Thirty-Three Going On Girlfriend (The Spinster Series Book 2)

by Becky Monson

  “Me, too. I’ll be at home waiting for you when you get back.”

  “Yes, be waiting with a box of tissues. I’ll probably need it.” I try to make my voice convey that I’m joking, but most of me is not. “Although according to my contract, I’m not allowed to talk about the show until it’s broadcast. I’m not sure how I’ll keep that from you. So I might cry, but I won’t be able to tell you why.”

  He chuckles some more. I can picture him in his hotel room, lying on his bed in a T-shirt and boxers, his hair ruffled. I’d give anything to be there right now, instead of here, on the verge of a panic attack.

  “Well, I’ll let you get to bed. Just know that I’ll be thinking of you tomorrow. You’ll do great. I love you and I’m proud of you.”

  “Wait. What?”

  “I said, I’ll be thinking of you tomorrow and you’ll do great—”

  “Yes, I heard that,” I say, cutting him off. “What was the other thing you said?”

  “I’m proud of you?”

  “No, the other thing.”

  “I . . . love you?” He says it more quietly this time, but I heard it. I definitely heard it. “I love you, Jules,” he says it again, but much more seriously this time.

  “Um, you’ve never said that before,” says my stupid mouth. Honestly, why do I even have a brain?

  “I haven’t?”

  “No. You haven’t.”

  “Well I’ve felt that way for a while.”

  “You have?”

  “Yes, I have.”

  My heart is pounding in my chest, and I’m pretty sure he can hear it over the phone. And I’m smiling. I’m smiling like a lovesick schoolgirl.

  “Jules?”

  “I’m here,” I say, still smiling. “And I . . . um . . . love you. As well.”

  Wow. Just wow. I have got to be the most eloquent person I know.

  “I’m sorry. I couldn’t hear that,” he says in a mocking tone.

  “I love you.” I spit out quickly, so that I don’t stutter this time.

  “Good.”

  “Yes. Good.”

  The phone goes silent. I’m still grinning from ear to ear and wondering if he’s doing the same. He chuckles lightly into the phone, confirming that he is.

  “Okay, we both need to get to bed.”

  “Yes, I guess you’re right.”

  “Call me during one of your breaks tomorrow, if you can.”

  “I’ll try to.”

  We say goodnight and hang up. There is so much more I could have said, and wanted to say. I probably shouldn’t lay all my cards out in one night, though. I want to marry you and have all your babies! And he’s right, I probably should try to get some sleep. But I’ve got giddy feelings in my stomach, mixed with looming nausea. I’m not sure I can sleep.

  Jared said he loves me. He loves me! It wasn’t declared in the most romantic setting, but it was totally perfect in its own way.

  CHAPTER 8

  This is it. It’s go time. Thank goodness I remembered my pants.

  I had a dream—more like nightmare—last night in which I was not wearing pants. And I kept going to get cupcakes out of the oven, only there was nothing there. When I finally had some cupcakes to present, they were red velvet with coconut frosting. The judges hated them, and I was cut in the first round. Also, Patti was a goat that kept eating my ingredients.

  I didn’t share that part of the dream with Patti.

  It was a stress dream and I should have seen it coming. It’s just been so long since I’ve had one. The last time was when I was working at Spectraltech, and I had a dream that my old boss Mr. Nguyen wanted an accounting report, and when I went to print it, it just kept printing and printing and printing. I had that dream often. I’m not sure what it meant.

  Maybe I should have Lia analyze my dreams. Only I haven’t had any stress dreams since I started at the bakery. Huh. I just realized that. Maybe you don’t have stress dreams when you love your job?

  Currently we are waiting in the green room while they get a few last things situated, and then we’re on. We’ve had someone touch up our hair and makeup. The look of death Patti gave the poor stylist who attempted to touch her bouffant was hilarious (and probably scary for the stylist). Needless to say, Patti’s hair is just as it always is, big and back-combed.

  We’re wearing matching T-shirts that have “Julia’s Bakery” on the front, and “You are what you eat, so eat something sweet” on the back. They’re the same shirts we wear at the bakery. Well, I wear them. Patti wears “whatever she darn well pleases.” But she had to conform today, even if the hot pink color of the shirts reflects off her big, blonde hair, giving it a slight pink hue. I wanted to go with black, but one of the other teams called it first.

  Speaking of the other teams, we’ve finally met the competition. Two husband and wife teams and one sister team. I’m the only one here without family, although Patti has become like family so that counts. Everyone seems nice and a bucket of nerves like me. All of us except for one team that is, the Somethings (also known as the black-color-shirt-stealers). That’s not their actual name, I just can’t remember. Brady and Something Something . . . I’m not good with first names either. I only remember Brady because I immediately thought of The Brady Bunch when I met him. Not just because of his name, but he also has a strange resemblance to the oldest brother, Greg, down to the curly dark hair. I’m expecting him to say the word “groovy” at any moment.

  The Somethings are those type of people that “get the party started.” Bordering on obnoxious, their game-on approach to this whole thing has been quite the spectacle. Every once in a while, completely out of the blue, mind you, they will scream the name of their bakery and high five. My heart has jumped a couple of times, it’s that loud and that out of the blue. I pray the producers tell them not to do that when the cameras roll. Who knows what I might do under the pressure of the cameras and their screaming? I might throw a cupcake at their heads. It would be completely accidental, of course.

  The other two teams I’ve named The Tallies (the other husband and wife team—they are ridiculously tall, like basketball player tall) and the Sisters (that one is pretty obvious).

  My stomach aches from being so tangled up and nervous. I’m not sure if I want to pinch myself and make sure I’m not dreaming, or kick myself for being here in the first place. I curse everyone who convinced me to do this.

  “We are about to go to the kitchens,” Jordan says, making my stomach ball up even further.

  Coincidentally, Jordan was the intern that was assigned to assist Patti and me with all of the backstage stuff. Interesting fact about Jordan, the head bobbing is not a car thing. It’s an all-the-time thing. It’s really starting to get on my nerves. In Jordan’s defense, my nerves are easy to get on right now.

  Patti reaches over and gives my hand a quick squeeze. My other hand has a death-grip on my phone. Jared and I have been texting back and forth all morning. We are not supposed to have our phones on us at this point, but I figured what’s the harm if we are in the green room and the cameras aren’t rolling.

  I text Jared.

  It’s time to go. Wish me luck.

  My phone buzzes back almost immediately.

  You’ll be great.

  I wish his vote of confidence would make me feel better about everything. Like a cheesy chick-flick movie where the man’s love is what makes the heroine do incredible things.

  My phone buzzes again.

  Love you.

  Okay, that does bolster my spirits a bit. I giggle, grinning at my phone, then text him back a “love you, too” reply. This is fun. I’ve never loved someone before, or had them love me back. Well, I mean, not in this way.

  “Who ya textin’?” Patti glances at my phone.

  “Jared,” I say simply, still smiling giddily at my phone.

  “He sendin’ you a sexy picture or somethin’?” She raises her eyebrows at her inference.

  “No!” I say quickly, “
Jared doesn’t do that.”

  “Oh, you two. So boring.” She clicks her tongue, disapproving.

  “You do that with your husband? Wait. Nope,” I hold up a hand, “I don’t want to know the answer to that.”

  Patti and her husband Randall walk the pervy line, always pinching each other’s butts anytime they are around one another, even in public. That’s the worst kind of PDA. They think it’s fun to make an innuendo out of everything. It’s really not fun for the rest of us. I’m sure they sext each other, and I don’t need details.

  Patti shakes her head and chuckles softly to herself. “Nah, Randy would never do somethin’ like that. But the guy before him, now that would have been right up his alley,” she says with a reminiscent look.

  “You never told me there was a guy before Randall,” I say, grateful to think about something else other than cupcakes or battles. It’s probably not the best idea, but I’m too nervous. I need the distraction.

  “Yeah, Roger was his name. I think in another life I woulda married him.”

  “What happened?”

  “Oh, ya know. He joined the Army. We tried to keep things goin’, but the long-distance thing kinda ruined things.” She shakes her head, that reminiscent expression still on her face. “But, Roger was a lot of fun,” she says, giving me a wink. “A lot.”

  Ew. I stop asking questions because frankly, I don’t want any more information.

  “COOL CAKES!” Team Something screams from across the room, as their intern leads them out to the studio.

  “I’m gonna slap those two,” Patti says, visibly shaken by the sudden outburst from Team Idiot (I may change their name to that). I jumped a little, but not as big as the first time they did it.

  “Yep, we are ready to go,” Jordan says, talking into his headset. He stands up and motions for us to stand, too.

  My heart starts to beat rapidly, like very rapidly. I wonder if I should ask Jordan if there is a medic on staff to help when people faint, because if not, they should have one waiting in the wings for me. I’ve never fainted before. I’m thinking today it might happen.

  Patti grabs my hand and gives it another quick squeeze. We glance at each other and I take a deep breath. There’s no turning back now. Well, I could make a run for it, but I’m already in this deep, I may as well finish.

  Anyway, what’s the worst that could happen? I could embarrass myself in front of millions of people. No big deal.

  Jordan turns on our microphone packs, which is slightly awkward since mine is attached to the back of my pants.

  “Let’s go.” He starts to walk out of the green room and we follow.

  Here we go.

  CHAPTER 9

  “Can you say that again with a little more excitement?” the cameraman says to me.

  “Um, sure,” I say reluctantly. I thought I did say it with excitement.

  I take a step back. Maybe my problem is that the camera is so close it feels like they could see the pores on my nose.

  “Okay, try it again,” Hal the cameraman demands. We are on a first-name basis, Hal and I, mostly because I keep tripping over myself, running into things, dropping things, and not using enough enthusiasm (allegedly). This has all happened only in the first ten minutes of taping.

  It’s going to be a long day.

  “I’m Julia, from Julia’s Bakery, in Denver, Colorado!” I shout brightly and raise my eyebrows up, so I seem more excited, but I’m pretty sure it’s going to come across as deer-caught-in-headlights. I don’t care. Let’s just get to the baking part of this competition. The introduction and cheerleading part of this thing is not my forte.

  “That should work,” Hal the cameraman says with his mouth, but his body language and facial expressions say otherwise. He’s probably thinking he got the short end of the stick when he was assigned to my kitchen.

  He moves on to Patti, who I’m sure will give him more of what he’s wanting. Or if not, a not very understandable Southern saying. Either way, she’s bound to be more entertaining than me.

  There are four open kitchens, one for each of us in the competition. So far, we have stayed in our own kitchen areas and done our intros there. Except for a few whoops and chanting of “Cool Cakes, Cool Cakes, Cool Cakes” by the Somethings, everyone else has been pretty quiet. Hopefully they are all as flustered as I am. I’d hate to be the only one.

  I’m not sure what impression I gave them during my audition tape, but obviously I made it seem like I was good on camera. In my defense, I was by myself, I had nothing to lose, and I was hopped up on Percocet. This time I’ve got two cameramen practically up my butt, lights everywhere, and a swarm of production crew members all in my personal space. It’s fairly disconcerting. I need something chemical, something to get me moving. I’m pretty sure Percocet would be a bad idea. Plus, the bottle is at home.

  Time to bring in the big guns. I search for Jordan. I spy him over in the corner, using his headset with an air of importance. Oh, brother. He makes eye contact with me and I signal him to come over to where I’m standing.

  “Any chance you can get me one of those Rock Star drinks?” I say in a whisper when he gets close enough to hear.

  “Sure,” he bobs his head up and down, and then speed walks out of the room.

  The studio gets oddly quiet as the judges come out and take their seats, as if royalty has just entered the room. Well, they sort of are royalty in our little baking world, but I’m not sure why everyone is quiet.

  “Why’s everyone so quiet? Do I have something in my teeth?” Josef says, with remnants of an Austrian accent. He pulls up his lips to reveal his perfectly white teeth and shows them to Ginger, who inspects and then shakes her head no. Spots of laughter filter through the production crew.

  I feel a little more at ease with his playfulness. I guess Jordan was right, he’s not as scary in person as he’s on camera. At least in the last five seconds he hasn’t been.

  Jordan runs back into my kitchen and hands me the caffeinated drink. “You have thirty seconds to chug that down,” he says, slightly breathless.

  “Okay,” I say and I quickly pop the lid and start chugging.

  “What was that?” he says, looking straight at me.

  “I said . . . okay?” I say after gulping down some of the fruity flavored drink.

  He holds up a finger as if to shush me and holds his other hand on the earphone signaling me that he wasn’t talking to me.

  “Okay, it’s time to go meet the judges,” Jordan says. I show him with my eyes that I registered his comment, but I continue to chug the Rock Star. I pray this works, and that I don’t get heart palpitations (that’s happened before).

  Jordan walks Patti and me up to the front where the judges are, and we stand in a semi-circle with the rest of the competitors.

  The host of the competition, Franky Jackson, comes out and the Somethings start to clap obnoxiously. Everyone else joins in. Franky, a rather handsome man with black hair, striking, deep brown eyes and a goatee, does a slight bow toward us, tucking his chin into his chest and closing his eyes in an overdramatic fashion. He seems unamused and not excited to be here. This show has been on the air for nearly a year now. It’s probably hard to get continually excited about cupcakes. I still get a little giddy when I see a good one, so maybe it wouldn’t be so hard for me.

  “Welcome, competitors, to Cupcake Battles,” he says in a voice that makes women want to undress. It’s deep and sultry and slightly breathy. “You have been chosen from many entrants, so you should feel proud of yourselves for making it here.” He looks us over as he talks, probably silently judging us.

  The Somethings start clapping again. Really? This is getting a little ridiculous.

  “Before we get started, Josef wants to say something to you,” Franky says, motioning to Josef with his hand.

  “Yes, thank you Franky,” Josef says, nodding his head at Franky and then toward us. “Welcome to Cupcake Battles. You were picked to compete from among some of th
e most talented bakers in America.”

  “Cool Cakes!” the Somethings chant. Josef does not seem thrilled. Oh, please let them get cut first. Or let me get cut first. Either option will do.

  “Yes.” He shakes his head, trying to recover. “Anyway, both Ginger and I want you to know that we are looking forward to this competition and that we know you will all bring the best that you can because you’re all very talented.”

  I brace myself for a “Cool Cakes” explosion, but nothing happens. Thank goodness.

  “I say all this to you because I want you to know that when the cameras start rolling, we’ll be a little tough on you, and that is just for the cameras and for the show. We are really just sweet little bunnies pretending to be bears. Well, I am. I’m not so sure about Ginger.” He glances over at Ginger who appears to be appalled at that inference.

  I wonder how many times this exact speech has been given. It’s obvious by how unamused Franky seems, that this is not the first time.

  I have to admit, I was nervous to meet the judges, especially Josef. He comes across as intimidating and not very approachable. I guess there’s more acting going on during this show than I had thought. Of course, everyone knows reality TV is not entirely reality. For example, my over-the-top enthusiastic introduction of myself. That is so not reality.

  “Good luck everyone!” Josef gives a little cheer in the air with closed fists.

  I make eye contact with the Tallies and the Sisters, silently saying good luck to one another. The Somethings just stare forward at the judges, as if to butt-kiss them from afar.

  We’ve yet to meet one judge, who is essentially the most important piece of this whole show. The third judge—the surprise judge—will be introduced as soon as the cameras roll so that our expressions of surprise when they tell us the theme of the show, will be real.

  The sounds of cameramen shuffling to get into position fill the room. This is it. The action starts now . . . I think. I’ve actually thought that exact thought a few times already, only to have to wait for five minutes while they adjust some sort of lighting, or something to do with the sound. But now, this feels like the real start.