During the first break, it was obvious that she wasn’t out-of-mind like Jackson had hoped. Ben brought her up, just seconds into his conversation with Jackson. “So were you trying to tell me something yesterday? Katrina turned me down.”
Okay, he could go two ways with this. Ben set it up perfectly. It would be so easy for Jackson to say Kat wasn’t into Ben. Then the rockstar crush on his best friend (aka stepsister) would be over. That was Jackson’s preferred option.
But, yeah, he knew he couldn’t do that. He couldn’t lie to Ben. And he especially couldn’t deceive Kat like that. So he had to choose option number two. Jackson gave Ben the run-down of his conversation with Kat yesterday: how much she regretted saying no, and how she really wished she didn’t have a prior commitment. Jackson was careful not to say too much: he didn’t want Kat to sound like a desperate bimbo.
Ben listened intently. Then he smiled a huge magazine-cover kind of smile and smacked Jackson on the back. “Cool. Thanks, man.”
“Ouch,” Jackson muttered. Why did he always feel like a human slap jockey?
“So, if I asked her again, she’d say yes?” Ben asked.
Jackson could hear the hopeful longing in Ben’s voice. “Yes, definitely,” Jackson said. “Unless she is getting deported, or has surgery scheduled, or has detention or something.”
Ben didn’t laugh. “So this dance thing she has … what is it exactly?”
“Um,” Kat’s dance world was nearly foreign to Jackson. “I don’t really know. She’s just in this troupe. They do ballroom dance and stuff. I think she said they are performing at a birthday party. For that game-show guy. What’s his name? The old one with the gray hair.”
“Gregory Ball?”
“Yeah. Him. He’s way old. A hundred and fifty, I think. So they are doing a performance to celebrate … his oldness.”
“Awesome,” Ben said. He gave Jackson huge, triumphant smile and turned to leave, marking the end of the conversation.
Obviously Ben only had one thing on his mind.
Chapter Four ……
It was a flawless performance. Katrina felt that rush of euphoria when the crowd cheered for her and her teammates. It was a small crowd of two-hundred, but the applause was loud nonetheless. And she didn’t have to worry about keeping her stage smile plastered on her face, because there was no way she could not smile when the guest of honor—aged and frail as he was—pulled himself up and gave them a standing ovation. Gregory Ball, legendary game show host, was applauding her. On his eightieth birthday. Way cool.
The cast graciously accepted the applause, offering a series of choreographed curtseys. Then they bounced out of the ballroom and into the halls of the Beverly Hilton. Giggles and skirts swishing could be heard on the way back to the dressing room. Kat was whispering with her girlfriend, Macey.
“Isn’t it amazing that he was a teenager when the Lindy Hop was popular?” Macey said. “He’s like an antique! The 1940’s were like a thousand years ago.”
“More like seventy, Mace,” Kat teased. Then she heard someone say her name. It was a guy. The six guys in her dance troupe (in comparison to the twelve girls on the team. Yes, it was off-balanced. But what else could they do? Put an ad on Craigslist looking for teenage guys who were dying for the opportunity to learn how to swing? Right.) were talking to others. None of them were looking in her direction. They hadn’t said her name. Kat kept walking.
A voice came down the hallway again, this time a little louder. “Katrina.”
She turned and looked behind her. A blonde guy in a tux—mega hottie—was following her. He smiled.
A horrible sound traveled out of her stomach and into her throat. She recognized the sound from her childhood days playing video games with Jackson. It was Frogger, getting squished. Blaph. Had her body really made that sound? And had he heard?
Her cheeks flared with embarrassment. She looked at the guy, five feet away, for any signs of disgust. He was still smiling. He must have been too far away to hear her stomach compress poor little Frogger. But Macey heard. “You okay?” she nudged Kat.
Katrina faced Macey and tried to wipe the astonishment/embarrassment/delight from her face. “Fine. Um, I’ll catch up, kay?”
She took two steps closer to the guy. He took three. “Hi,” he said.
“Hi,” Kat replied tentatively. She glanced over her shoulder, making sure her teammates were gone. She had two questions and she didn’t know which to ask first. “What are you doing here?” She hoped it came out as curious and not critical.
He answered, “Uh, Mr. Ball was good friends with my grandfather.”
“Really?” She could hear the skepticism in her voice.
“Yeah. Actually, it was my great, great, great grandpa,” he said.
Ben Wilder’s smile grew larger by the second.
She got it. He was pulling her leg. Before she could ask why he was really there, he said, “I came to see you dance. You were great.”
Katrina gummed her lips, then realized the mistake. It probably smeared her awful red stage lipstick. She put a nervous hand to her mouth and mumbled a thank you.
“Really. You were terrific. I couldn’t keep my eyes off you.”
She was grateful her hand was still at her mouth. She caught another one of those Frogger sounds before it escaped. “Thanks, Ben.” She glanced at her hand as she lowered it. No traces of red. Thank you, Max Factor. The lipstick was kiss-proof. “You die your hair?” she asked. Again, she hoped her tone came across right. Just curious, not critical. Not that he looked bad with blonde hair (could Ben Wilder ever look bad?), but he just didn’t look like … Ben. The amazing contrast with the black hair and ice blue eyes was missing.
“Nah,” Ben answered. He put his hand to the top of his head and gave his hair a little tug. “Wig.”
“Oh,” Kat didn’t really know how to respond. Ben was at her dance performance wearing a tux and a wig. Weird.
“I didn’t want to draw any attention. I came to see you dance and I didn’t think I could do that being Ben Wilder. I needed to be invisible.”
Nice try, hottie. Kat knew that even though Ben was attempting to be ordinary, he was still better looking than nine-tenths of the population. No way he could ever be invisible.
And then his other words reached a sensory connection within her brain. She tingled all the way from her pin-curled hair to her stiletto heels. He had gone to all this effort, just to come see her dance. Holy Tupelo.
Kat needed to dismiss the heavy implications of Ben’s presence. “Nothing better to do on a Friday night than watch the jitterbug?”
“Honestly, no.” Ben’s voice was soft. He took a step closer to Kat.
Her stomach wanted him to take a step back. Only a foot-and-a-half between them threatened more stomach compressions. His eyes were intense, and relentless. They wouldn’t let her eyes look elsewhere. She was trapped, having no choice but to let him look into her thoughts. Could he tell that she was terrified? That the next thing to come up might contain more of Frogger than just a croak? Ben Wilder was pursuing her. No way.
“That was the best twelve-minutes of entertainment I’ve seen in a long time. Kinda makes me want to learn swing.”
She had an instant vision of herself waltzing with a tuxedoed Ben. Black hair or blonde, didn’t really matter. Yum. “I’ll have to teach you sometime.” She couldn’t resist saying it.
“I’d be learning from the best.”
Aw. Or was it Awe? Yeah, he knew how to flatter. And that’s exactly how Frogger felt. Kat didn’t dare open her mouth.
“Hey: I’m still craving Frostdots. You game?”
She didn’t croak when she answered. But she squeaked. “Sure.” She looked down at her polka-dotted dress with the wide swing-skirt. “Let me go change.”
His hands were in his pockets. He tipped his feet up and rocked on his heels. “Yeah, me too. I don’t think we’d be invisible in Frostdots like this. Meet me in the lobby in fifteen minutes
?”
“Sure.” It came out with less of a squeak this time.
Once Katrina rounded the corner to the dressing room, she broke into a dead run. She was breathless when she reached the dressing room.
“Kat, you okay?” Macey looked startled.
“Eeee!” Kat couldn’t help but squeal. But softly. She didn’t want the entire team to hear. “I have a date.” Then she remembered that Macey was her ride. “Um, is it okay if I don’t ride with you back to the studio?”
“‘Cause you’re going with that fox? Of course it’s okay,” Macey said.
Macey—obviously excited—grabbed Kat by the arm. Kat was grateful: it kept her from feeling so wobbly. Then Macey asked the inevitable. She wanted to know who the fox was. “Um …” Kat began. Probably better not say too much. She pictured Macey and the other ten female team members (and possibly a few of the male members) chasing Ben through the hallways of the Hilton, tearing his tux off his body. Kat lingered a little too long on that last thought. “He’s just a guy I met this week. He’s a friend of Jackson’s.”
“Jackson’s? Where’d Jackson meet a guy like that?” Macey asked.
“I dunno.” Kat turned to the locker where her clothes were hanging.
“And he hangs with old people? What’s he doing at an eighty-year-old’s birthday party?”
“He came with … his grandpa.” Kat reached into her locker and drew a deep breath before turning back to Macey. “And now he wants to go out. So I need to change.” Kat hastily shoved past Macey and sat on the bench. She bent to unbuckle her shoes.
“Whoa. You’re kinda freakin’. You must really like him.”
Kat sat up, her face flushed from bending over and from … well, Ben. “Ssshhyeah,” she gushed.
Macey gave Kat a good once-over. Then she pitched in and helped Kat change. “You need to cool it, Kat. You’ll blow it if he see’s you actin’ all freakish.”
Kat quickly changed out of her dance costume. She allowed herself to spend a few minutes doing her yoga breathing; Macey worked on getting the two dozen bobby-pins out of Kat’s hair. But then Kat looked in the mirror and started hyperventilating again. Her hair was a wreck. She had gone from the sleek, pinned waves of the forties to what looked like a cheap ladies wig that had been run over by a garbage truck. “Aahh!” she yelled. “What do I do?”
Macey was like a superhero. She swept through the dressing room and after a few minutes, she came back with a twisty and a headband. In just another few minutes, she tamed Kat’s big-beast hair. Kat’s wavy bangs trickled down her temples. The rest was pulled back and guarded by the headband. And the cute headband with brown and red swirls even matched Kat’s dress. How’s that for luck?
Next problem was the stage make-up. Since Kat hadn’t brought along her make-up bag, she didn’t have the option of re-applying, so she had to delicately wipe off just enough so she didn’t look like a drag-queen. She still ended up wearing more than normal, but not thick enough to put her in the tramp department either.
Kat did a thorough exam of herself in the tri-fold mirrors. She looked good. Like she’d planned on having a date. Thank you Ms. Stella, for the strict dress-code. Ms. Stella always required that her performers looked professional when traveling to a venue. And because of that, Kat had on a flattering wrap dress. Much better than the baggy sweats and T-shirt she had actually wanted to wear.
“Ah, Kat. His eyeballs are going to fall out. You’re hot, girlfriend.”
“Thanks, Mace.” Kat hugged her friend and gathered her belongings. She deliberately slow-walked to the lobby. She didn’t want to seem rushed or overly anxious. Or sweaty. She kept her elbows out as she walked down the hall in order to keep her rayon dress from gathering pit-dew.
Ben was in the lobby, sitting in an armchair, staring up at the elevator. A gush of air escaped from Katrina’s gaping mouth. At least it was a silent gust, but she was passing a decorative tree and she had to wonder: did her breath really make the leaves flutter or was the tree catching a draft from the ventilation system? At least the tree didn’t wilt from her breath. That would have been a date killer. But, knowing that her breath was minty fresh, she didn’t worry about sighing so deeply that it made branches sway. How could a girl not be breathless at the sight of Ben Wilder waiting for her?
“Dang,” Ben said when he stood to greet her, “I think I’m underdressed.” He wore dark grey jeans and a white T-shirt with a faded logo, along with that scraggly blonde wig. Maybe she looked self-conscious, because he added, “You look really nice, Katrina.”
She tried to explain the dress code and the leftover stage make-up, but then she realized she was babbling. She ended up saying, “Thanks. You too.” And then she regretted it. Are you supposed to tell a guy that he looks nice? That’s almost as bad as saying “you look cute.” Already, she was fumbling over her words and they hadn’t even left the lobby.
The valet pulled Ben’s car up to the curb and Ben opened the door for Kat. Sitting inside the car, she had about five seconds alone while Ben tipped the valet. She pinched her inner arm hard enough to leave nail marks because #1. She needed to make sure this was real and #2. She needed to pull it together. No more gushing, Kat. No more blabbering. No more idiocy.
This stray thought seeped into her head. It said, “This is an incredible experience. Just have fun with it.” She grabbed hold of that stray thought and imbedded it in every mutinous gland/organ in her body. Her stomach, her heart, her brain, and her sweat glands were now under control. And just in time. Ben slid in beside her. There was only six inches separating them. She could reach out and touch him if she wanted to. And boy did she want to.
The interior of the sleek muscle car looked as if no one had ever sat in it before. “I bet you don’t eat French fries in here,” she said.
“Ah, no. I don’t eat fast food. Let alone eat in the car.”
“Really? Then what will you do if you ever get stranded—you know, like run out of gas in the middle of the desert? You won’t have any stray food to munch on. You could totally starve to death.”
He kept his focus on the road as they pulled on to Wilshire Boulevard, but she could see the look of contemplation in his eyes. She smiled uneasily, and he finally gave way to a laugh. “You’re joking, right?” he asked.
Crap. He might be getting seriously illed out. Plenty-o-guys would think that it totally rad that a chick would eat off the floor. But Ben, probably not. She should have thought of that. “Yeah, totally joking,” she said with a fake giggle. Of course, she had been known to eat a thing or two (or maybe more, but who’s counting?) from the floor of her car. And she hadn’t even been stranded in the desert. More like starving after study hall. And she knew that the partially eaten Slim Jim had only been there for about a day. Yeah, it was gross. But she was seriously starving. Moving on …
“Nice car. Is it fast?” She couldn’t quite place the name of the car. One of the “C” word ones. But she was too embarrassed to ask.
“Yeah. 425 horsepower. But she’s heavy. She does zero to sixty in five point two seconds. Not the fastest; but adequate.”
Kat nodded. He was heading in the direction of Car-land, and losing her quickly. She needed to bring him back to actuality. If he thinks that she speaks Car-nese, she’ll spend the rest of the date being lost. She changed the subject. “So, you must have finished filming early today.”
“Ah, yeah. We reached a good stopping point.” He gave a triumphant smile.
Meaning what? Kat hoped she didn’t read too much into it, but it kinda sounded like they stopped early just so he could come see her dance. Kat looked out her window in efforts to hide her smitten grin.
His car made this deep grumbling sound as he accelerated onto the freeway. She noticed Ben’s foot was flat on the floor. All the other cars were blurring past. She grabbed on to the handle. “Um, are we in a hurry?” she asked, trying to keep the nervousness out of her voice.
He gave her this sideways glance—a
nd a very toothy smile—then he shifted and passed (in the right lane) a slower vehicle. “No,” he answered once he was back in the fast lane. “Top notch radar detector,” he said touching a dial on the dash. “I never get tickets.”
“And that makes it okay to set a world-speed record on the 405?”
He chuckled. Then he let off the gas. “I’m making you nervous.”
“No.” She tried to act nonchalant. “My grandma would have been nervous. But not me. I was just … you know … thinking of her, and how she would feel in this situation.”
He smiled and she could hear him make some sort of inner laugh. “I’m sure your … grandma appreciates your thoughtfulness.”
Then—quiet in the car. Seriously, neither of them said anything for like three miles. Or it could have been six miles: he was still going really fast. Anyway, it was beginning to get awkward. And she started to worry. Had he thought that she was type of girl who liked to go fast? Did she put him off by acting like a pansy? Great. She should have yelled: “Yee-haw! Can’t this baby go any faster?”
Kat racked her brain, trying to redeem herself. She had to work her way out of pansy-dom. “So, did you watch Brains last night?” As cool as the show was, she couldn’t bring herself to call it by its full title: Brains vs. Ba—s. Yeah, you know, those thingies. But she just realized her mistake: only the pansies (and parents, but you know … big diff) called the show just Brains.
“Ah, no. I missed it. You?”
“I had … homework, and a ten o’clock bedtime. So no. I was hoping to get the low-down.” Kat screamed inside her head. She was talking about homework and parent enforced bedtimes with a rockstar. Yep, she couldn’t be more of a pansy. A pansy nourished with Miracle-Gro for that matter. What was even more suck-tacular was that she didn’t even need the low-down. She’d been briefed in the hallways before school even started. That show was all anyone talked about all day long.
So what did that leave her to talk about? Luckily, Ben broke the silence. He asked her about school. And the questions kept coming. Favorite subject? What electives? Involved in extra-curricular? This was good. He seemed genuinely interested.
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