“He called himself Goose all night, but it doesn’t matter. I’ll never see him again. He had a flight this morning, and I have no idea as to where.”

His question rings in my ears. Do you really not know who I am? I thought it was all part of his persona, but maybe our evening of secrets gave him a privacy he hadn’t had before.

“Who does he think you are?” Juni startles me out of my daydream.

“Duck.”

“Goose and Duck?”

I shrug. “That’s the only name I could think of.”

“You know nothing about this stranger, and yet you gave up our family’s nickname for you?”

“I didn’t think it through, okay? I wanted to try and not let the little voices of doubt make me believe all the lies about how a girl like me would never have an adventure like I did,” I admit, feeling small. “I’m trying something new, Juni. I want to figure it out myself.”

“You’re right. The only thing that matters is that you were safe and that you had fun.”

When I was a kid, Juni appointed herself as my first line of defense. Middle and high school weren’t easy for me, both socially and emotionally. Fitting in when you’re born to stand out isn’t a concept kids grasp while navigating puberty and pool party invitations.

My sister and our moms became vigilant protectors, driving me to therapy twice a week and ensuring I made the best of my teenage years. I’m forever in their debt for that. Now, as a functioning adult—who, yes, still lives with her sister and lacks dental insurance or a 401k—I hoped Juni would ease up on her big sister duties, but she never has.

It’s another reason this Yes Year is the most important thing in my life. I need to prove to myself and to my family that I’m not afraid of the big world out there and that I want to carve out a bigger place for myself in it.

“If my one-night stand is any indication of how my Yes Year will go, then I’m looking forward to it.”

“However potentially illegal that hookup was, I’m happy for you.”

My phone buzzes with a notification.

10:00 a.m. Video Interview - Stone Times x Influencer Daphne Quinn (@wooly.duck)

“Crap! Juni, how could I forget? My interview is today.” That leaves me only a few hours to catch a nap and prep for what might be one of the most exciting moments of my knitting influencer career.

“With the Stone Times ?”

“I’m freaking out!”

“Don’t. If you survived the impaling, this will be a piece of cake. Just be yourself, and they’ll love you.”

Just be yourself, and they’ll love you. I repeat the words on a loop before exiting the taxi and rushing up the stairs to our apartment.

I can do this. I can do anything.

Liv Parker: Hi, Daphne, or as some of our readers may know you, Wooly Duck. I am so excited to speak with you today about your charitable work for the UCSF Medical Center.

Daphne Quinn: Thank you for having me. I have to be honest, this is my first interview with a real newspaper, so I’m a little nervous.

Liv Parker: Let’s start with the basics. Tell me about yourself. Where does influencer Daphne Quinn come from?

Daphne Quinn: I grew up in Santa Cruz, in a cozy beach bungalow with my sister, Juniper, and my moms, Prim and Dani. Prim is a wedding portrait painter from London, and Dani is an accountant from San Francisco, making our household a mix of artistry and practicality. Some of my fondest childhood memories are of digging up outrageous eighties and nineties pieces from my parents’ closets. I was the odd kid covered in glitter, trying to make bedazzled Uggs happen. Spoiler: they didn’t, even when I tried again in college at the Academy of Arts in San Francisco.

Liv Parker: Clearly, a lot of that influence has carried over into your knitting. But I’d love to know when the hobby began.

Daphne Quinn: I started knitting in middle school. Being a tween or a teenager wasn’t easy for me. I was relentlessly bullied, and the way I coped with that led to my generalized anxiety disorder diagnosis. I tried various coping mechanisms, like painting, swimming, and juggling, but nothing clicked until I saw an older gentleman knitting on a bench at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk. That same day, I asked my mom to take me to the yarn store. The rest is history. I still visit that bench whenever I’m in town; the sunsets are gorgeous.

Liv Parker: You speak about your mental health so openly, I can see how you’ve managed to gain over a hundred thousand followers and build such a tightly woven community online.

Daphne Quinn: Thank you. Knitting gives me a sense of control. In knitting, you can make all the mistakes you want, and you get to undo them. Where else can you do that in real life? Plus, I get to focus all of my energy on creating something beautiful that has a purpose. When I’m knitting, it’s one of the few times my mind is free of any worries or concerns. Just me and my needles.

Liv Parker: So, how did you start your page, Wooly Duck? What made you want to take a comforting hobby and turn it into a career?

Daphne Quinn: I started Wooly Duck in college, when one of my professors asked for the pattern of a midi dress I made out of upcycled yarn. She insisted that others would want to re-create my dress, and it all took off from there.

Liv Parker: When did your charitable projects begin?

Daphne Quinn: My sister works at UCSF, and the hospital was looking for donations for the cancer center, to comfort patients and their families. Instantly, I knew that I had to get to work. The beanie pattern I used is beginner-friendly and available for free on my Instagram page. The pattern made it simple for me to get the project done rather quickly.

Liv Parker: You’re telling me you knitted one thousand beanies all by yourself?

Daphne Quinn: Yes! Most of them I made during knitathons with my community online.

Liv Parker: Have you always used your knitting needles for good?

Daphne Quinn: No, but moving forward, I want to. The project was meaningful, and getting to make that kind of impact is something I want to pursue in the future. One day, I’d love to run a knitting retreat where people who have dealt with mental health struggles like me can find community through knitting.

Liv Parker: Sounds like you’ve got it all planned out.

Daphne Quinn: Totally.

Liv Parker: So, what’s next for Daphne Quinn?

Daphne Quinn: At the moment, I’m doing this thing called a Yes Year, which started on my twenty-sixth birthday two days ago, June twenty-ninth. My first order of business is moving to London at the beginning of August.

Liv Parker: Yes Year? Say more.

Daphne Quinn: My work, as fulfilling as it is, requires that I spend a lot of time at home, or deeply homed in on what my fingers are doing. I want to break out of my comfort zone and say yes to anything that’ll set me up for adventure. My family has an apartment in London, so it’s not completely new, but it’s exciting.

Liv Parker: I think a lot of us could use a Yes Year. Do you have any inspiration for our readers?

Daphne Quinn: After the night of yeses I had yesterday, my biggest advice would be to just go for it when an opportunity presents itself.

Liv Parker: Well, now I’m intrigued. But that’s all the time we have for today. Thank you for speaking with me.