Hollywood Ending

by Kellye Garrett

  Spoiler Alert. Sweetie was not very sweet. I looked to see what she was reading. The infamous “Stars Are Just Like Us!” page of Us Weekly. Toni was outside Versailles restaurant off La Cienega Boulevard. She’d been tearing into a piece of garlic chicken and the camera had caught her mid-chew. It wasn’t a pretty sight. At all.

  Anyone would have looked bad in that type of pic. Movie star or not. Problem was, we were dealing with an “or not.” It wasn’t a photo of Toni. It was Emme. She was indeed the bigger of the twins. If you considered a size two to be big.

  And people wondered why Emme barely left her house.

  I pointed to the photo. “You think that’s big?”

  Sweetie still didn’t look up. “Hey, if the shoe fits and the outfit doesn’t … ”

  Geez, she was a cranky one. Perhaps because she’d been subsisting on kale, hot air, and judgement for most of her adult life. Any guilt I felt about my forthcoming lie went as ghost as Casper. “If that’s a hippo, then you must think I’m Godzilla.”

  Sweetie looked up long enough to give me a once over. She didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to. Her expression said it all.

  Since we were apparently judging appearances and what not, I took her in. It was a given she’d fit right in at the “Mean Girls” lunch table if only she wasn’t twenty-plus years too old. It was clear she was still searching for the fountain of eternal youth. It was also clear that she hadn’t found it. Her body was as fat-free as skim milk. Her skin happened to be just as pale. If it weren’t for the perfectly ponytailed red hair, I’d have mistaken her for a skeleton. I wasn’t impressed. In the least. “Now are we done with the critique so you can actually do your job?” I said.

  Sienna glanced at me. We’d agreed she would play bad cop, but that was B.S.—Before Sweetie.

  “You have to excuse my friend.” Sienna reluctantly fell into her new role. “She got up in the wrong bed this morning.”

  “You mean wrong side of the bed,” I said.

  Sienna leaned toward Sweetie and whispered loud enough so I could hear, “I don’t. She didn’t even get his name. I told her not to have that fourth drink.”

  They both laughed and Sweetie looked ready to give Sienna the other half of a “Best Friends Forever” necklace. “How can I help you?” It was clear by her tone that Sweetie literally meant just Sienna. I wasn’t offended. At all.

  “We’re here to pick up an order. Should be under Keila Somers.” That was the name I’d picked for our cover story. Sienna held up the certificate. It was Omari’s, of course, but that was need-to-know information. And Sweetie clearly did not need to know.

  Sweetie pushed some buttons on a laptop, then stared at the screen. “You’re all set.” I already knew that, since we’d been the one to call and set it up. “You didn’t even have to come in. It’s scheduled to be delivered this evening,” Sweetie said.

  “Delivered?” I turned to Sienna, channeling my Sweetie-induced rage into the role. “You set it up for delivery?”

  We had, but that had been part of the plan. Sienna played her role to perfection. “Of course not. I clearly told the girl on the phone it was a pickup. We all know J. does not do delivery. Not food. Not flowers. Certainly not bikes. There must be some mistake.”

  I addressed Sweetie but looked at Sienna. “Was there, Sweetie? A mistake?”

  Out the corner of my eye, I saw Sweetie shake her head. “It’s already on the truck.”

  “But we called and explained the situation, right?” Again, I directed my ire at Sienna. It was called method acting. Brando had won an Oscar for it. Two, in fact. “We explained that our boss didn’t like deliveries. Didn’t we?”

  “We did,” Sienna said. We actually didn’t. Another part of my plan. “Is the truck still here?” she asked Sweetie.

  Sweetie nodded.

  “Can’t you just take it off the truck?” Sienna asked.

  “We’d have to take every bike off, and we have a lot of deliveries.”

  “Can we talk to the manager?” I asked.

  “That would be me,” Sweetie said. Of course it would. With her sunny disposition she had to be the owner’s second wife’s third cousin once removed.

  “I understand.” Sienna turned back to me. “You should call her right now and explain the mistake.”

  “I should call her? And explain your mistake?”

  Sienna nodded. “You’re the executive assistant, remember? I’m just the personal assistant. You’re the one always throwing your seniority in my face.”

  My phone rang right on cue. “Oh look, she’s calling.” I finally turned to Sweetie as I got out my phone, making sure she saw the caller ID pic. “It’s our boss.”

  Six

  Sweetie’s eyes bugged out when she realized who the order was for. Or at least who she thought it was for. I’d gotten the J. Chris pic off of Instagram—a “no makeup” shot posted thirty-four weeks back. I knew from past experience people changed their tune when they thought you were talking to an A-list celebrity, especially one with as bad of a diva reputation as J. Chris. TMZ kept a running log of how many cell phones she’d destroyed by throwing them at poor assistants and salesgirls’ faces. I believe it was up to seventeen, but I hadn’t checked in the last five or so minutes. The number could’ve grown.

  I hit answer. “Hi, Ms. Christie. It’s Keila.”

  “As in Tequila?” Emme asked from miles away. “You got your fake name from liquor?”

  “No!” I said. “Not your personal assistant. That’s Sheila. This is your executive assistant.”

  “Keila and Sheila? You knew they rhymed when you chose these names, didn’t you?”

  “Yep. We’re at Wheelhouse but there’s a slight issue with your bike.”

  “Should I yell now?”

  “Not yet,” I said. “They won’t let us take the bike with us. They’ll only deliver it.”

  “What about now? Can I yell now? Can I? Can I? Can I?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I did tell them who you were. They don’t seem too concerned with keeping your business private.”

  Emme let me have it. “Look here Tequila. Brandy. Champagne. Whatever your name is. I gave you exactly one job to do. One!”

  I pulled the phone away from my ear all shocked-like so Sweetie could hear. Every. Single. Word. “I have my interview with Gus the Gossip in a few hours,” Emme continued. That is, J. Chris did. I’d checked. You can’t say a girl doesn’t do her research. “I can’t be concerned with this. Tell them if that bike even drives past my house, I will destroy them.”

  Yes, it was melodramatic. It was also accurate. J. Chris had dropped a “I’ll destroy you” during a disagreement with a flower place over being sent a white rose bouquet. I’d read about it—and every other detail—in a wrongful termination lawsuit filed by her fourth assistant.

  “They won’t let you pick it up? Who told you these lies?” Emme went on. “Give me their name. Now!”

  I glanced at Sweetie, who shook her head frantically.

  “I have to get her name. Let me call you right back.” I hung up. “How quickly can we get the bike off your truck?”

  Not bothering to wait, I walked to the back of the building. Sienna scurried behind me. Sweetie was right behind her yapping a mile a minute. “You can’t go back there!”

  I turned back to her. “I’m trying to save our jobs. All of our jobs. We’ll look through the bikes. When we find it, you get it off the truck. Or just rip the dang address label off it. I don’t care. But that bike cannot make it to that house.”

  Within minutes the three of us were in the truck staring at boxes upon boxes of stationary bikes packed tighter than a freshly botoxed face. The labels were stuck in a top corner of each box for easy viewing. “VIP orders have a pink sticker,” Sweetie said. “Let Jimmy know when you find it and he’ll take it off.”
She motioned to a worker a few feet away who was paying us no mind. “I gotta get back to the front desk. Make sure you let Ms. Christie know how accommodating we were.”

  And with that, she was gone. I was surprised she’d leave us alone, but it wasn’t like we could stick a 125-pound bike down our pants and sneak out.

  Luckily, there were only about fifteen pink stickers, which was fine by me. I hadn’t been this happy to be in the back of a truck since high school. “You know the plan,” I reminded Sienna. “Take a pic of all the addys. We’ll have Emme look them up later and see if any could possibly belong to our killer.”

  We worked in blissful silence. I recognized a few names and several streets. Nominees clearly weren’t passing up the free swag. I had a great rhythm going when Sienna called out from somewhere in the depths. “Found it!”

  She sounded confident. Almost too confident. I came over for a closer look. The box was addressed to a R. Jones who lived in Ferndale. “You sure?” I asked, just to be, well, sure.

  “Have you heard of Ferndale?”

  “Nope.”

  “Me neither. And if I don’t recognize a place that means only one thing. No one famous has lived there. Ever. This is our guy.”

  I believed her, but still. “Let’s look at the last couple. Just in case.”

  Five minutes later, we were walking back to the car. Unfortunately, we had to pass Sweetie, once again immersed in her magazine at the front desk. Glad to see she was working hard. “You find the bike?” she called out as we speed-walked by.

  “Yeah, but she changed her mind,” I said. “You can deliver it. She consulted her spiritual advisor, who said it’s a good day for deliveries.” The address they were shipping the bike to was Emme’s apartment, anyway.

  Three hours later, Sienna, the bike, and I were all crowded into Emme’s living room. The delivery guy—a different one from Jimmy—had just finished setting it up. Emme stared at the bike, then looked at me. “IDK.” I don’t know.

  “You said you wanted to exercise more,” I said. “Now you can take spin classes and not leave your house. I figured you’d love it.”

  “Sigh,” she said, in lieu of actually sighing. “Fine. You win.” I didn’t know it was a competition, yet I still treasured the victory. “I’ll send you video of me on it from my new Focals.”

  “If you get them,” I said, knowing full well she would get them and I would be the one buying them for her. She knew it too, which made it all the more frustrating.

  “Right,” she said. Then, “You have the addresses?” Emme had found some quite possibly illegal fancy software online that did instant background checks.

  “I already know which one it is,” Sienna said.

  “Maybe R. Jones is someone’s assistant,” I said.

  “Not a chance. Hollywood assistants are the ultimate wannabes. They aren’t living in Ferndale. They probably live in ritzier neighborhoods than their bosses.”

  Touché, but still. I called out an address. Emme typed it in, fingers flying over the keyboard. But Sienna was faster. “That’s Leo DiCaprio’s Malibu house.”

  Emme nodded. “Right.”

  I gave her the next address. Once again, Sienna spoke up. “Reese’s beach house.”

  “Ding. Ding.”

  It was a good party trick. I made a mental note to ask her to bust it out at our next get-together. I gave Sienna my phone. “In the interest of time, let me know if you don’t recognize any of these addresses. While you do that, Emme can look up the Ferndale addy?”

  I read it off. Emme tapped a few buttons, then spoke. “The R stands for Regina,”

  Blurg. “Anyone live with her?”

  “IDK,” Emme said. “No one else is listed.”

  I’m the first to admit black people can definitely get creative with names, but it was rare even for us to name a boy Regina. Maybe she was someone’s poor assistant after all. Emme motioned to a monitor. “No Facebook or Twitter. Did find her Instagram. It’s private though.”

  I looked. The page was indeed locked. All we could see was her profile pic. On Emme’s gigantic monitor, Regina looked almost lifesize. She wore a tank top and on her arm was a tattoo. A rose that turned into a clock. The top featured some very familiar cogs.

  Regina Jones must have been one of those people with her phone permanently attached to her hand because she accepted my follow request almost immediately. Of course, she didn’t follow the Ms. Lady of the Red Vine fan account back. As Sienna pointed out, that was kind of rude. We needed as many followers as possible. Plus, she would miss out on some great shots.

  Regina clearly wasn’t the killer. She had boobs. The guy in the surveillance footage didn’t. The first photo on her page was her cuddled up. Unfortunately, it wasn’t with a man with a matching tattoo. It was with a statue. One made of dingy brown metal sculpted into a curly haired woman giving a side-eye for the ages. She had her legs crossed and arm casually propped on back of a bench. The bench was coincidentally made from the same material, which gave the effect that the woman had been waiting for something for so long that she’d mummified.

  “It’s Lucy!” I said. “They’re in Palm Springs!”

  Sienna and I had taken a trip out there a couple of years back and went full tourist. The Lucille Ball statue had been one of our first stops. We had the pictures to prove it, including one of Sienna thrusting her own boobs out right next to Lucy’s as if comparing the goods.

  I read the caption. “Mr. Wonderful got me going on vacay. #MrWonderful #Surprise #Vacay #Needed #ILoveLucy #ILove Him #TooBlessedToBeStressed #Love #ILoveMyLife.”

  Personally, I thought it was #Overkill but apparently one couldn’t have too many hashtags, just like one couldn’t have too many friends. Regina didn’t hashtag where they were staying, but then she didn’t have to. I was guessing it was the hotel from the swag bag.

  “So, she’s dating a murderer,” Emme said.

  “Looks like it,” I answered. “The ink. The bike. Now the trip to Palm Springs. It all added up.”

  “We’re going to Palm Springs!” Sienna couldn’t mask the excitement in her voice and realized it too. She opened her mouth again, attempting to sound more solemn. “For work.”

  “Not yet,” I said.

  She motioned to Emme’s Gigantor computer screen. “The photo was posted three hours ago. They’re there. We need to catch him in the act … of tanning.”

  “We just need a photo or a name, which we can get from here. Let’s keep checking her page.”

  We combed the rest of her Instagram in hopes of finding a photo of her beloved. We got zilch. Apparently, the only thing Regina liked more than hashtags was selfies—893 to be exact. And not in a single one did she bother to clean her bathroom mirror. Though there were quite a few mentions of Mr. Wonderful there wasn’t a single picture. Regina also didn’t tag his account or mention his real name.

  “I guess Mr. Wonderful is a tad photo shy,” I finally said.

  “Are we sure he even exists?” Sienna asked. We’d had a previous experience with a make-believe boyfriend.

  “Yep. This’s one is on tape,” I said.

  Sienna smiled again. “Palm Springs it is!”

  I still wasn’t quite ready to go the confrontation route. “I’m gonna send her a DM.”

  It read: Mr. Wonderful might not be who you think he is. Plz call.

  I included my cell number.

  And with that, we parted ways. I headed to Omari’s. Sienna went home to get ready to go out with her friend Fab. Emme went back to her simulation game. Our own versions of pure bliss.

  Omari was home with no pressing party invitations, which meant I had him to myself. We went to bed very early, went to sleep very late, and woke up the next morning to his landline ringing. Yes, Omari still had a landline. He picked it up and mumbled a few words before thrusting
the phone in my general vicinity. “For you.”

  I was instantly awake and in full panic mode. Had bill collectors tracked me down to Omari’s place? I was tempted to just hang up. Then I remembered I’d actually paid Sallie Mae. She had no reason to send her attack dogs after me. But still. “Who is it?” I asked.

  “Nina.”

  That made me want to hang up even more. I took the phone anyway. “Hello … ”

  “You know who killed Lyla.” It was more statement than question.

  I was instantly confused. “I have a lead. That’s it. It might not even pan out.”

  “That’s not what TMZ says.”

  “Let me call you back.”

  I hung up and opened the TMZ app on my phone. Sure enough, it was the lead story. “No Chicken! Former Chubby’s Spokesperson and Ms. Lady of the Red Vine Solve Publicist’s Murder?”

  They’d even thoughtfully created a graphic of me holding a piece of fried chicken in one hand and a pair of handcuffs in the other. To make it even worse, they’d superimposed Sienna next to me, holding a piece of Red Vine licorice and a gun. She’d love it.

  Omari looked over my shoulder, saw what I was looking at, and went right back to sleep. “Way too early for this.”

  It really was. Still, I trucked on, not even bothering with the article. My brain wasn’t up yet. No way could I read anything longer than a sentence. Luckily, there was video. Sienna and Fab filled the screen as soon as I hit play. They walked out of a club and directly addressed the camera. The cameraman was off screen but I recognized the voice. Razzle.

  “So Ms. Red Vine. Solve any more murders?”

  Sienna just smiled coyly. That’s why she was my girl. Unfortunately, Fab jumped in. “Stop being modest! She already found the guy who killed that dead publicist!”

  Sienna’s eyes bugged out, words tumbling out her mouth. “We haven’t found anyone. We may have found someone connected to the guy.”