by Julie Wright
I hated that Ben wasn’t with me, wasn’t seeing what we’d made together living a life beyond us. I imagined he was just sitting on my blind side. I imagined he observed it all and approved it all.
Maybe it was the long hours and stressful work. Maybe it was the fact that my standing up to Dean Thomas meant he would have me in his crosshairs for the rest of his life. Or maybe it was because something beautiful filled the screen in a lovely ballet of movement and sound that touched my soul to the core.
Whatever it was, I cried. And when I wiped at the tears on my blind eye, I found it was weeping blood again.
Somehow it felt appropriate.
When the lights went up, no one spoke. The initial, reverential silence paid homage to something wonderful. Then came the applause. They praised Dean, taking turns clapping his back and laughing with the joy of those who knew they had something magical on their hands. I allowed them to praise Dean. It was only natural, since they believed he’d done the bulk of work, but I made sure to interject myself to guarantee that the same praise found its way to my head as well.
I would not be passed over.
“She’s a real find, isn’t she?” Danny said, smiling at me.
“She’s certainly something.” Dean also smiled, but his red-rimmed eyes were never touched by that smile. I thought of the shooters and stabbers that he drew in his notebooks and decided to walk back to the editing studios.
While praise shifted to the musical director and sound editors, I remembered I still didn’t have a ride at the end of the day. I wouldn’t be able to walk home as easily as I would be able to walk back to the editing studios.
I’d totally lied to Ben about already having plans for dinner with Emma tonight, which meant I’d have to call her at some point anyway. Yes, I felt guilty for lying. But it was for his own good.
I called Emma.
She answered on the second ring. I loved that about her. Even though she was neck-deep in dealing with her job as an executive marketing officer and also planning her own wedding, she always took my calls.
“How busy are you?” I asked.
“Right now?” She paused. “I’d need an hour to get unbusy. What’s up?”
“Could you come get me from work later?”
“Of course. What’s going on? Why do you sound like you’ve been crying? Do you need me to come now? I’ll cancel meetings. I can come now.”
“No,” I assured her. “Don’t cancel meetings. I was up all night finishing a film. Which . . . leads me to my good news.” I walked farther away from where Dean, Christopher, and Danny were talking. Just thinking about my good news flooded me with new energy.
I could almost see Emma honing all her attention to the phone at her ear. “Well? Spill it! You can’t just announce good news and not share it!”
“The director and the producer loved it!” I squealed into the phone, trying to keep a cap on the noise so it didn’t carry through to everyone eating from the craft services trays or congratulating themselves on a well-made product. “They loved it, Em. And I mean loved it as in they couldn’t stop gushing. They hugged me and thanked me for shining it up so much. And Bronson’s team worked miracles with the sound and musical score. The film is almost perfect!”
She squealed, too. That was the great thing about having a best friend: my feelings always had a mirror in her. “That’s amazing! And they hugged you? Does that mean Mr. Thomas actually acknowledged you did all the editing work?”
She said Mr. Thomas with a definite tone of mockery, making me glad she wasn’t on speakerphone. He was unhappy enough with me. He certainly didn’t need to hear my friends making fun of him on the phone.
I searched for the right words. “Well . . . he didn’t acknowledge I was even there at first, but—” I lowered my voice and glanced at the small crowd surrounding him. “We had a discussion, and I’ll probably be fired as soon as he can figure out how to do it without making a scene, but for now, he knows better than to try to take credit entirely away from me. For now, he’s sharing it.”
“Sharing? Even though he did absolutely nothing?” She sounded like she was already plotting ways to hide his body.
“I know. It’s not ideal, but it’s better than it would’ve been if I hadn’t stood my ground.”
She sighed. “That was something you were always better at doing than I’ve ever been. Anyway, congratulations. I am so glad to hear they’re recognizing your talent. You’re amazing! I’ll be over as soon as this meeting is done. We’ll go to dinner to celebrate.”
“Only if I buy.”
I smiled to myself as we hung up. See, Ben, I thought, I didn’t totally lie to you. I was going to dinner with Emma. My earlier statement to him was just predicting the future. I sighed. Justifications were not going to make an honest woman of me. I hated that Ben hadn’t gotten to see the reactions of a respected producer and an award-winning director. He deserved to see how they felt about the work we had done together. He deserved to know that his talents were good enough for bigger studios, bigger movies.
I would tell him. Of course I would tell him. But how would it have been to have had him in the theater at my side watching those reactions together?
Dean didn’t linger too much longer. Once the applause and praise had died and Danny and Christopher had left for another meeting, Dean said, “Time to get back to work.” I got back in the golf cart in spite of my earlier decision to walk. Maybe now that he’d seen the film, he would feel better about me.
I expected something from him. A “good work” or “nice going,” but the vacuum of space would have proven to be noisier than the brief ride with Dean Thomas. We parked and went our separate ways to our offices without so much as a glance.
Oh well.
I was asleep at my desk when Nathaniel buzzed me to let me know Emma waited at the guardhouse. Nathaniel knew that Emma was on the list of approved guests, but he lived a by-the-books kind of life, so he checked every single time. The taste of sleep in my mouth and the ache in my eye socket let me know I’d managed to get in a pretty decent nap. I gave Nathaniel permission to let Emma onto Portal Pictures property.
Taking a bleach wipe out of the plastic container to clean off my desk, I realized I had yet to throw away the pillow where Adam had taken his turn at napping. The studio was becoming a regular bed-and-breakfast—only without the comfortable beds or the awesome breakfast part. I stood, straightened up my rumpled clothing as much as possible, checked the time, and realized it was fairly late in the afternoon. I wondered if anyone had ever cleaned the kitchen.
A bright white tugged at the periphery of my vision. I turned my head and saw a vase of flowers sitting on the bookcase across from my desk. That hadn’t been there before. Confused, I crossed the room and plucked the card from the plastic holder jutting out from the bouquet of white tulips. I slid my finger along the seal of the envelope and opened it up to read.
Dear Silvia,
Thank you for making my film into something magical. I know I owe the credit all to you. It’s too fresh and innovative to belong to Dean. The white tulip was Audrey Hepburn’s favorite flower. Since you look like you could be her sister, I thought you might also like them. I’ve always considered myself her biggest fan. I am happy to say I am now your biggest fan as well. I hope we’ll work together again soon.
With much gratitude,
Danny
“You look terrible,” Emma said as she leaned against the door frame and surveyed me standing by the bookcase with the card still in hand.
I smiled weakly. “Thanks. I’m sure you meant that to be a compliment, right?”
“No, really, you look terrible,” she said. “When was the last time you slept?”
“About two minutes ago.” I pointed at my desk.
Her eyes went to the desk and then snapped back to me. “You’re doing the cycl
ops squint.” Emma took a few steps closer. “Seriously, desk sleep does not count. When was the last time you got real sleep?”
I dropped the smile. It wasn’t working anyway. I tugged on my right eyelid to make it stay open. “Honestly, who knows? I’ve had so much to do with so little time to get it done. . . . But, see how it all worked out?” I waved the card at her. “They like my work. I’ve succeeded.”
Emma took the card, her smile growing as her eyes scanned the cream-colored paper. She pulled me into a tight hug when she’d finished reading. “I am so proud of you! And how funny that he called you Audrey Hepburn. Did you tell him your eye’s name is Audrey?”
“That’s definitely not information for public consumption.”
“Fair enough. Well, sister-of-Audrey, let’s get you fed and in bed. Got your stuff?”
Going to dinner with Emma was always relaxing. She was the sort of friend who didn’t require a lot of maintenance. Well, she usually didn’t require a lot of maintenance. Emma, like everyone, required some attention every once in a while. We spent dinner talking about how her company was expanding into new locations and how her wedding plans were going.
For my half of the conversation, we talked about all of the editing I had to do, how Dean Thomas was the most worthless boss on the entire planet, and how I appreciated that everything still managed to work out okay with the film. I didn’t mention anything about Ben’s help with why everything turned out okay. He and I had pinky promised after all, and pinky promises were unbreakable. I didn’t love not telling her, though. Keeping secrets from Emma tore at my soul. We’d told each other everything since the time we were both five years old and she showed up in my bedroom like some specter out of a ghost movie with her pale face and her nearly white hair gleaming in the moonlight.
Emma just happened to show up on the same day I’d been released from the hospital after my eye surgery. After the initial scare of her ghostly presence passed, she climbed into bed next to me, and we’d been best friends ever since.
Losing my eye had been a major ordeal. The entire world shifted for me after that. It was like everything had been divided in half. I had to remember to turn my head to see the half that was missing. Looking both ways to cross the street required more work, more attention. I’d had a couple of close calls when Emma had needed to snatch me back just before my foot left the curb.
My mom used to tell my dad that she believed Emma saved my life the night she showed up, and even beyond the times Emma kept me from walking into traffic, Mom was totally right. But Emma and I knew that we’d saved each other. Emma had lost something, too, the night she showed up at my bedside. Her mother had walked out on the family. Both of us losing something that the other could not imagine made it impossible for us to feel sorry for ourselves, because we were too busy consoling the other.
“I’m proud of you for standing up for yourself. Finally.” Emma mopped up the remains of her balsamic dressing with a remnant of bread and popped it into her mouth. “What?” she said when she caught me giving her the stink eye.
“You say that like I never stand up for myself.”
She shrugged sheepishly. “While it is true that you have the backbone in our friendship, not me, it is also true that you don’t use that backbone very often when that guy you work for is around.”
I conceded the point. “It’s just the nature of the business. Half the guys in Hollywood are still unaware that suffrage has happened.”
She laughed while at the same time calling me out for the crazy exaggeration. “That is not true!”
“It’s not true,” I agreed. “It just feels true when I’m dealing with Dean.”
“The Dean of Misery. We should get him a T-shirt with that on it.” Emma effortlessly rolled into a different topic. “Lucas is out of town next weekend. Want to watch Mansfield Park at my place?”
I agreed to her plan. I loved Jane Austen—not like Emma loved it—but what wasn’t to love? Jane had helped Emma and me ride the turbulent waves of romance. And when Emma called me an “obstinate, headstrong girl,” she managed to make me feel capable and strong.
The waitress left the bill on the table closest to Emma. I took the black folder and popped my credit card in it. “Even the waitress thinks I look like a homeless person who can’t afford dinner.”
Emma tapped her fingers on her glass stem, obviously working to keep herself from snatching up the black folder and switching out the cards. She behaved herself and let me pay for dinner, as was our deal, but I could tell it bothered her. As CMO of one of the nation’s hottest fitness chains, Emma made more money than I did. A lot more. This meant she worried about me financially. But my own independence mattered, and I was grateful she gave me the chance to stretch out in the luxury of my own autonomy.
“My mom called the other day,” I said. “She told me to thank you for the day spa gift card.”
“Oh good! I’m glad she got it.”
“She wanted to see if we were going to visit her soon, so we could use it all together.” I grinned at that. Mom loved when Emma and I shared major mother-daughter activities with her. “I know,” I said with a sigh when Emma grimaced. “I don’t have time right now, either.”
Finding time to do road trips of that variety was harder and harder. Even weekend trips by plane were nearly impossible. Mom couldn’t come to us because she was taking care of her parents in Washington, and their health had declined to the point that leaving them was not an option. My parents had moved a long time ago, promising they’d come back someday, but as the years dragged on, I began to think they were never coming home.
The only reason Mom hadn’t come to drag me up there with them was that my grandma on my dad’s side still lived locally, and I spent a lot of time with her. Forget the fact that I was a grown woman with my own apartment. They would have packed me up already if it hadn’t been for Grandma Bradshaw.
The waitress returned with my credit card slip, which I signed before releasing a deep yawn.
Emma saw and frowned. “Where am I taking you, again?” she asked as we gathered the to-go boxes from the table.
“Do you remember my boss from Mid-Scene Films?”
“Ben? The blue-eyed and thick-haired hottie?”
I felt the flush in my face and hurried to turn away so she couldn’t see the red-cheeked evidence. “He does have blue eyes, and his hair is thick, I guess. And who are you, and what have you done with my best friend? You never use the word ‘hottie.’”
She ignored my reluctance to admit he had handsome features. “I’ve finally embraced my ability to appreciate the appearance of a beautiful man. Besides, my niece, April, uses it all the time. Her language has been rubbing off on me. But that is beside the point. Why is your car at the hottie’s house?”
I groaned. “Don’t call him that.”
She poked me in the back. “Why? I know you’re down an eye, but your left one still works, doesn’t it? You can’t tell me you haven’t noticed. Answer the question: why is your car there?”
So I explained about Dean and how he’d been impossible and how Ben had shown up and helped me get Dean back to the studio.
“And now Hottie Ben has your car. That’s convenient.”
“Don’t call him that. He’s my boss. It makes it weird.”
“He’s not your boss any longer. Which makes it not weird.”
This was the sort of conversation that came from calling my friend for a ride rather than calling for a hired driver. This was the payment required for such favors. “We’re only friends.”
“I’m just saying that sometimes friends make the best boyfriends.” Emma, knowing when to quit pushing, wisely changed the subject. “So, what’s the address? Where am I going?”
When I rattled off the address to Emma, she smiled wide as she entered the information into her car’s GPS.
“W
hat?”
“You just happen to know Hottie Ben’s address by heart?”
Okay, so maybe she didn’t know when to quit pushing. “We used to work together; that’s not so strange.”
“You don’t think so? I work with dozens of people. And I don’t know any of their addresses. Sure, I know the general direction in which they might live, I might even know the city name, but an exact address? Admit it. It’s not a crime to just admit that you like him.”
“I don’t have a problem admitting I like him, but liking a guy doesn’t automatically mean you want to date him.”
“That’s true. I’ve liked many people in my life, and I haven’t wanted to date most of them. But that doesn’t change the fact that Ben is a nice-looking man who is also a nice man, which, let’s be honest, is an incredibly rare combination. You’re the one who’s always telling me that.”
“You being engaged does not mean I need a relationship, too, but thanks for the concern,” I said.
“This has nothing to do with me being engaged. It has everything to do with you bringing him up and you no longer being held hostage by the Mid-Scene Films contract.” She flipped her blinker and made a tight turn.
Rather than comment further on a subject that made me feel awkward for reasons I didn’t understand, I just let her drive. Soon we were parked in front of Ben’s house.
“Is it really weird that I know his address by heart?” I asked as I stared at his house. It always made me think of gingerbread and Christmas. It was an older home in all the best ways and matched the man who lived in it.
“It’s only weird if you don’t do anything about it,” she said.
When I didn’t get out of the car immediately, Emma asked, “Do you want me to go with you to get the keys? Is Hottie Ben a creeper, and you forgot to tell me, and I’m suggesting you get cozy with someone likely to be featured on America’s Most Wanted?”
I laughed. “No. Hottie Ben isn’t a creeper. I’m just enjoying the warmth and vibe you radiate.” The truth was, our conversation regarding Ben had hit repeat in my head. It’s only weird if you don’t do anything about it.