by Tess Oliver
"Yeah?"
"He called me Keezy. I don't know why I'm mentioning it, but it just stirred all kinds of feelings when I heard him call me by the nickname."
"Uh huh, and you actually think there will be a problem rekindling some of that chemistry?" A call beeped through for her but she ignored it. I had her full attention again, but I wasn't even sure why I brought it up. I suppose I just needed to talk about my unexpected reaction.
"This doesn't have to do with chemistry on a movie set," I stated plainly.
"Right. So he calls you by the nickname that only he ever used and it stirred emotions. That means there is still chemical stuff there. Just needs to be reignited. And then we can't forget the look, which your highly intuitive best friend already pointed out to you on the television screen, even though you were too drunk to see it. It was there. I saw it."
"You were drunk too."
"Yes, but I'm a much more clear thinking drunk than you." The phone beeped again. "Got to answer that. I'll see you later. And stop pacing and chewing nails," she said as she hung up.
I stared over at the coffee table where the book was sitting, unopened since yesterday, between an empty bag of olive oil and pink salt popcorn and a half sipped glass of iced tea. I hopped up and plucked the book, grabbed my sunglasses and headed out to my balcony. It was a typical Southern California day, hot, dry with only a few dots of white puffy clouds. With an inordinate amount of clamor, enough to send two squirrels down the trunk of the adjacent Mulberry tree providing the only shade on the balcony, I yanked the chair across the cement floor. I sat on the lounge, adjusted the seat back from sunbathing to reading level and opened the book.
October 20
I've dispensed with the year on my entries. I'm certain, looking back at this diary in ten years (if I survive that long) I'll be able to remember the year without hesitation. It is, after all the year when my entire existence unraveled like an expertly knit sweater only to be reconstructed again with a clumsy crochet hook and turned into something so rustic and unrecognizable it was impossible to see any of the original stylish sweater.
I have discovered in the past two weeks, two very important, noteworthy details. Firstly, none of the boutiques or draper's shops are hiring during this dark, sorrowful autumn. Naturally, that is due to the utter collapse of our entire town's commerce and financial stature. In one moment of delusional hope, I convinced myself that if I could bring in a small income, pay my way in the house, Father would consider me suddenly more valuable and worthy of staying under his roof. That hope was quickly dashed by the hurricane of rejections pelted at me from every shop and business I entered. No one was hiring and many were looking for work themselves. It was the worst possible scenario for my first job hunt.
Secondly, and far more distressing than the first noteworthy detail, was my confirmation of exactly how I became, as it were, a commodity. It had all started innocently enough two years earlier when a group of us, twenty or so, gathered at Beverly Simmon's large gray stone manor for photos. The grand home had a vast sitting room with floor to ceiling windows overlooking her picturesque gardens. It was the perfect setting for the photos. Beverly had taken it upon herself to gather all the women of the East Park Woman's Club, of which I had been an honorary inductee due to my mother's lofty status in the club well before her death. Each of us had a nice full figure photo taken, and Beverly had included a short biography for each member to be included in a pamphlet touting the accomplishments of the club. Which wasn't much more than filling willow baskets with fruit from the market that was nearly past use and delivering them to needy families. I actually enjoyed that part of the club the most and befriended a woman named Andrea who was widowed with three small children. I made extra trips to the small shack where she lived outside of town, providing her with bread, cheese and milk for the little ones. I wondered how she was faring now or if she was missing my visit. I was sure the poor were feeling the financial disaster just as keenly. Well, the day with the photographer, a lanky, round shouldered man who had more height than his frame wanted to support, was pleasant enough. Beverly had her cook, Hilda, bake cherry tarts for the occasion. They were the most memorable part of the day. Only now, that entire day has more meaning because it was that very pamphlet that Mr. Biggs stumbled upon when he came to the city to search for a wife as if it were some kind of mail order for brides. I wondered if he opened the pamphlet and tossed a coin to see who the lucky woman would be, or perhaps he just closed his eyes, spun around like in a child's game and pointed out his choice with his callous, soil crusted finger. However it was done, fate was against me and I became the prize.
It is all too hideous to think about for longer than a moment in time, but it seems my future is now in the hands of a stranger named Thomas Biggs. The other man, who now seems more a stranger than a father, has all but avoided me. I can't tell if that is a result of his sudden disregard for his only child or if it is due to his utter shame at having sold her off. I certainly hope it is the latter and that his last years will be spent tortured by his decision.
Cassie's latest entry had pulled me in, transported me back to a time when fine society meant charitable clubs and days eating tarts, while waiting for the painstaking process of early twentieth century photography. Her pristine, pleasant world had certainly crumbled quickly. I was feeling the depth of her despair when my phone snapped me into the present.
I grabbed it, my heart once again jumping with a shot of adrenaline, thinking it might be Jameson. Shit, I was like nineteen-year-old Kinsey again, waiting anxiously for his phone call. It was Marley. I hesitated long enough for it almost to go to voicemail but then I'd have to suffer one of her lectures about ignoring her call. The woman knew I wasn't busy . . . unfortunately.
"Now, I think you need to lose about fifteen pounds," she started right in without even a hello.
"Well gee, thanks. And now that you've stunned me with that confidence booster, I'll get back to my day."
I heard a stapler snap in the background and her phone clattered onto the desk. Her fumbling to pick it back up was accompanied with a good string of cuss words. "Sorry, dropped the phone. I'm trying to do too many things at once. Story of my life. I'm actually stapling Jeremy's report on the grizzly bear because he called me from school and said he tried to print it out at home last night but there was no ink in the printer. So, apparently he decided the proper response to that was to head into the den and finish his video game and wait until when the teacher asked for the friggin' report to call me at work and let me know I needed to print it and 'oh could you make a nice cover too' and get it to the school before closing bell or it loses ten points."
Marley's family stories were generally entertaining, but I was still stinging about the fifteen pound remark. "So, you think I'm not getting roles because I'm too fat?"
"What? No. Why would you say that?" Another stapler snap.
"Uh, let me direct you back to the earlier part of the conversation before the grizzly bear rant and after the greeting. No wait that was the greeting. Lose fifteen pounds. Remember?"
"Yes but that's only because for a good deal of the part, you're going to be on a farm in the middle of the Dust Bowl, so you can't look as if you just came out of a Bel Air champagne brunch. You need to look waifish, hungry."
I sat in silence for a moment, trying to remember if there were important details I'd missed during her diatribe about Jeremy's report, but I couldn't remember a brain fade. "I'm sorry but I don't know what the hell you're talking about."
"Sawyer's movie part," she said with a heavy layer of irritation, then she paused. She shuffled through something on her desk. "Oops, sorry my fault. I had it on my to-do list and I thought I checked it off but apparently I didn't."
"Still don't know what the hell you're talking about." It seemed raising six kids was really starting to take a toll on the woman. I had to admire her though. Even with all her money, she refused to hire a nanny. She was a very hands on mom, eve
n if she was making big contract deals while doling out bowls of oatmeal and wiping runny noses.
She seemed to have finally stopped fussing with the report and the stapler. "Right." She took a deep breath. "You got the part. Sawyer and I are meeting this afternoon to work out the numbers, but he wants to start filming in three months. He said the script will be ready in two weeks, so you can start reading it while you sit your ass on a stationary bike and work off that 'living the good life rump' as I like to call it."
As was always the case with Marley, she was throwing a lot at me all at once. I was still trying to absorb the first detail. "I don't understand. Did Jameson agree to take the part or did Sawyer just decide he could hold his nose and have me play the female lead even with a different male lead?"
"Jameson called him and told him he was in. After I finish with the grizzlies, I'm going to start writing up contracts for both of you."
"I can't believe it. Any of it. And most importantly—I've got a movie part," I sang and walked with a little skip in my step to the kitchen. "Just a few years ago I'd be saying ugh, another part, another eight months of filming, but now I'm thrilled as if it was my first part. How the mighty have fallen." I reached into my pantry cupboard and pulled out a package of cookies. A sweet treat reward was just what I needed since I was fresh out of champagne. I jammed the phone between my ear and shoulder and ripped open the package.
"What was that? Was that Oreos?" Marley asked sharply, just as I was lifting the iconic cookie sandwich to my mouth.
I stopped and held the cookie in front of me. "How could you possibly have guessed that?"
"How? Trust me, with six kids you learn how to decipher every sound coming from the kitchen, and that was the distinct crinkle of an Oreo wrapper, double stuff."
"How could you have known it was double stuff?" I glanced at the phone to make sure I hadn't accidentally hit FaceTime.
"All right, the double stuff was just a guess. But you need to toss that package in the trash. We need you to look like a half-starved wife of a farmer whose entire livelihood has been consumed by drought and dust. So clean out your junk food stash and head to the gym. You're going to be a movie star . . . again . . . God willing . . . with any luck."
"Gee, I'm feeling so amped up now with that send off. I'll talk to you later. I've got an Oreo funeral to attend."
I stood in the middle of my kitchen staring at the Oreo that should have already been halfway to my stomach. "Fifteen pounds," I grunted. "I hate diets." I picked up the newly opened pack of cookies but rather than put them in the trash—wasting food was a big no no in the Greene house—I stuck them in the freezer. Everything was still tenuous, contracts were still unsigned and minds could change at any moment. Sawyer could still wake up in the middle of the night and think 'what the fuck am I thinking putting those two back together'? And if it all fell apart, I was going to need those damn Oreos to go with the pity party tequila.
Twelve
Jameson
I turned off the shower and grabbed the towel. Sounds coming from the kitchen meant either Harlow had used her key or I was being robbed and the thief decided to fry bacon and make toast.
I sighed with resignation as I rubbed myself down with the towel. It had been a week since I'd signed the deal to do Sawyer's movie. Filming was only a few months away, I was going to have to break the news to her. I wasn't completely sure why I was being such a chicken shit about telling her. I supposed it was because I just wasn't in the mood for an argument. When I'd mentioned in passing that Sawyer Croft wanted me to play a leading role in his screen adaptation of the book Diary of a Mail Order Bride she squealed with excitement. She'd been one of the many millions of readers who fell in love with the book, and she was thrilled she'd be able to tell all her friends that I was going to play the notorious, and apparently very loved, Nate Biggs.
The whole excitement of me being offered the part, spurred her into action. She immediately called her own agent to see if he could grab her an audition for the female lead, Cassandra Youngston. Harlow and I had worked on one movie together. She was a supporting actress and far from the lead role, but it was how we met. We started dating before the movie wrapped up. We hadn't played together since, and, as far as I was concerned, it was for the best. I tried several times to stop her from making the call, but she waved me off and walked out of the room with her phone. She returned a few minutes later, smiling from ear to ear. Her agent was going to make some calls and set something up, she chirped with glee. At the time, I hadn't made up my mind and I was leaning toward no so I left it alone. There was no reason for me to mention that Croft already had a female lead in mind because that particular actress would have only sparked a fire. And I fucking hated fires. Two days later, Harlow's agent broke the news that I'd been avoiding. She didn't talk to me for the next two days, insisting that our entire relationship was sitting on a rocky foundation of lies and secrets. She tended to overdramatize. After that, she never brought up the part again, assuming I'd already decided against it, following her passive threats to move me to that position.
I pulled on my shorts, combed back my wet hair and headed out to the kitchen. Harlow was standing over the stove, flipping a strip of bacon.
"Hey, babe, didn't hear you come in," I said. She had been pushing for us to move in together, but I just wasn't ready to give up my independence. I was between movies and Harlow was just finishing something that had been filmed locally at the studio, so we were seeing each other a lot.
She stuck her blonde hair behind her ear, exposing a row of tiny gold hoops running along her lobe. "Thought you might be hungry for breakfast. I think Marley left you a message while you were in the shower."
My gaze dashed to my phone. I'd left it sitting on the kitchen island. I ignored it as I headed to the refrigerator for some orange juice.
"Maybe she has news about a part," she suggested. "Or did you decide to do the alien movie after all?" she asked.
I poured two glasses of orange juice. "Nope, not hunting aliens."
She turned away from the stove with her spatula. "Then maybe she has something else. You should listen to her voicemail."
“O.K., Mom, don't worry about it. Things are under control."
She put down her spatula, apparently letting me know she was going to spin around and we were going to have a serious exchange about my mom comment.
"Jamie, sweetie, I'm just worried that you're going kind of stir crazy here. It's never good to have gaps in your acting career." She was using just enough condescension and fake sweetness in her tone to make me grit my teeth.
It made me mad enough to spill the beans. "There won't be a gap. I've just signed a contract. We start filming in three months."
Her expression was a cross between surprise and excitement. She was always keeping tabs on my career, something that bugged the shit out of me. She threw her arms up and cheered. "Yay, baby, why didn't you tell me?" She threw herself into my arms and kissed me.
She unwound her legs from around my waist and planted her feet back on the kitchen floor. "So tell me about it. Who's the director? Is it an action adventure?" She pointed at me. "A new superhero? Did Marley negotiate a good deal?" It was another irritating aspect of her character. Money, namely, how much I made, was always at the top of her interest list.
"I decided to take Sawyer's offer," I said it casually as I reached for my glass of orange juice. It took her a second to remember what exactly Sawyer was offering. Then her flawless skin mottled with some angry pink.
"I thought you'd decided not to take that part? I don't understand. How long have you been keeping this from me?"
Bacon smoke was starting to fill the kitchen. "I haven't been keeping anything from you." A lie. "I just signed a few days ago."
"And you didn't tell me?"
I slipped past her and pushed the frying pan off the flame. "I didn't realize I had to fill you in on every detail of my life. I signed with Sawyer for a movie part. Don't make it
such a big fucking deal that I didn't call you up right away to let you know. Thought you'd be happy. You love that book."
I grabbed my orange juice and headed back to the bedroom to finish getting dressed. Harlow's sandals slapped the hardwood floor angrily as she marched after me. And this, I thought to myself, was exactly why I didn't tell her.
"Of course I'm happy that you're going to play Nate Biggs but who is playing Cassie? You can't tell me that Sawyer is still considering Kinsey for the lead. It'll be a flop before it even hits the theater. She's box office poison." She laughed. It was just a cruel enough sound that I wondered why the hell I stuck it out with her.
"What the fuck are you talking about? People love Kinsey."
"Not after that embarrassing wedding video. Besides, she's too—" She paused to search for the words but I stopped her.
"I don't want to hear whatever harsh adjective is about to come out of your mouth, Harlow. I need to finish getting dressed. I've got a few meetings today. I don't have time to sit around here and argue with you."
She stood in my doorway with her arms crossed. "That says a lot about our relationship if you can't even take the time to finish an argument. Besides, it's not an argument." Her lips pulled tight along with the rest of her. "I'm fine with the whole thing. It's not as if I'm jealous of what's her name."
"Somehow, I don't believe that you can't think of her name." I held back the head shake and focused on getting dressed.
"Did you say you're starting filming in three months?" she asked.
"Yes, the start date is first week of October." I pulled my t-shirt over my head.
She pulled out her phone. "Let me check my calendar." A smile formed. The earlier anger had dissipated, although it was still swirling around her. "Perfect. If all goes well, I'm finished early September with my part. I can join you on set. Where are they filming? I suppose they'll need two locations since the story starts on the East Coast and then moves to Nebraska. Goodie, I'm looking forward to some travel. Even if it's in farmland U.S.A.."