by Lisa Ferrari
“Oh, that’s right,” Denise says. “Wasn’t he married to Elizabeth Taylor or something?”
In unison, Harper and I both say, “Marilyn Monroe.”
Denise smiles at me and winks. I can’t tell if she’s been playing dumb in the hopes of Harper and me winding up in bed, or if she actually is dumb.
“Actually,” says Harper, “my mom is a huge Harper Lee fan. To Kill a Mockingbird is her favorite book of all time. She even got to meet her once and has a signed copy of it. If you come over sometime, she’ll show it to you but don’t touch it or ask to read it. She keeps it in a special box that’s actually a small humidor for cigars, and she keeps it at a perfect seventy degrees. My dad wanted to put some of his cigars in there too but she wouldn’t let him.”
Denise bursts in, “Claire has auditioned for a movie role.”
“I know,” says Harper. “I saw the Iron Born video of you on the beach. That was some crazy stuff, man. It looked like a B.U.D.S. documentary on The Discovery Channel. Everybody in the office just about flipped when Denise pointed out that it was you. So, how do you feel about it? Do you think you’ll get it?”
I sigh. “I really don’t know. I hope so. But Calista Roth is up for it, too. She’s a big name and is super hot right now.”
“And super hot,” says Harper, “if I do say so myself.”
“Super hot,” says Denise. “I’d let her eat me out. Did you guys see her in the Carl’s Junior commercial where she’s eating the hamburger and is wearing nothing but the bacon bikini and those dogs are sitting around her, drooling all over the place? Oh my God. The first time I saw it, I couldn’t decide if I wanted to have sex with her or eat a hamburger.”
“Or both,” says Harper, and they laugh. “But you’re just as hot, Claire,” he adds.
This is a surprise. One with which I immediately disagree. “I am?”
“Absolutely,” he says. “You could’ve been in that commercial. All you need is the same hair and makeup and lighting that she had, and you could rock the shit out of that bacon bikini. Guaranteed.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Yes, Clarice,” Denise adds. “Everyone at the office thinks so. You have a real shot at this Hollywood thing. That video of you has women all around the country ready to go run on the beach in the middle of the night with a bunch of Navy SEALs. You’re probably going to get a call from the U.S. Navy asking you to come and shoot a commercial for them. Your boobs in a wet Iron Born tee shirt will do more for recruiting than anything since Top Gun came out way back in nineteen-eighty-whatever.”
“Totally,” says Harper.
I’m slightly affronted, totally embarrassed, but also intrigued. Are they correct?
“What does Kellan think?” Harper asks.
“He’s excited. He hopes I get it, obviously. But he’s also fighting for his part, too. Apparently they’ve upped the budget and there’s talk of putting in someone a bit more A-list.”
“Like who?” Denise asks.
“Dwayne Johnson, Jason Statham, Daniel Craig, Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill, Liam Neeson… I think that’s all of them.”
“Fuckin-A,” says Denise.
“Yeah, he’s fucked,” says Harper.
Now I am affronted. I give both of them my best glowering, grimacing frown.
“Sorry,” says Denise, “but it’s almost guaranteed that the studio is going to go with the Rock and Calista Bacon Tits Roth before they go with Kellan Bodybuilder Kearns and Claire Nobody Valentine. No offense. It’s just that no one knows you guys. Well, some people know Kellan. Some people know you, too, after your beach video. Which is good, I’m sure it’ll help. Have they done a screen test with Calista Roth and all those actors you mentioned, to see if they work together?”
“I’m not sure. Not that I know of.”
“Have you read with any of them?” Denise asks.
“No, just Kellan. Why?”
“Well, the beach video might wind up being bigger than anyone realizes. It might be the difference in you getting it over Calista Roth. They might want to have you both read with the Rock or Ben Affleck or Daniel Craig or whoever. A movie this big, they’re going to explore all their options. What is the budget up to?”
“Kellan said three-hundred million, but they may split it three ways and each put in two-hundred million. It’s going to be the first movie to ever cost six-hundred million dollars.”
“Actually,” says Harper, “the last Pirates movie was something like six-hundred twenty-seven million.”
“But Kellan said that after they spend another three-or four-hundred million on advertising, it’ll be the first billion-dollar movie.”
“Jesus,” says Denise. “Aren’t you scared? Aren’t you shitting your pants?”
“I don’t know. Kind of. Why?”
“I would be. Oh my God.”
“All I can control is myself and my preparation. Everything else is out of my hands. But you can be damn sure that the next time I see Calista Roth, I’m going to be looking just as good as she did in that bacon bikini.”
“And what if you don’t get it?” Denise asks.
“Then I don’t get it. Maybe I’ll get something else. Whatever. Life goes on. I’ll be fine.”
I excuse myself because I have to get to work. I don’t want to be late, again, and incur the wrath of Nancy, again.
I also do not care to entertain any further fear-based doubtmongering from Denise and Harper. I know they mean well and believe it’s important to be honest about my chances. But I don’t want the negativity in my mind, burrowing in like a worm, making me crazy. Because I know that’s what will happen; I’ll end up in my kitchen, naked, shoving Oreos down my throat or up my butt or in my hoo-ha, going crazy trying to escape the fear.
I shall remain positive.
THE SHIFT IS a small event, no big deal, but everyone is super nice to me. The people at work are always nice, but today it’s beyond the norm. Two young servers who work in the restaurant say hi and tell me they liked the video.
That explains it.
Later that evening, I’m on my way home to Kellan’s and I stop at Whole Foods to grab some stuff for dinner, more eggs, more chicken, more asparagus. A complete stranger says, “Hi, Claire,” as I’m walking past the salad bar on my way to the cash registers.
After dinner, Kellan still isn’t home from his photoshoot in San Francisco. I don’t like being here when he’s not here. I feel like getting out of the house so I hop in my Solstice and drive to Iron Palace.
My workout is going well, back and glutes, with hip-thrusts, deadlifts, stiff-legged deadlifts, kettlebell swings with a dumbbell, and seated rows.
But more than one person approaches me and says hello. Then a few more. Someone asks for a selfie, interrupting my workout.
I don’t know what to do. Kellan is always so gracious about this kind of thing, and I feel I should be as well. But I’m also terrified that right now Calista Roth is down in Redondo Beach carrying all manner of heavy objects up and down those stairs and eating nothing but determination-flavored chicken. It scares me and makes me angry when I’m interrupted. But I keep my cool and do my best to be nice. It’s quite a change given that Kellan isn’t even here.
By the time I get home, Kellan has arrived. He wants to train at home. So even though I’m tired, I drink a protein shake and join him in the home gym for some lat pulldowns and a bunch of shoulder work in order to increase our hourglass proportions.
When we’re done with our workout, Kellan shows me what he was doing all day in the Shakespeare Rose Garden while he was waiting for the photographer and website people to get set up. He went online and created a web store for me that sells Iron Born tee shirts and other apparel, pretty much everything you can think of from coffee mugs to satchels.
It seems far fetched and a bit ridiculous.
But then he shows me the back office for the shopping cart. There have already been more than thirty transactions totaling almo
st seven hundred bucks. He asks for my PayPal info. I give it to him and he sets up the cart to wire the money to my PayPal account.
Within about three minutes I’m seven hundred bucks richer.
Wow.
I can almost pay my rent with that.
He also put links to my website in the e-store.
We check my Amazon KDP account. Traffic is up. WAY up. More than 1,000 visitors and 800 book sales, totaling almost 1,600 bucks in royalties.
Holy cranberry sauce.
I can more than pay my rent with that.
It’s more than I typically make in two weeks of catering.
In a matter of hours.
I’m blown away. Almost too blown away to be happy.
Kellan also shows me the ad he put up for my Toyota. It’s already had some inquiries and he has someone coming tomorrow to look at the car if I still want to sell it.
I assure him that I do. I really want to pay him back for the little red Pontiac. I love the car and I love the fact that he took the initiative to get it for me. But I want to pay him back for it. If I sell it, and the tee shirts and coffee mugs and book sales continue, I’ll be able to pay Kellan back in a few days.
I like the idea of having some extra money. It’ll give me room to breathe. It’s scary, for sure. But it’s a heck of a lot better than being broke. I’ve been broke. For a long time. It sucks. I’m ready for more.
OVER THE NEXT few days, Kellan and I continue with our routine: training and eating and doing cardio. I hustle at work, trying to burn more calories. But I’m finding that the usual tasks at work are too easy now. Carrying trays isn’t as difficult. Kellan says it’s because I’m getting in shape, building muscle, losing fat, and trimming down. My body is carrying less fat and it has more muscle to use to move me around, so everything feels easier.
One day I swing by my apartment for a bit and I run up the stairs to my front door with an ease I’ve never known before. I turn around and go back down and run up the steps one more time, in case it was my imagination.
But it’s not.
My legs are stronger. I weigh less. So it’s easier.
Cool.
Kellan and I continue to monitor book and merchandise sales. Both are good. My Instagram account goes from 15 followers to 140,000. Kellan shows me how to use a meme generator to create pithy memes about fitness and working out and training hard and succeeding in life and never giving up.
I continue to receive text messages from Nathan. He continues to suggest sex at his house in the Hamptons.
I show the texts to Kellan.
“Tell that douchebag to fuck off,” Kellan says. We’re in the middle of a shoulder workout. Kellan is pressing 100-pound dumbbells toward the ceiling one at a time. He doesn’t even break stride.
“What about the contract?”
“If there is or ever was a contract, you don’t need it. Your sales are going up. People are discovering you. Give it time. You don’t need him.”
I don’t actually tell Nathan to F.O.
I choose to ignore him. I know it’s my typical avoidant behavior kicking in, but I can’t help it; I’ve wanted a real publishing deal for most of my life.
Kellan isn’t happy about this but he leaves it up to me.
ONE EVENING, KELLAN and I are up late, training our asses off in the home gym, alternating between abs and calves.
We have Conan O’Brien on the big TV. Jane’s Addiction are the musical guest. Kellan says it’s because of my tee shirt; they’re getting a bump.
I say no way. They’re huge, they’ve been huge for a long, long time. Long before me.
Kellan insists it’s because I was wearing their tee shirt during our lunch at the West Hollywood Mel’s on Sunset and during our stroll through LAX.
At the end of the song, Perry Ferrell looks right at the camera and does the fist-heart-bump two-fingered-kiss thing I did at the airport.
“See?” Kellan says, smiling, and goes back to crunching while he holds a 45-pound plate behind his head. I’m holding a ten-pound plate, which is meager compared to his, but I’m pleased with my accomplishments thus far.
WE ENCOUNTER THE Claire-vs-Calista debate everywhere. TV, radio, online, social media…
After a couple of weeks of people talking all manner of crap about me and saying how much better Calista is, I can’t take it anymore.
Not everyone supports her; there are a lot of people who are complimentary of me and who want me to be in the movie.
But most are for Calista.
My training begins to suffer. I lose some of my intensity. Kellan has to motivate me to train. He has to pretty much drag me out of bed in the morning to do our fasted cardio.
I’m also upset about Nathan. I really thought I’d made it, that New York City Publishing had finally come calling.
But no.
It was only one Manhattan-based douchebag trying to get into my pants.
It causes me to question my writing abilities and the quality of my books, which is absurd because my book sales have completely skyrocketed. I’m getting more traffic to my website than I’ve ever had before. More people in one day than I used to get in more than a month. Conversions are up so much I have no metric to measure them. I’m selling upwards of 30 to forty books per day, and usually more. I’m on track for my book revenue to exceed my catering income for the first time ever. That’s huge.
I know I should be happy, but I’m sliding into a slump.
The former resolve I had in the ladies’ room after talking with Calista has vanished.
I’m no longer interested in sex with Kellan, either.
Several times, I rebuff him.
I feel horrible for it. My mind is willing, sort of, but my body is not.
To his credit, Kellan is very understanding. He says I’m under a lot of pressure and it’s understandable, and that he’s been there, too.
I don’t ask him to elaborate on who it was he refused to have sex with. But I secretly hope it was Stacy.
I’m like Maverick after Goose dies. I can’t get back in the saddle. I won’t engage.
I’m like Monica after her wedding plate is broken. I lose the will to scold.
I’m like Ophelia. I must get myself to a nunnery.
I’m like Bella, doing stupid stuff on a dumb dirt bike with Jacob because I want Edward to come back and turn me so we can finally make it without him accidentally killing me.
I’m like Wesley when the Six-fingered Man sucks one year of his life away.
I’m like Jack Torrance: all work and no play makes Claire a big dull dud, like Joanna, Rachel’s boss, before she handcuffs Chandler to her office chair and leaves for a business meeting, minus the mascara goop.
I’m like Kristen Wiig when she smashes the cake because she wasn’t invited to get her anus bleached and she hates her boring old asshole.
I’m like Harry, when Hedwig saves him from the killing curse, and all innocence is lost.
I’m like Molly Ringwald in The Breakfast Club, serving Saturday detention in the library, when she does the thing with the lipstick.
Wait….
Where was I going with this?
Kellan refuses to take no for an answer; he continues to show me daily updates of Calista’s Instagram page, which is covered with pics and video of her training her ass off, doing one-arm pull-ups and walking on her hands, even carrying guys across the sand on her back.
She even carries a guy piggy-back up the stairs she mentioned down in Redondo Beach.
I’m completely intimidated by this.
Kellan points out that Calista is totally emulating me. She is manufacturing the same event I did organically.
I read every single comment on her post. A lot of people like her video (it gets more than twelve-thousand likes), but most people see through it and say I look tougher in my video with the SEALs.
Kellan insists that I have the edge. He says the brass ring is right in front of me; I need only to reach out a
nd take it.
This does nothing to motivate me; I’ve never been into jewelry.
I begin having food cravings. Whenever Kellan and I go shopping, I always find the ice cream aisle. All I want to do is eat, all the time.
Kellan says this is my pathology kicking in. I am reverting back to what I know, which is to turn to food for comfort. We spend hours on the sofa and in the spa and in bed discussing psychology and patterning and behavior modification.
It occurs to me one day that I may be pregnant. It would explain the appetite and the listlessness. I buy a pregnancy test from the dollar store but it comes up negative. So I go to Target and get one for $14. It, too, comes up negative. So it’s not that.
It’s nice to talk with Kellan and I’m always impressed with the breadth and depth of his knowledge. But when we make love, I mostly do it for his benefit. And I still want cookies. And ice cream. And pie.
One night while we’re making love, Kellan tells me to come with him. But I’m not close. Not even a little bit. He says it over and over, urging me to have an orgasm. He’s doing his best to turn me on, but I’m simply not.
I consider faking it.
Kellan stops suddenly and props himself up so he can see me clearly. “Don’t you dare fake it.”
Holy sex therapist how does he do that? It’s like he can read my mind.
“If you can’t come, fine,” he says. “Sex isn’t supposed to be about orgasm anyway. It’s supposed to be about closeness and intimacy and tenderness and being together and all that froofy stuff. Which is fine. I’m all for it. If you want to stop, we can stop. But don’t ever fake it. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“Calire, I’m serious. If I do something to you and you fake an orgasm, it teaches me to do that same thing again. But if that thing I’m doing doesn’t turn you on, I shouldn’t be doing it.”
“You always turn me on. It’s not you. It’s just… everything.”
“I know. It’s okay. You’re under a lot of pressure. I know. We both are. It’s fine. Let’s just go to sleep.”
Kellan begins to withdraw.
“No, wait. Don’t stop. Let’s keep going.”
“Are you sure? It’s fine, Claire.”
But it isn’t fine. As soon as I begin withholding sex or being unable to perform, Kellan will begin to worry. At first he’ll be fine with it. He’ll be very understanding and intellectually supportive of me and my psychodrama baloney, the way he’s being now as he’s lying on top of me. But a week from now, or two, or ten, his body will take over. His hormones will get the best of him and he’ll wind up shooting a big fat load all over Stacy’s augmented sweater stretchers.