Love's Encore Series (Books One and Two)

by Miranda MacLeod

  “Rory? Oh do tell. Is he really young and hot?”

  Cecily choked back a laugh. Now she knew Bailey was out of the loop. “Bailey, you’ve met Rorie, at the Oakwood. She designed the sets for our show, remember?”

  Bailey’s mouth dropped open. “Rorie’s a she? How did that happen?”

  She was born that way? Cecily swallowed her snarky response, knowing that this wasn’t what Bailey had intended to ask, and informed her instead, “We were together in college, and reconnected last fall.”

  “And she turned you back into a lesbian, just like that?”

  Cecily’s jaw slackened and she raised her eyebrows. “Um, I…” Nope. There’s no way to answer this. “You know what, how’s Phinn? Is he here in Portland with you?”

  Bailey’s face lit up at the mention of Phinn’s name. “It’s kind of a secret still, but look!” She thrust her left hand forward, twisting it back and forth to better display the planet-sized diamond that graced her ring-finger.

  Bailey might be as clueless as a child sometimes, but Cecily was genuinely pleased at her good news. “Congratulations! I’m so happy for you!”

  “Phinn’s back at the house, but he’s planning to come by later today. Will Rorie be coming to visit the set?”

  It was the first time the possibility had occurred to her, and Cecily brightened at the thought. Well, why not? “I’d love to show her around. That’s okay, to bring people to the set?”

  Bailey waved her hand dismissively. “Oh, sure. People do it all the time.” Bailey glanced away as someone called her name from the door of the trailer, then looked back at Cecily. “I’ve gotta go. Do you have any scenes today?”

  Cecily shook her head. “No. Not until Wednesday.”

  “That’s the day I have off. I don’t think the FBI characters and the police characters have many scenes together, so we may not see each other much on set. I’m mostly filming with Brad Perris, and boy is Phinn jealous! Of course, I guess your girlfriend would be way more upset if you were filming scenes with me, huh?”

  Bailey winked saucily and Cecily blinked hard to keep from rolling her eyes. Naturally, Bailey would be one of those straight girls who assumed that if you were into women at all, then you must be into her. Will people always act like this around me now, or is it just the surprise of finding out that makes them behave so strangely?

  Bailey scurried toward the door. “We should plan to get together soon, okay? I hear Portland has some great restaurants. Maybe we can get some of the other members of the cast together, too.”

  Cecily waved goodbye, then rejoined Rachel. Despite her friend’s occasional faux pas, her mood was tremendously improved by her encounter with Bailey, and she suddenly realized just how lonely she’d felt in the short time since her arrival. She’d talked to Rorie on the phone yesterday, but Rorie had been completely preoccupied with some cryptic message about her mother. She wanted to be there for her, but Rorie had told her it was probably just a mix up. Then the spotty cellphone coverage at her new apartment had cut out, and they hadn’t managed to reconnect since.

  It had been a frustrating experience, and a harsh reminder of how difficult long distance relationships could be. She missed Rorie so much after just a couple of days that she wasn’t sure how she would make it another four weeks until her trip home. Having Bailey and Phinn to spend time with would help keep her sane, but the prospect of inviting Rorie to visit over the Labor Day holiday was very appealing.

  “Rachel, what do I need to do so that my girlfriend would be allowed to come visit sometime during filming?”

  Rachel’s mouth twitched to one side as she thought. “It shouldn’t be complicated. I think you just get her name added to a list. I would suggest talking to Josh, the AD. He’ll know what to do.”

  They continued the tour through the wardrobe trailer and onto the sets in studios one and two, which were in the brick buildings where Cecily had first arrived. When they’d concluded the orientation, Rachel handed Cecily a new iPad in a sleeve with her name on it. “Your script for Wednesday. We’re going paperless as part of a green initiative, so I’ve loaded everything you need for now on here, and will take care of syncing it for you every morning when you arrive. Is there anything else you need?”

  Cecily looked at the sleek little tablet and stifled a laugh. Between this, and the trailer, and the van, and the apartment—she could hardly believe it was real. When she thought back to the start of the summer and her voice acting career, even Grant Studios was nothing compared to this. Is there anything else I need? Cecily couldn’t think of a thing. Well, maybe just one thing. “Can you tell me where Josh’s office is?”

  Cecily stood outside the AD’s office and tapped on the door frame. A man in his forties sat behind the desk. He glanced up at the sound and invited her in.

  “Cecily DuPont, right? Nice to meet you! How are you settling in?”

  “Really well, thanks. The apartment is perfect, and Rachel’s just finished showing me around. I’m really excited to get started, and I just had a quick question I was told you could help with.”

  “Sure, what do you need?” He smiled pleasantly.

  “Well, I’d like to invite my girlfriend for a visit in a couple weeks, and I was told you would be the one to ask to get her access to the set.”

  Josh’s smile faded. “Oh, I’m sorry. We’re limiting access just to spouses and significant others right now.”

  Cecily looked at him in confusion. “Uh…that’s what I just said. My girlfriend.”

  His face took on an expression of profound puzzlement, followed by a dawning understanding. “Oh…oh! I thought you meant a girl friend…I… okay, right.” He nodded his head silently for a moment. “Yeah. Sure. I can look into that for you. It could be a little… complex. Lots of hoops to jump through and all that, but yeah… I’ll let you know.”

  Cecily thanked him and headed out to where she had been dropped off that morning. The van was there but the driver appeared to have stepped away, so she decided to walk back to her apartment. As she navigated through the congested streets toward the Pearl District, she pondered her conversation with Josh, and the more she analyzed it, the stranger it felt to her.

  Something doesn’t seem right. Rachel had told her that getting a pass for Rorie would be as simple as adding her name to a list, and Bailey seemed to think so, too. But Josh made it sound like it would take something akin to a declaration from the President. Someone had to be mistaken. She’d be tempted to chalk it up to an inexperienced PA, except Rachel had seemed so competent when it came to everything else that it was difficult to imagine her being wrong about a simple policy question.

  The other possibility—that she was being discriminated against deliberately—left a cold lump in the pit of her stomach. She thought about it for a minute, then brushed the notion aside. This was twenty-first century Hollywood, after all. She was hardly the only actress out there with a girlfriend! She laughed at herself for being overly dramatic. Rachel probably didn’t know all the details that were involved the way Josh did, that was all. And she was reading things into it that weren’t there. Josh hadn’t meant to offend her any more than Bailey had with her clueless questions. She just wasn’t yet accustomed to the normal range of people’s reactions when they found out about Rorie, and needed to remember to give people the benefit of the doubt.

  She’d arrived at her apartment and was preparing to read through her lines for Wednesday when the phone rang. It was Jonas. She answered, wondering if it was a routine call to see how the new job was going.

  “Cecily, I just wanted to touch base about a little contract detail I failed to go over before.”

  “Oh?” She felt the mild tingle of anxiety that the mention of contracts was bound to provoke. After the Grant Studios debacle, if he was about to tell her there was some hiccup with getting paid, she might scream.

  “Yeah, don’t worry. It’s nothing serious. Just, there’s a standard clause in the contract about not d
iscussing sensitive information with third parties that I don’t think we talked about, and now seemed like a good time.”

  “Sensitive information, you mean like not giving spoilers to media? I kind of assumed that was frowned upon,” Cecily said with a laugh.

  Jonas laughed, too. “Yeah, definitely no spoilers. And just, you know, not giving personal interviews unless they’ve been pre-approved by the studio, not talking about your private life…”

  His emphasis on that word, private, brought the cold lump back again. This isn’t just a friendly chat. It’s a warning. Benefit of the doubt, be damned! “Jonas, did Josh Cunningham ask you to call me? Because if this has anything to do with Rorie or my sexual orientation, there would be grounds for me to—”

  “What?” His voice was laced with just a bit too much surprise to sound natural. “No! Of course not. But…”

  “But?” Cecily’s voice was controlled, but her hackles were raised. “Jonas, this is straying into dangerous territory. It’s starting to feel like a violation of my rights and—”

  “Whoa! Whoa, now. Let’s not start making this into something it isn’t, kiddo. Nobody’s violating anybody’s rights. This is just a…friendly chat, that’s all. Just a tip from your agent that sometimes the public likes a little mystery about their stars, you know? And that sometimes when you’re an unknown actor with an open ended contract, well, jobs have been known to last a lot longer than six episodes sometimes when the studio executives feel like you’re on the same page about things. They like a team player. That’s all I’m saying.”

  That may have been all he said, but what was left unsaid was loud and clear. If Cecily wanted this job to turn into something more permanent than it was now, she would be wise to keep her private life strictly to herself. She didn’t like the situation one bit, but she feared that fighting it could cost her the job, or sabotage her chances for advancing her career. That was the last thing she wanted to do, but was the potential payoff worth putting up with the crap they were trying to pull? I need to talk to Rorie. She dialed her number, but it went to voicemail. Cecily hung up the phone and sighed. I wish Rorie was here.

  Chapter 12

  “What do you mean you have to postpone your trip? It’s next week!” Rorie massaged her temples and glared at Cecily’s photograph on her nightstand. It was a less than satisfactory substitute to express her displeasure at, but apparently it would have to do since Cecily wouldn’t be around to glare at in person for the foreseeable future. I knew something like this was going to happen!

  “I’m sorry, Rorie. I just got a call from Jonas and—”

  “Not Jonas again,” she groaned, feeling irrationally angry with the man. “I’m beginning to hate when he calls.” Rorie still chafed at the clause in Cecily’s contract that had prevented her from visiting over the recent long weekend. Even though she knew it wasn’t his fault—she’d been around Hollywood long enough to have seen her fair share of gay actors being instructed to be vague about their private lives with the media—she still disliked him for it.

  “Well, Jonas said the schedule changed and they need me during the time they’d told me I could take off. Jonas had the nerve to reschedule my work at Grant Studios for October before he called!”

  “Well, to be fair, it’s his job to manage your bookings. That’s why you pay him, Cici.” Rorie had no idea why she was suddenly inclined to stick up for the man she was just cursing seconds before, but in her contrary mood she felt compelled to disagree with whatever Cecily said.

  “He made all the arrangements for the week after my birthday, so I won’t even get to be home for that. He could have talked to me about it first!”

  Rorie rolled her eyes at her girlfriend’s complaints. “Seriously, Cici? You’re this riled up because your agent forgot about your birthday?” Normally Rorie would’ve been disappointed by this news, too, but she had other concerns right now. Like whether to keep ignoring the contact information for my mother that my attorney emailed to me two weeks ago. Concerns that Cecily was too wrapped up in herself to even ask about.

  She realized that the line was silent. Rorie could hear the hitch in Cecily’s breath over the phone and knew that she was fighting back tears. She pictured Cecily crying, all alone, and her peevishness dissipated, replaced by an aching desire to be close enough to wipe the tears from her cheeks. There were few things more painful to her than the sound of Cecily in tears.

  “It’s not the birthday. It’s that I can’t be there when Tyler moves in, and I don’t know what to do.”

  Oh, shit. Tyler. Rorie had totally forgotten that Cecily’s son was arriving in LA next week. Guilt needled her. Cecily wasn’t the only one who was being self-centered. She’d been just as wrapped up in her own problems as Cecily was, and neither one of them was succeeding at supporting the other right now. Damn this job for being so far away!

  Rorie sighed. Something had to be done about Tyler’s arrival. It’s not like UCLA would postpone starting classes for a few weeks to accommodate an actress’s schedule, though she assumed a few had tried asking. And Cecily’s shooting schedule was set in stone. Which left her. She had insecurities by the cartload over how to interact with Tyler now that she was dating his mother, but if Cecily couldn’t be there for him, Rorie had to step in. She hesitated a beat, screwing up her courage. “Send me his itinerary. I’ll take care of Tyler.”

  “No, Rorie, I promised you I wouldn’t ask you to step in like this.” Her words said ‘no’ but the relief was evident in her tone.

  “I’ve got it covered.” Rorie’s voice exuded a confidence far exceeding what she felt inside. But how hard could it be to pick up a teenage boy from the airport and help him move into a dorm? It was a simple operation. Drive the car. Carry boxes. Done.

  She took a deep breath. I can do this.

  Traffic on the 405 freeway was typical for a Friday afternoon, which is to say that it was exactly like a parking lot except that every few minutes the cars shifted forward one space. The GPS claimed that the drive from the Los Angeles International Airport to the UCLA campus in Westwood would take fifteen minutes ‘without traffic’, but Rorie was fairly certain such conditions were nothing but an urban legend. In LA, traffic was as sure as death and taxes. At the current rate, they’d be lucky if the drive took under an hour.

  “Is the sky always this color?” Tyler stared out the car window as they lurched along, nodding his head toward the outline of downtown LA, which was shrouded in a layer of brown smog that clung to the tops of the tall buildings like wisps of dirty cotton candy.

  “I’m afraid it is, at least until the worst of the summer heat wears off.” The calendar claimed that fall was just around the corner, but outside Rorie’s air-conditioned car, the weather that day bore a strong resemblance to a bowl of hot soup.

  Well, we’ve covered the weather. Now what? Rorie rummaged around for a new topic of conversation. She liked Tyler well enough—he was Cecily’s son, so of course she did—but she didn’t know how to relate to a boy his age. What on earth do you say to them? They’d bonded over their shared love of film when they met in Connecticut, but you couldn’t just talk about films twenty-four hours a day. Still, she had to say something because the car had gotten uncomfortably quiet.

  “Uh, Tyler, I’m…sorry your mom’s not here to meet you like she’d wanted to be.” Rorie cringed at her awkwardness. She wondered if there was a class she could take to learn how to parent your partner's adult child. If not, someone should start one.

  “She still thinks I can’t take care of myself.” He said it petulantly, then straightened up, seeming to realize how childish he’d sounded. “Er…I mean, not that I’m not grateful for the ride…and…stuff.” Tyler’s cheeks flushed at his own awkwardness.

  “Glad to do it. So, the dorm’s on Hilgard?” she asked as the car inched its way toward the Wilshire Boulevard exit. She glanced over at him and arched an eyebrow questioningly. “I thought that was all sorority houses over there.”r />
  Tyler shook his head. “There’s a private dorm, too. But the proximity to the sorority houses might be why I didn’t put up a bigger fight over it.” Tyler had turned pink to the tips of his ears.

  “Can’t fault you for that,” Rorie said with a snort. “Of course, I should’ve known with your family that you’d be in a special, fancy dorm.”

  “Not fancy, exactly. Just closer. The dorm the school was going to assign me to was on the opposite side of campus and Mom said I’d be more likely not to skip classes if I didn’t have to walk too far.”

  “Yeah, she’s probably right. I lived off campus and it was way easier to get to classes when I slept with your mom at her dorm. Er…I mean…” Rorie could feel her entire face begin to burn, and it was Tyler’s turn to make a laughing snort. “We’re going to pretend I never said that.”

  “Gotcha. My mother’s a saint, and I am, in fact, the product of a modern day immaculate conception.” Tyler winked. “It doesn’t matter how old I get, I’ll always be willing to buy into that story, trust me.”

  “As willingly as she’ll believe you when you tell her how you hadn’t even noticed there were sorority houses surrounding your dorm, I’m sure.”

  Cars were lined up bumper to bumper along the curb outside the three-story, white stucco dormitory that Tyler would soon call home. Up and down the street, parents and students carried duffel bags and boxes, and every car seemed loaded to the bursting point with stuff. Rorie looked uneasily at Tyler’s two suitcases as she lifted them from the trunk and set them on the sidewalk next to her car. “Are you sure you have everything you need?”

  “I shipped a bunch of boxes ahead. They should have them inside. Plus, my roommate’s local, so he’s bringing the bigger stuff like a microwave and a refrigerator.”

  Rorie was relieved. It’s not that she wouldn’t take Tyler shopping if he needed to go, but she hadn’t a clue what was considered essential for dormitories these days. Twenty years ago, it had been a coffee pot and CD player. The need for caffeine was timeless and universal, but she was almost certain nobody listened to CDs anymore. Suddenly, she felt old, and as she lugged a suitcase up the steep stairs from the sidewalk to the front door, the constant crunching and popping of cartilage in her right knee did little to convince her she was wrong.