Eyes Like Those

by Melissa Brayden

  “What? Not a fan of the desert?” Hadley looped her arm through Isabel’s. She wore what looked to be a flamenco dancer’s costume. Scarlett red with a line of ruffles. Her blond hair was secured in a tight bun. Lucky for her, she had the looks and the body to pull it off easily.

  “Would it surprise you to know that it scares me? Howling wolves and reptiles are the things my nightmares are made of.”

  Hadley winced. “In that case, I will be happy to waive my fee, because we’re friends now, right?”

  Isabel grinned. “We are. More soup for me.” She gestured to the outfit. “You really go all out. I wouldn’t have the guts.”

  “I can help with that, too. Next month we’re celebrating the Irish, so search out your green ahead of time. I can lend you buckled shoes if you like.” She glanced down at Isabel’s feet. “I’m guessing a seven and a half.”

  “Next month is October,” Isabel said, trying to make the connection she knew wasn’t there.

  “I just really like St. Patrick’s Day,” Hadley said, as if were the most obvious thing in the world.

  Gia laughed. “It’s best not to ask questions. Hadley just enjoys life. Many, many aspects of it.”

  That earned her Hadley’s elbow in the ribs. “You get free snacks, so how about a little support?”

  Gia wrapped Hadley in a sideways hug and gave her a shake. “For snacks, you have my undying support.”

  Autumn pointed at the action from the couch. She had her feet up and still wore her Cat’s Pajamas T-shirt from work. “I second that motion and am available for menu consultation.”

  Isabel slid into the spot next to Autumn on the couch. “You didn’t dress for Latin night.”

  She turned her face against the couch to Isabel, dropping her tone. “I tolerate the themes for Had. I’m here for the people. And the booze.” As always, Autumn served as the voice of reason.

  They clinked glasses as Barney and his muscles cha-cha-ed his way past, wearing a matador’s hat. “Hey, new girl,” he said, and bobbed his head. “Doin’ that new girl thing?”

  Isabel bobbed back. “Hey, Barney. Yep. Sure am.” Whatever the hell that meant.

  He continued his dance solo around the living room, and Autumn grinned. “Barney’s a keeper for no other reason than he entertains the hell out of me. Watch him. He’s entirely off rhythm and couldn’t care less.” Isabel was starting to appreciate Autumn’s wry outlook. They were kindred spirits that way. “He’ll also happily change a hard-to-reach lightbulb, which should be filed away.”

  Isabel tapped her head and pointed at Autumn in gratitude.

  “What’s going on in here?” a male voice said from the doorway. They glanced up.

  “Larry Herman, as I live and breathe.” Isabel wondered when she’d run into the guy again.

  He turned to her. “Ms. Chase. Is this a party?”

  “Not even close,” she deadpanned. “A get-together, and a very quiet one.”

  He stood taller, and didn’t seem sure of her answer. “I see you’ve met the neighbors.”

  “I have.”

  “Some sangria, Larry?” Hadley asked from the punch bowl, picking up the ladle and letting the fruity liquid trickle like a beckoning waterfall.

  He seemed mesmerized by her for a moment but then held up a hand. “No. No alcohol.” His lips pursed and his brow seized up. “I have a re-enactment in the morning. I have to be fresh.”

  Hadley grinned. “Larry is a member of a history buff club of some sort. They do little plays.”

  “The Preservation of Dramatic History,” he said quietly, through gritted teeth. He turned to Isabel. “We don’t do plays, we re-enact history with precise attention to detail.”

  “What’s being re-enacted tomorrow, Larry?” she asked.

  “The Battle of Yorktown.”

  Gia shook her head. “Can’t say I know it. I sucked at history in school.”

  This seemed to ruffle Larry’s feathers and he blew out his cheeks.

  Isabel jumped in. “Victory of the Americans over the British. Are you playing Washington, Larry?” Her tone shifted in exaggerated awe. “Do you get to play General George Washington?”

  More agitation. His eyebrows drew in. “No. It’s a very long and sordid story, but I will not be playing Washington this time. I lost out to Timothy Bottoms.”

  Isabel stared at him evenly. “With that name, I think Timothy lost a long time ago.”

  He snapped out of it. “I better go home and look over my notes while I’m thinking about it. But I swear, if there is a report of a loud party, I will be back.”

  Hadley smiled. “I promise you, Larry, I will make sure we stay quiet.”

  He softened and bowed his head to Hadley as his cheeks glowed pink. He seemed to like her. “Thank you.”

  As Larry headed to the door, Isabel turned to Hadley. “So, we can have a loud party later though, right? We just have to wait until he’s gone?”

  “No!” he said loudly, whirling around. “No loud parties ever. None. That’s the main rule!”

  She smiled and pointed at him happily with both index fingers. “Gotcha.” She would never get tired of Larry Herman and the fun she had with him.

  “That’s not funny,” he deadpanned.

  “Yes, it is,” she deadpanned back.

  Autumn covered her mouth in amusement. “I think you’ve met your match, Larry.”

  Larry stared Isabel down. “Ms. Chase’s ability to match me has yet to be determined.” He turned once again and exited the apartment.

  Isabel stared after him and shook her head slowly. “He’s so many things wrapped up in a tight little ball of hostile.”

  “He means well,” Hadley said. “He does.”

  “Why is he so nice to you?” Isabel asked her.

  Gia fielded the question instead. “I think he needs a girlfriend, and I think he wants her name to be Hadley.”

  “Yeah. He’s gaga in love with her,” Autumn said.

  “He’s not in love with me.” Hadley joined them around the couch. “He just has a soft spot for me.”

  “Is it called, ‘Please, softly get into bed with me’?” Isabel asked innocently.

  “Let’s keep this girl,” Gia said, and indicated Isabel with her chin.

  Autumn nodded. “I second the motion.”

  In spite of the ribbing, Hadley softened. “Unanimous. Now I need to introduce Gia to my friend Richie, who doesn’t believe I actually know her.”

  “Who says you do?” Isabel heard Gia quip as they headed off across the room.

  “Behave,” Hadley admonished.

  “Hey,” Autumn said, and gestured to the very gothic, very pierced, highly tattooed woman who filled the doorway. “Iz, have you met Stephanie yet?”

  “That would be a no,” Isabel said. “Should I be afraid? She’s glaring at the room.”

  “Only a little. Steph,” Autumn said, signaling the sullen girl. “This is Isabel. She lives in the unit below you.”

  Stephanie blinked at Autumn in mild toleration. “No, Celeste lives in the unit below me,” she said, in a monotone delivery. There was a large spike through Stephanie’s eyebrow. Isabel swallowed and wondered absently how much effort it would take to impale someone with it.

  “Not anymore,” Autumn told her. “Isabel moved in last month.”

  “That’s extraordinary,” Stephanie said with the excitement level of someone who’d just been told their flight was canceled.

  Isabel attempted an olive branch of a grin. “Well, it’s cool to meet you. And if you ever need anything, you know, just knock and—”

  “Yeah. Super cool,” Stephanie said, looking through her. “Steer me to the food.”

  Autumn and Isabel pointed to the table across the room in unison. “She dislikes me,” Isabel whispered once Stephanie had gone. “Intensely.”

  “Yeah. You’re done for. Stephanie’s bad side is…not where you want to be.” Isabel turned but saw that Autumn was smiling. “Relax. Th
at’s just how Steph is. Brooding. Terrifying. You get used to it.”

  Isabel raised a half-hearted shoulder. “Yay.”

  “What are we celebrating? Did you score with the boss?” Gia asked.

  “What boss?” Hadley stared at them, taking a seat on her coffee table across from Isabel. The music shifted to a sultry salsa beat, which felt both perfect and inappropriate for the topic at hand. Stephanie leaned against the wall and munched a taquito aggressively. Barney twirled.

  Isabel focused on the question. “Her name is Taylor. But it doesn’t matter. She’s been out of pocket for the past couple of weeks, and it was stupid to begin with.”

  “Taylor Andrews,” Hadley whispered. A smile blossomed on her face and she grabbed her heart. “Of course it matters. I should have seen this coming. One attractive writer falling in love with another attractive writer. Sultry glances across their laptops. Like sands through the hourglass. Oh, I’m gonna love hearing about this one developing.”

  “Not in love. Not in love at all.” Isabel scrubbed her face, realizing that she was about to confess all, and maybe that was good. Using her friends as a sounding board might actually prove helpful. “All right. Yes, I have a crush, and how could I not? That woman comes with the kind of beauty that slams a person’s throat shut. You just have to accept that kind of fucked-up punishment because that’s what life demands.” It was all pretty cut and dried to Isabel.

  “Wow,” Hadley said. “I want to slam some woman’s throat shut.” She turned to Gia with hope in her eyes. “How can I do that?”

  “Just be you,” Gia said gently. “There’s only one Hadley. Plus, you don’t give yourself enough credit for being hot. Girls on the beach check you out all the time. You just forget to notice because you’re thinking of ways to make the world better. That makes you unique.”

  Hadley nodded. “Okay, I like that. I can work with that. I’m a hot do-gooder,” she said quietly to herself.

  “Now that,” Isabel said, pointing, “is the kind of self-affirmation I need.”

  “I’m willing to share the moniker,” Hadley said.

  Isabel shook her head. “I’m more of a sardonic, jaded train wreck than a do-gooder, but I appreciate the offer.”

  “So, what’s next with you and the boss, then?” Autumn asked Isabel. “Or will there be a next step, given the hands-off policy you’re implementing at work?”

  Isabel shook her head and sliced her hand through the air. “There will not be a next step. The buck stops with the crush. The torturous, all-consuming crush. Besides the obvious conflict of interest, she’s way out of my league. Dates starlets and people with lengthy IMDB pages.”

  Autumn placed a hand on Isabel’s knee and nodded. “I think that’s a very mature, adult approach.”

  Hadley shook her head sadly. “It’s also a boring approach.”

  Autumn held up a finger. “It’s not, if you think about it. This is her livelihood we’re talking about. Not to mention, she’s still new at her job. This is not the time to make waves, professional or erotic ones.”

  Hadley wasn’t done, her starry-eyed innocence in full effect. “Since when does a paycheck trump love?” While sweet, it wasn’t exactly an identifiable sentiment to Isabel, who valued living in the land of hard-core realism.

  “When it just doesn’t make sense,” Isabel answered. “And when I finally have the dream job in my eager little hands. I just need to keep my head down and my eyes off Taylor Andrews.”

  “So, you work for Taylor?”

  Isabel looked up to see that Stephanie had pushed herself off the wall. “Yes. I do.”

  “Right on. That lady’s my boyfriend’s aunt. We’re having dinner with her this week.” And with that, Stephanie headed right out the door, leaving a very confused Isabel grappling.

  “Wait. What?” Isabel asked, pointing after Death in Doc Martens as she exited the apartment. She turned back to the group. “Stephanie knows Taylor? Stephanie. Knows. Taylor. This is awful.”

  Gia looked confused. “That’s the longest sentence I’ve ever heard her speak.”

  Isabel moved her hand in a circular motion. “And she heard everything I just said, right? I mean, we’re sure about that?”

  Hadley looked thoughtful. “It’s hard to say with Stephanie. Sometimes I think she’s checked out and other times not so much. She’s a hard one to pin down.”

  “Hey,” Autumn said, reining her in. “Just because she knows your boss doesn’t mean she’s going to race off and tell all. Like Had said, she’s a quiet girl. I bet she stays that way.”

  “A quiet girl who has already made up her mind about me,” Isabel said in combination of shock and dread.

  Autumn nodded solemnly. “I’m thinking more sangria.”

  Gia and Hadley leapt up in pursuit, while Isabel contemplated how quickly one could die of mortification.

  Chapter Nine

  Taylor luxuriated in the feeling of being back on home turf. She’d even brought snacks for the script meeting, hot little pigs in a blanket. Okay, she’d ordered pastries for the meeting, but the thought was there, right? People would appreciate that. She made a point to arrive in the writers’ room first and smiled and greeted each member of her staff as they filed in. Why was she nervous and obsessively grasping at the sleeve of her suit jacket? She never did that.

  Kathleen and Isabel walked in with their heads together in a quiet chat. She hadn’t seen Isabel since their cafeteria run-in some weeks back. She looked…amazing, and seemed more sure of herself and in control—that is, until she met Taylor’s eyes and her smile faltered. She offered the briefest of nods before heading to her chair at the table, her cheeks coloring noticeably.

  Conversely, Kathleen made her way to the front of the room to greet Taylor. Normally, her gray hair was pinned neatly into a bun. Today, a handful of strands fell haphazardly from the pins, as if escaping a house fire. “Am I glad to see you,” she said quietly, as the other writers made small talk.

  “Oh, come on. It can’t have been that bad.”

  Kathleen frowned. “I had no idea how much you did around here. I come with a newfound respect. Over these past few weeks, I’ve barely had time to sleep.”

  “You’re sweet. I’m just a phone call away if you need anything. I mean that.”

  “I didn’t want to bother you.”

  Taylor smiled sweetly. “I’d much rather you bother me than be blindsided with a script I’m not on board with.”

  Kathleen hesitated. “I anticipated that. Give me time to convince you.”

  “I’m willing to listen.” But she carried lingering doubt. Kathleen had returned Taylor’s email the night before and had been quite receptive to the criticism. However, to her credit, she’d held her ground and they’d agreed to table the discussion until the script meeting.

  “How are things on Sister Dale?” Kathleen asked as she took her seat next to Taylor.

  She met Kathleen’s gaze. “It’s a shit-show, no pun intended, and it’s sucking my soul into a never-ending oblivion of dreck. Shall we begin?”

  Kathleen offered a curt nod. “Let’s.”

  After a few welcome-backs from her staff, Taylor kicked off the weekly script meeting in which they’d critique the most recently completed script, in this case, Isabel’s. The staff would have already read the script with the goal being to suggest improvements, point out roadblocks, and make sure the storyline advancements fit with what the other writers had been (and would be) writing in the future.

  “It’s bold,” Scruffy said, kicking them off. “It’s not something I would expect from Lisette, which is both positive and a shot in the foot.” He ran a hand up and down his beard thoughtfully. “We might be showing our footprints.”

  “So, you think it’s heavy-handed,” Taylor said. Validation already. This was going well. More of this, please, so she could safely back them away from this pitfall.

  “I didn’t say that.” He glanced at Isabel. “The cub over there has br
ought us a script that’s either brilliant or a disaster. I haven’t decided which.”

  Isabel nodded, but said nothing.

  Lyle sat tall with a burst of energy. “I’m just gonna say it. I hated it. I hated it a whole lot, and then I loved it. Finally, the Goody Two-shoes sibling is shaking it up. It’s time.”

  “I had the same reaction when I first heard the direction Isabel wanted to take this episode,” Kathleen said. “But it seems to me that she’s right. We’d already agreed on the Lisette/Thomas storyline. This episode just speeds us along.”

  “Right about what?” Taylor asked, feeling flabbergasted by her team’s response and more than a little defensive. Maybe more so because having been away for the past few weeks had her feeling like an outsider.

  “This is the time to go balls to the wall,” Isabel said, finally speaking up. “That’s what I told Kathleen, and it’s a sentiment I stand by. The show has played it safe for years now, keeping Lisette on some pedestal while her siblings cause all the trouble.”

  Taylor jumped in. “And will you stand by it if this is our jumping the shark moment and our numbers fall even further?” A pause as she glanced around the room. “Yeah, I didn’t think so.” She took a seat, frustrated that she didn’t see what her team did. Faced with a moment where she had to decide whether to lead or delegate, Taylor took the hard line. She scanned the faces of her staff. “I think we have to reshuffle. Cedric, we’ll move your episode, 409, in place of Isabel’s. It will require some minor rewriting for continuity, but it’s what’s going to happen.” She saw Isabel out of the corner of her eye fixate on her script, shrinking into herself in either anger or dejection, making notes in the margins of her pages. She offered zero eye contact, which meant she was taking this hard. She’d been sidelined on her first time out, and Taylor knew how much it must burn. Fortunately, she didn’t have the time to fixate on the feelings of a fledgling staff member, no matter how much she strangely wanted to and no matter how much Isabel’s reaction affected her.

  “Let’s map it all out.” Taylor moved to the whiteboard as details of their upcoming storylines were sequenced and cross-checked. Isabel seemed to perk back up and offered several suggestions on how to make the reshuffle work. She hadn’t directed any of her comments to Taylor, however, and that said something. When they finished the restructure, the writers scattered to embark upon their respective assignments. “Isabel, if we could talk in my office?”