The Actor and the Housewife

by Shannon Hale

  “Last time I saw her, she was wearing a sort of . . .” Felix mimed something like a bib over his chest. “Something silver, with buckles . . .”

  “Like a . . . space suit?”

  Felix’s gaze returned to the contract. “My curiosity is piqued. Let me just . . .”

  He reached across the table and slid the contract from under Becky’s purse, upsetting the purse in the process. ChapStick, wallet, keys, and receipts spilled onto the bench.

  “Hey,” Becky said, trying to catch the detritus before it hit the floor.

  “Apologies.” Felix didn’t look up from the papers.

  She managed to stuff everything back in her purse except a travel-sized lotion, which had fallen under the table. Her belly wouldn’t allow her to bend over enough to reach it, but she managed to kick it out from under the table. She had to sit on the very edge of the bench with her legs apart in order to scoop it up by hand. Her face was flushed and she glared at Felix, who hadn’t budged. He was on the third page of the contract now, a pen in hand.

  Her (surprisingly delicious) food came and kept her pretty well occupied, and Felix finished making margin notes by the time dessert arrived.

  He heaved a big breath. “She’s a clever girl, I’ll give her that. No one like Annette. So. It’s not reasonable to expect profit participation on your first deal, but from a producer like Bub and Hubbub, you should get a guaranteed payout for the script option and then a percentage of the bud get if the project gets a green light. Also there needs to be a time limit—if the movie isn’t in production in eighteen months, say, then they need to renew the option or else return the rights to you. And this clause here basically states that anything you write for the rest of your life belongs to them. That has to go.”

  “I don’t want to be pushy, scare them away or anything.”

  “This is entirely reasonable.” He paused, drumming his fingers on the script, looking at her with a considering squint. “I’ll take it over to Annette myself tomorrow morning. Is she going to argue with me?”

  “She’d be crazy to try. You might call her fat.”

  “To Annette? I wouldn’t dare without wearing protective eye gear.”

  “Thanks for offering. That’s very sweet of you . . . I think. I’m not sure why you’re being sort of sweet all of a sudden—”

  “Neither am I,” he said, glaring at the script.

  “But you don’t need to take it over. I can—”

  “I’m going there again tomorrow anyhow. Look, don’t argue with me, all right? Just be gracious and say ‘thank you.’ ”

  “Again with the ‘gracious’!”

  “It appears to be the only thing that works with you. Just—I’m not used to running little errands for people and I’m feeling fairly irritated about it.”

  “Then why are you offering now?”

  “I don’t know! Drop it, please?”

  “Okay. Fine. I’ll never bring it up again.”

  “Good.”

  Their gorgeous redheaded server chose that moment to come by and ask if they needed anything else.

  “A muzzle,” Felix grumbled, just as Becky said, “A fly swatter.”

  “Um, sorry?” the server asked, her expression adorably quizzical.

  Becky sighed. “There was this enormous fly over here a minute ago—”

  “It was trying to lick her ice cream,” Felix said.

  “I thought we should swat it, but he is so humane.”

  Felix held up a finger. “ ‘Just muzzle it,’ said I. ‘Just muzzle the wee creature so it cannot consume your confection.’ ”

  “He always goes Scottish when he’s trying to protect his pesty pals. He’s very tender-hearted actually. Don’t believe those tabloids about punching reporters and sucking the marrow from the bones of the elderly. Mostly rumors.”

  “But for that one time . . .”

  “There was no evidence, so it doesn’t count,” she said through clenched teeth.

  “Ooo, right. At any rate, the winged creature seems to have fl own away.”

  “So we’re good.” Becky smiled pleasantly at the redhead. “Thanks for checking.”

  The redhead tried her best to smile cheerfully but mostly she looked confused, and she stumbled on a stair as she walked away.

  Becky took a deep spoonful of ice cream to keep her mouth occupied, because she wanted to grin right at him, a big old embarrassingly pleased grin.

  He’s not Augie, she reminded herself—he’s Felix Callahan. And you’re wearing a purple canvas tent for a shirt.

  But she did glance at him and saw that Felix was smiling in his slow, sweet way, a smile full of fondness and ideas, and she felt it hit her in the gut. He was most definitely Felix Callahan.

  “Would you like to dance?” he asked.

  “What, are you serious? I can barely plod.”

  He looked at the dance floor, where a tourist couple who seemed pretty well toasted were spinning and swaying to the DJ’s music. “In this crowd, plodding would be an improvement.”

  “Wait a minute . . . You just want to dance with me because you think it would be funny.”

  He raised one eyebrow. “Wouldn’t it?”

  She tossed down her cloth napkin like a gauntlet. “I’ll have you know that I’m a fairly decent dancer.”

  He held out his elbow, she took it, and they walked out as “A Kiss to Build a Dream On” began. He held her left hand and put his other hand on her theoretical waist, deftly leading her into a gentle two-step. After a time, he would switch up the steps, lead her backward, swing her out, and she was proud that she could keep up, belly and all.

  “When I was a teen and going to church dances,” she said, “the adult advisers told us to keep a Bible’s distance between our bodies during the slow songs. This pregnant belly does the same thing.”

  “It is rather rudely bumping into me.”

  “Can’t be helped. Oof, he just kicked again. This kid knows right where to boot me. You’d think this swaying would rock him to sleep.”

  He spun her out and brought her back so that they danced side by side.

  “You’re right,” he said. “You can dance.”

  “Aren’t you at all worried that some smart-aleck paparazzi might take our picture for a tabloid? Imagine the headline: ‘Who Is Felix Callahan’s Secret Pregnant Girlfriend? And Does His Wife Know?’ ”

  He stopped dancing. “Excellent point. Shall we sit?”

  “Not yet. I love this song.”

  He scanned the room looking for cameras, dancing her toward their table.

  “You are paranoid,” she said.

  “With reason.”

  “Seriously, who’d believe that the man married to French model Celeste Bodine would frolic with pregnant me?”

  “Who’d believe that the man in a relationship with Elizabeth Hur-ley would pay for professional attention?”

  “Oh, all right. The song’s almost over anyway.”

  They returned to the table and Felix tried to claim her bill. She refused and gathered her purse and things, keeping possession of the contract as they walked to the elevators.

  “Listen, I don’t want to bother you anymore,” she said. “I can just write Annette a note with the ideas you suggested and—”

  “And next thing you know she’ll be standing in your labor and delivery room with a catcher’s mitt. No, strangely, I insist.” He frowned. “I never insist. What’s come over me?”

  “I have magical powers of persuasion.”

  “God’s chosen people and all. By the way, you know that there actually isn’t a god, right?”

  “You don’t say? You mean I’ve been fooling myself all these years?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “Golly, thanks for setting me straight.”

  “Think nothing of it.”

  At the elevator door, he held out his arm, gesturing for ladies first. He really was a sweet boy when he didn’t open his mouth.

  He
asked her floor, pushed the button, and they rose up in silence, watching the numbers.

  “You’re thinking something absurd, aren’t you?” he asked.

  “Just that you’re a sweet boy when you don’t open your mouth.”

  “Boy? I think I have a few years on you.”

  “I’m thirty-four, but I already feel like everybody’s mother.”

  His eyes were still on the numbers—ten, eleven, twelve . . .

  “Would you like to come up to my room for a bit?” he asked.

  She stared. Up to his room. To Felix Callahan’s room. Whoever this guy had been during dinner, this person who felt like an old friend, he was still Felix Callahan. And she was in her third trimester and wearing maternity pants she’d purchased in 1987. “Come up to your room? You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  “I didn’t mean for . . . I only meant that . . . just to keep—never mind. I don’t know why I wanted to prolong the evening.”

  That was nice, actually. He wanted to prolong the evening! He wanted to keep chatting . . . or something. But though she had gotten into his car, though she had shared dinner and a dance, they’d never been alone. Now the lines became more clear. Becky Jack wouldn’t go into a man’s hotel room alone, no matter if he was a dear friend, the prophet Moses, or Felix Callahan.

  When the elevator doors opened, she shook his hand. “Thanks for the contract advice. And the company. And the dance.”

  “You’re welcome. Good-bye, Becky Jack.”

  He smiled politely as the doors shut. She had no doubt that she’d never see him again.

  In which Becky tells all and Edgar Poe falls asleep

  Mike picked up Becky at the airport, coming inside to help her with her bag.

  “It’s just a carry-on,” she scolded him when he met her at the gate. “It’s not going to send me into preterm labor.” But of course she was thrilled and let him buy her an expensive airport frozen yogurt, holding his hand as if they were on a date. Really, any moment together without the three kids was a date, and lately those were as rare as warmed beef.

  So she didn’t tell him about Felix right away. The thought of it was on her tongue, around her shoulders, rubbing against her neck. But her husband—the former varsity high school tight end, big as life—was holding her hand and wearing a smile fit to dazzle. His presence was even more delicious than the nonfat strawberry-cheesecake twist. It would seem like such a slap to bring up the happenstance meeting of her number-one heartthrob right away. Later, then.

  She did describe Annette’s attire with relish, as well as her bus ride to the airport that morning and her in-depth conversation with the driver on the subject of “Which are cuter—animal babies or human babies?” Mike laughed at all the right places and kept bending down to kiss her cheek.

  “You’re in a good mood,” she said.

  “I missed you.”

  “You missed me taking care of the kids and the house.”

  “That too.” He kissed her again.

  She was going to have to remember to go away more often.

  It took half an hour to drive home. They headed east, the Wasatch Mountains growing larger, rust red smudges of autumn gathered on their lower slopes, the craggy peaks of the highest already white with snow. She glimpsed the building cluster of downtown Salt Lake City before they veered north, leaving behind sight of the palatial peaks for the older, rounded hills of Davis County. The road lifted, and to the west she could see the mysterious purple outline of Antelope Island and a glint of the Great Salt Lake. Becky sighed, meaning that even though she’d only been gone one night, the landscape already felt new and it was nice coming home. Mike smiled, meaning that he understood and was glad to have her back. Early in their marriage, Mike and Becky had driven from Boston to Utah, and Becky had learned she could spend hours in silence with her husband and never get bored.

  When they came in the garage door, Becky could hear nine-year-old Fiona’s voice from the family room. She put a hand on Mike’s arm to stop him, wanting to listen in.

  “I’m a princess who can turn into a dragon, and you’re my maid.”

  “I wanna be a princess too,” said Polly, who at age six had just learned to pronounce her r’s, though they were soft.

  “No, Polly.”

  “Fiona will give in,” Becky whispered. She had a theory that no one could deny Polly anything—she was unaccountably sweet in every way.

  Mike shook his head. “She’s getting stubborn.”

  “Please, Fiona!”

  “Okay, but you can’t turn into a dragon. Hyrum is the evil ogre. Here he comes—run! Run!”

  Two voices squealed as footsteps pounded down the hall, resembling the stomps of ogres more than princesses. Behind them four-year-old Hyrum growled in his high-toned little-boy voice, more princess than ogre.

  Fiona shouted, “And now behold my transformation into the dragon Princess Firemouth!”

  “And I’m Princess Hot Mouth!”

  “No, I told you already, you can be a princess but you can’t turn into a dragon.”

  “Rwaaarrrr!” said Hyrum.

  “But—”

  “No, Polly. I said no three times. You need to listen to me when I’m talking to you.”

  Becky nodded at Mike. Apparently Fiona was mother when Becky wasn’t around.

  “You can’t be a dragon ’cause I’m already a dragon.”

  “Pwease—please, Fiona?”

  Fiona sighed. “You can turn into something else—like a hamster.”

  “A fire-breathing hamster?” Polly sounded intrigued.

  “Sure, okay.”

  “Rwaaarrrr!” said Hyrum. “You are dead. Rwaaarrr!”

  “I like home,” Becky whispered to Mike.

  “Home likes you,” he said. “Also, the cat knocked an open ketchup bottle over on the rug.”

  “And what was an open ketchup bottle doing on the rug?”

  “Um . . . let me go put your bag in our room.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Polly came around the corner, abandoning the game to fall into Becky’s arms. She was petite and darling, freckles high on her face and hair blonde, like her father’s. Fiona and Hyrum both took after their mother’s side: brown hair, angry cowlicks in front and back, sturdy and unremarkable features. With those two, Becky did most of the hugging. She drove thirteen-year-old niece and babysitter Kayla to her home and then whipped up an improvised dinner (apparently in the thirty-two hours Becky had been gone, her family had nearly expired from starvation).

  Right around the cleaning up of the dishes, it occurred to her that waiting too long to tell your husband about a heartthrob encounter can make it seem even more important than it was. It took the usual hour and a half to coerce her children into clean teeth, PJs, and beds, but it felt like at least an hour and three quarters.

  Alone in their bedroom, Becky began to unpack and said casually, “You’ll never guess who I met in L.A.”

  “Carol Burnett.” Mike was sitting on their bed, reading the hunting magazine Big Buck—lead article: “Five Deer Scents You Can’t Live Without!”

  “Carol Burnett? What made you guess her?”

  He shrugged. “She seems like a fun person to meet. Now you’re going to tell me who it really was, and I won’t know the name and I’ll have killed your story. But try me anyway.”

  She tossed the purple tent/shirt into the hamper. She did feel a touch disheartened because, in fact, Carol Burnett would have been awesome. Still, the actual person was no one to sneeze at, so she straightened up proudly when she was able to report, “Felix Callahan.”

  “Who?”

  And, she slouched. “Come on, Mike! He’s an actor and completely famous. He was in that weird drama you liked, the one with the baseball and the live bats.”

  “Furry. Which one was he?”

  “The British one. The good-looking one.”

  Mike stared blankly.

  She sighed and mumbled, “The one who eats the
gopher.”

  “Oh, okay. He’s in that what-cha-call-it movie you and Jessie watch every year when Mark and I are on the elk hunt.”

  “Yeah . . .” She was embarrassed he knew that.

  “So you met him, huh?”

  “Get this: I didn’t just meet him. We had dinner together. Steak. At least, I had the steak. It was good. And some ice cream. Ooh, do we have any ice cream left in the freezer or did you guys eat it all while I was gone?”

  Mike had lowered the magazine. “Wait, wait . . . you had dinner? As in, on a date?”

  “What? Oh, no, not a date. A . . . a . . . I don’t know, just dinner.”

  “Just dinner.”

  “Yeah, in the hotel. We were in the same hotel. And then we did dance, but just because it was funny.”

  He stared at her. “You had dinner, just the two of you? And you danced? It’s been a while since I was on the scene, but as far as I know, that would be considered a date.”

  “Can you blame me for not . . . I mean, sheesh, look at me.” She stuck out her belly. “I’m nearly my own continent. And he’s a famous actor. It was hardly a recipe for seduction.”

  Mike smiled into the corner of his mouth. “You charmed him, didn’t you?”

  She clicked her tongue. “You are the only person in the world who would assume I could charm some actor, and in my third trimester, no less. It’s very sweet of you, but, no.”

  “You did. You charmed him. You know you can be very charming when you set your mind to it.”

  She threw a pillow at his head. He snatched it out of midair like a ninja catching a thrown knife. He could be quite agile. When he set his mind to it.

  “I’ll bet he’s never met anyone like you. He’s probably twitterpated and doesn’t know what to make of it.”

  Becky snorted. “Not likely.”

  “That’s my wife, so pregnant she’s about to pop and still getting men to buy her steak dinners.”

  “Oh please, as if I’m some femme fatale. Besides, I paid for my own dinner.”

  “But he offered, didn’t he?”

  She didn’t answer. He smiled at her, and the sweetness of this man and his smile made her feel all warm and gooey, as if her heart were hot brownies. Until the smile turned sneaky.