It took Dana a moment to find her voice. “When is this happening?” she managed to say.
“Brace yourself,” Megan said. “It’s tomorrow.”
Tomorrow? Dana’s heart thudded with excitement. And nerves. So much was riding on this.
After getting the details, she ended the call and sat back in her chair, numb. She could hardly believe it was happening. Not many actresses got a chance like this—a steady gig, regular hours, high pay, national exposure. Talk about a big break. It was almost too good to be true.
“You okay?” Chelsea asked her.
Her father’s brow knitted in medical curiosity as he stared at her, as if searching for a diagnosis.
Dana looked at the two of them, considering exactly what to say. She could, of course, tell them nothing. But this opportunity to impress them—okay, him—was as golden as a polished malachite ring under a sparkling spotlight.
“I got the Shopping Channel job,” she said, and swallowed hard, because it wasn’t exactly true—there was still one more hurdle to cross. But if she had qualified the statement, saying, I think I have it or I might have it, the news would have landed with a thud, and her father would dismiss it as wishful thinking. But this. This would impress him.
He picked up a napkin and wiped his mouth. “Where’s that girl with my coffee?”
5
The next day, Dana awoke so nervous she spent the morning going back and forth on whether it was wise to take a few hits off a joint to mellow her out. She knew she shouldn’t. She knew she was perfectly capable of performing sober. In fact, she had spent her whole career performing sober. Or most of it. There was that one time she had a gig on a cruise ship playing Louise from Gypsy and downed three shots of tequila just to impress a gorgeous, swarthy steward who wound up sleeping with the girl who played Mazeppa. But this was different. This was pressure. Real-life pressure. She had about two months’ worth of rent saved up, and once that was gone she was out of luck.
She had the joint in her hand and was staring at her lighter when Megan rang her buzzer. Dana hesitated. It would be so easy to ignite that tiny flame and take one quick toke.
You are not a child, she told herself. This is a grown-up job and you need to make a grown-up decision. Megan buzzed again and Dana pressed the intercom button. “I’ll be right down,” she said, and slipped the joint back into the secret compartment on her key-chain fob, which appeared to be nothing more than a silver charm in the shape of a dachshund. The tiny white Dexedrine pill already rested inside.
It was raining, so they took a cab to the studio—a seven-story brick building on West Fifty-Fifth Street near the Hudson River. After they passed through security—and Dana got another smile from the cantankerous Mr. Beecham—Megan went off to meet with Sherry Zidel, Charles Honeycutt and whoever else was involved in contract negotiations, while Dana was whisked off to the makeup department by a cherub-faced girl named Jessalyn, who then vanished.
Dana tried to slow her breathing as one woman applied her makeup and another rolled over a stool and began inspecting her nails.
“Not too bad,” said the manicurist, leveling her eye on a troublesome cuticle. “We can wawkwiddis.”
It took Dana a second to process that wawkwiddis was work with this. She didn’t think it was possible for someone to have a thicker Queens accent than Cyndi Lauper, but this woman managed it. Dana listened carefully, in case she ever wanted to appropriate it for a role.
She learned that the manicurist’s name was Jo, and the makeup girl was Felicia.
“Would it be okay if I had a French manicure?” Dana said to Jo.
“Sorry,” the manicurist said as she removed Dana’s old polish with a saturated cotton ball. “I’ll give you pale pink. Only Kitty gets French. It’s in her contract.”
“You’ve got to be kidding,” Dana said, and immediately wished she hadn’t. The last thing she needed was a reputation for being hostile toward the star.
“The worst part?” Jo said. “Her nails is so weak, and she won’t let me do gel, won’t let me wrap them. Nothing.”
“And she has her own makeup box,” said Felicia. “With her own special false eyelashes. Extralong. No one else gets them.”
Dana was starved for gossip—and knew these ladies had the goods—but she had to be cagey in case her comments got back to Kitty. “Success has its privileges, I guess.”
“And she grabs ’em like M&M’s,” muttered Jo.
“And wouldn’t share if you was starving,” Felicia added as she dabbed concealer under Dana’s eyes.
Dana burned with curiosity. This was getting interesting. “I don’t know much about her, but she went to bat for me at my audition.”
It was shameless fishing. Felicia and Jo shared a look.
“What?” Dana said.
“Do yourself a favor and be careful ’round her,” Felicia said.
“And ask yourself why Vanessa Valdes got canned,” Jo added.
Canned? As Megan had explained it, Vanessa Valdes was the woman whose Shopping Channel program aired just before Kitty’s. Soon, she would be leaving for a coanchor spot on a local news show in San Antonio, and if all went well with Dana’s short segment today, the job would be hers.
“I thought she found greener pastures,” Dana said. Megan had told her Vanessa had good sales numbers, so she just assumed she was leaving of her own accord.
“Ha!” Felicia said as she brushed a sweep of blush on Dana’s cheek. “She’s leaving because Kitty wants her out.”
Jo nodded. “Her ratings were slipping, and that pissed off Kitty, because her show comes on right after.”
Dana looked from one woman to the other. “Why were her ratings slipping?”
“I think it was scheduling changes on the networks,” Jo said, stretching the word I like Coney Island taffy. “Ellen was put in a competing time slot in a few markets, so you know, that’s pretty tough. But Kitty don’t give a shit.”
Dana had to suppress a smile. In the entertainment industry, everyone was a marketing expert—from the accountants to the caterers.
The door opened and a slender-necked young man in a white smock appeared. He had spiky, powder-colored hair tipped in pink, incongruous against his dark skin. He looked like a more feminine version of Thandie Newton. Before approaching Dana, he studied her, his arms folded thoughtfully. Then he leaned over Jo and lifted one of the short locks on the top of Dana’s head. He had the perfume-y smell of hair products.
“We have to talk about this cut,” he said.
“Something wrong with it?” Dana asked.
He made a face. “It looks a little...schnauzer-y.”
“It does?” Dana couldn’t mask the hurt. She thought her short hair was kind of cool.
“Don’t worry, love. I’m really good.”
“He does Kitty,” Felicia said.
The hairdresser put his hand to his heart as if Felicia had made a shocking sexual suggestion. “In her dreams, girl,” he said.
“Kitty’s not his type,” Felicia explained, as if Dana hadn’t already figured that out.
“But is he her type?” Jo said pointedly. “That’s all that counts.”
The hairdresser laid a hand on Dana’s shoulder. “Kitty tends to get what she wants. I’m Robért by the way. And I have the dubious distinction of being a male employee who hasn’t slept with her highness.”
“I’m Dana,” she said. “And this is getting really juicy.”
“Girl, you haven’t heard the half of it.”
* * *
After hair and makeup, Dana was whisked off to wardrobe, where she was shown the sleeveless Bastina maxidresses that would be sold during her segment.
“They like you should wear one of these,” said Irini, the wardrobe lady, in a heavy Greek accent.
It was offered in four very diff
erent prints, and had lovely lines. Dana studied each of them, though she knew immediately which would look best on her—the navy multi that was vaguely Moroccan. She slipped it on and the microfiber knit did its magic, conforming immediately to her subtle curves. Irini produced an array of shoe choices, but zeroed in on a jeweled sandal that was just right.
“Bastina will be so happy,” Irini said as she took in Dana’s full length. “You look beautiful.”
Dana thanked her, and Irini added, “Be careful for that Kitty Todd. She’s not kind woman.”
“I will,” Dana said, and wondered if there was anyone at the Shopping Channel who wasn’t terrified of Kitty.
When she left wardrobe, Dana saw a familiar face—it was Lorenzo, the sound guy she had met at the audition. He had been sent to bring her to her next stop—an unused set where she would get a crash course on everything a Shopping Channel host needed to know. He asked how it was going.
“So far,” she said, “I feel like I’m getting a master’s degree in Kitty Todd.”
“I’ll save you some time on your thesis,” he said, leading her down a long hallway toward the lobby. “There’s only one thing you need to know about Kitty—she gets what she wants.”
“So I heard,” she said. “But it sounds like you speak from experience—like you may have a Kitty Todd story of your own.”
“Who doesn’t?”
“Tell me,” she said.
He set his jaw, reticent. She could tell he was someone who didn’t share easily.
“You can trust me,” she added.
He exhaled. “Okay. One time her mike went out during a broadcast. Bad cable—happens sometimes. We switched it out in about three seconds, but after the show she acted like I’d been trying to sabotage her. She went on a fifteen-minute rant in front of the whole crew.” His eyes went tense as he remembered.
“That’s kind of...deranged.”
“It helps if you know how to handle her.”
“Which is?”
“Just let her have her tantrum and move on.”
“You sound like a pro.”
“I’ve dealt with people who would eat Kitty Todd for dinner and swallow the bones,” he said, trying to sound casual. But Dana sensed that he wasn’t kidding. This guy had some dark characters in his past.
He brought Dana to an unused studio where she received a tutorial from Jessalyn Grage, who seemed to take great pride in her efficiency as talent coordinator, and Adam Weintraub, a segment producer whom Dana pegged as a new dad. He smelled like baby food and was a little disheveled, with a sticky patch of something on his shoulder that had trapped one of his wife’s long hairs. At least she assumed it was his wife’s, as his hair was dark and curly, and a baby’s would be short.
Jessalyn struck her as single and ambitious, but not in a ruthless kind of way. Just the kind of hardworking young woman who was willing to go the extra mile to prove herself. Dana suspected her ambition was to be promoted to segment producer.
The two of them led Dana through everything she needed to know. She was taught the importance of looking straight into the camera, even when she was describing the merchandise. For every segment there was either a pitch chart, which was really a giant poster listing the key selling points of whatever product was currently on display, or a color chart, complete with swatches and their corresponding names. These were never simple words like red, white and blue, but marketing terms like raspberry cream, summer linen and deep sky. There were also three monitors she had to keep an eye on. One showed what the viewers were seeing and another showed what the next shot would be. But the most critical monitor was the one that let her know exactly how viewers were reacting to her pitch. She could see, in real time, whether she was moving merchandise. This was life and death on the Shopping Channel.
Still, Adam didn’t want her to focus on it. “It’ll make you crazy,” he said. “Just do your job. I’ll be the voice in your earpiece and will let you know if your pitch is working or not.”
Her head crammed with information, Dana was taken to the set where Vanessa Valdes was broadcasting live, selling a line of brightly colored spring tops. Bastina, the designer, was at her side. Vanessa was good—natural, friendly, likable. Dana tried to imagine what she could possibly do better than this woman. Vanessa was enthusiastic about the clothes and found something punchy to say to fill every second of airtime. When the camera went to Bastina, who was about seventy, with hair dyed jet-black and a hint of a Slavic accent, Vanessa let her guard down and at last Dana saw it. She was bored. She had no affection for the designer and no patience for sharing the spotlight. When the camera when back to Vanessa, she lit up again, but didn’t express any warmth for the woman at her side. That was a fatal mistake. It made it easy for viewers to switch back to see who Ellen was interviewing.
At last, the segment on the spring tops wound down and Vanessa announced that after the break (which was really nothing more than a commercial within a commercial), Bastina would introduce her new line of summer maxidresses, with the help of a new Shopping Channel host, Dana Barry.
Dana’s pulse shot up, but she didn’t have time to process the fear, because she was immediately led onto the set by Jessalyn. As far as Dana could tell, the talent service coordinator’s job was to keep track of the hosts’ whereabouts.
“Good luck,” Vanessa said to her as they passed. “You’re going to need it.”
Dana was positioned next to a rack of maxidresses, Bastina at her side. Her heart banged in her chest. This wasn’t just stage fright. She was accustomed to the nervous jitters of preperformance excitement. This was something more profound. It was her body’s recognition of the stakes. Everything was riding on this. She breathed into the dizzying fear.
Use that energy, she told herself. Dive right into it.
She looked straight into the camera, waiting, and when the red light came on, she was ready.
“I’m Dana Barry, your lucky host! It’s my debut on the Shopping Channel and I get to do it with Bastina herself! I’ve been a fan of hers forever and...” She stopped and turned to the designer. “Is it okay if I hug you? Is that weird? I’ve just been wanting to meet you for so long. I love your clothes!”
Bastina looked taken aback, but delighted. And her response was so genuine Dana knew that viewers would react.
“Of course, darling!” Bastina said, and threw her arms around Dana.
“Will you tell us about this gorgeous new maxidress?” Dana asked, as if coaxing one BFF to share a secret with another. “Because the second I saw it, I knew I had to have it. And what a dream to wear!” She took a step back so the camera could take in her full length, and she did a half twirl to show how the dressed moved.
Bastina caught Dana’s enthusiasm and beamed with pride over her creation. “You look beautiful in that.”
“Well, the lines are so flattering!” Dana said. “And let’s talk about these colors!”
And they were off, discussing the dresses in minute, gushing detail. Dana occasionally glanced at the monitor with the sales numbers, and noticed that the one she wore was moving fastest. She assumed this was a good sign.
Bastina was so chatty and had such intimate knowledge of the garments she made it easy. But when Dana stepped up to point out details of the patterns—in language that didn’t appear on the pitch chart—Adam’s voice came through the earpiece. “That’s great! Numbers are skyrocketing.” Within a few minutes, she had to give viewers a warning about which dresses and sizes were down to limited quantities. Moments later, Adam told her to pull the navy and the pink off the rack because they were sold out. She pushed hard on the remaining patterns and soon she got the signal to wind it down. And then it was over.
As Dana stepped off the set, Adam emerged from the control booth and clapped a hand on her shoulder. “You knocked it out of the park!” he said.
Dana th
anked him and glanced around for Megan, who was nowhere to be seen. She signaled Jessalyn, who rushed to her side and gave Dana back her purse.
“Do you know where Megan Silvestri is?” Dana asked, slipping the strap over her shoulder.
“She’s still in the meeting. You didn’t hear it from me, but I think they’re negotiating an offer, so it could be a while.” She paused to smile. “Congrats!”
Dana held up her crossed fingers and Jessalyn went on. “They told me to find someone to give you a tour of the building in the meantime. I’m still working on that.”
“I’ll do it,” said Lorenzo, who was only a few feet away, listening to the conversation.
“Aren’t you on break now?” Jessalyn asked.
“I don’t mind,” he said.
Dana smiled, and tried to keep herself from thinking it all seemed too good to be true. She didn’t want to jinx herself, but there was no denying it. Megan was upstairs negotiating a contract for her, and she had already met a hot guy who seemed interested. And okay, maybe he wasn’t exactly handsome, and he probably had a history that would give her father about forty cerebral hemorrhages—but that was part of the appeal.
As they walked from the sound studio to the hallway, Dana told Lorenzo that she had seen a lot of the building while being prepped.
“But you missed the best part,” he said, his eyes bright.
“And what’s that?”
He gave an almost imperceptible grin and led her to the elevator, which they took to the top floor. From the moment the doors opened, it was obvious this was where the executive offices were located. There was an elegant and expansive reception area, with a lovely woman sitting behind a rounded desk that was wider than Dana’s apartment.
“Brenda,” Lorenzo said to the receptionist, “this is Dana Barry, and it looks like she’s going to be our newest host.”
Brenda flashed an easy grin with a mouthful of perfect white teeth. “I just saw your segment,” she said, pointing to a flat-screen TV on the wall. “You rocked it, girl.”
Love Sold Separately Page 4