“I need to go shopping,” I muttered. An idea hit me as I stood back up and looked at all of the designer clothes I had hanging up. Why I’d bought all of these was a mystery to me since I had racked up quite the hefty credit card bill thanks to Louboutin's and Versace, but...they were all in pristine condition and could fetch a pretty penny. I didn’t think I could sell them in town simply because most people around here were more interested in Fairtrade and eco-friendly, not Hollywood elitists who charged way too much for synthetic materials.
Things like this were the reason God invented eBay. Smiling, I began slowly pulling out my Hollywood wardrobe. While part of me cringed at the thought of throwing my old life away, and giving up my Hollywood dream, country-girl Kitty Crawford knew it wasn’t always clothes that made the person. Putting on a smile and pretending you had it all together went a long way, too.
A few hours later I stood in front of the mirror examining my new look. I’d toned down my dark brown hair and curled it just on the ends so it had body but didn’t scream I was trying too hard. My makeup looked as natural as I could make it, though I did double up on the mascara to accentuate my baby blue eyes. Those eyes had convinced a lot of people to give in a lot more than they’d wanted to and though the woman at the agency seemed impervious to things like that, I decided to try anyway. I had to get this job, if only to be able to get my own place and stop living off my parents.
Over to the left, hanging in various assortments around the room, was my wardrobe. I made sure I’d dry-cleaned everything before I left, so all of the clothing looked pristine and straight off the rack. When I got home later, I’d take pictures of everything. I wasn’t the best photographer, but there was so much editing software out there it shouldn’t be a big deal to get decent photos. My mind whirled with the possibilities. It would take longer, but I could also go online and offer up various jewelry ideas. Sort of like please buy my stuff, but wait, here’s what you can get with it. And, oh by the way, you have to buy my stuff to get it. I grinned to myself as I grabbed my purse and swept out the door. I had a good feeling about this. At minimum, I could pay my parents back for their hospitality and possibly even put a deposit down on an apartment.
I hadn’t asked Ruthie how much the new job would pay, but it had to be over minimum wage. I hoped.
Fifteen minutes later, I was sitting in front of Exit Stage Left, taking deep breaths and telling myself it was all going to be okay. I dug through my purse and pulled out a pair of black-framed glasses. I didn’t need them but everyone always told me they made me look smarter, so I wore them any time I needed a boost. Sliding them on my face, I glanced in the mirror, pressed my lips together to spread my lip gloss a little smoother, and nodded to myself.
“You got this,” I whispered.
I slid out of the car, contemplated the appropriate posture for a mourner, and walked into the building.
Ruthie was sitting in the same exact position I’d left her. A regal, aging queen, she stared at me as I walked through the waiting area and straight to her desk smack in the middle of the room.
“Kitty Crawford,” Ruthie said as she pushed a folder over to me. I couldn’t figure out whether she was impressed or amused.
“Ma’am,” I said, politely.
I found out what she thought when she said, “Lose the glasses.”
I pressed my lips together in embarrassment and lost the glasses.
“I assume you don’t need them?” she asked in her raspy voice. Her gaze pinned me to the floor. I felt like she was measuring me and I was coming up short.
I shook my head.
“You’re trying too hard. This isn’t Hollywood.”
I nodded. “Right.”
“Your outfit is good. Keep doing that.” Ruthie waved her hands in the air, motioning at everything from my hair to my shoes. She rolled a pen across the top of her desk to me. “Sit down and fill these out.”
I caught the pen before it rolled off the desk, scooped up the folder, and made my way to the empty waiting area. Two attractive women gathered by the water cooler caught my eye. One of them gave me an appraising stare, but the other offered me a wide-toothed grin which gave me a little hope that Ruthie was more bark than bite.
Ten minutes later, after filling out my address and social security number for what felt like the thousandth time, I’d finished the paperwork. I took it back up to Ruthie who was enjoying what appeared to be her fourth or fifth cup of afternoon coffee and slid it across the desk. She took the pen from me and scooped up the folder.
Ruthie motioned for me to follow her. I swallowed hard, unsure why I was so nervous. On one hand, the office was nice but stark. There was nothing overly personal or scary there. On the other hand... Ruthie. She fulfilled the role of a sitcom grandma, somewhat warm on the outside, but she walked with steel in her spine and grit in her eye. It made me want to please her and that wasn’t a feeling I’d had in a long time. Not since I’d gotten off the plane in California ready to take the world by storm. A feeling that slowly faded every time a casting director told me to do a spin so he could look at me. Even worse when they wanted to come by my apartment for a “drink”. The only “drinks” they wanted were the ones I wasn’t giving away.
But there was something about the woman in front of me that made me want to do a good job. I shook my head free of those odd thoughts and followed her into another office, once again with few personal touches. I frowned as I walked in and Ruthie caught it.
“No one is in the office long enough to make it their own.” She motioned for me to sit. “There’s a lot of autonomy here. As long as you get your job done and the clients are happy, you don’t have to come into the office that much. When you do have work here, find an empty desk anywhere and claim it for a little while. No need to personalize it. We aren’t your typical 9 to 5.”
She opened the folder in front of her and scanned over my details.
It felt very weird to describe your entire being in just a few sheets of paper. Even though most of it was cut and dry information, it was me listed out in just a few sentences. I was so much more than that and I hoped Ruthie kept me around long enough to figure that out.
She skimmed over most of it and I could tell the moment she hit my job history. Her eyes slightly widened. I assumed she had arrived at the place where I listed the name of my mortal enemy and my brief foray into potential stardom.
Seth Morrow.
“You worked with Seth?” she asked, her lips lifted on one side.
I was just about to wax poetic about how wonderful Seth was (a total lie, by the way), when I realized that Ruthie said Seth. First name only. Like she knew him. It totally threw me off my game.
“Errr. Yes?” I said it as a question when I meant it to be more authoritative, but my mind was scrambling to think of something to say if she brought up that which must not be named. Because if she knew about the incident, there was no way I was getting this job.
“Huh,” she muttered to herself. “What did you think of him?”
I blinked, doe-eyed, plastered on a megawatt smile, and began to sing the praises of Seth Morrow. The southern devil in disguise.
One of Ruthie’s eyebrows quirked up as I extolled Seth’s virtues. She finally held up a hand. “So, you hated him then?”
My mouth worked like a fish out of water before I finally managed, “No, oh no. He was -”
“Save it.” She sighed and removed her glasses. “The other girls already know this, but since you’re new, I’m going to tell you this once and only once. Lying to me will get you thrown out on your keister.”
I squirmed in my chair praying I wasn’t somehow speaking to one of Seth Morrow’s relatives.
“Capisce?” she asked.
I nodded.
“Now tell me what you really think of Seth Morrow.”
I slunk out of Exit Stage Left, defeated and demoralized. I was a terrible liar, but I could usually cover it up by talking people to death and smiling all the
while. Ruthie, the old buzzard, was too smart for that. I tried every trick in the book to get out of making my opinions about Seth known, but Ruthie broke me like a twig. The dam finally broke and I belted out with, “he’s the worst man on this entire planet and I hope someone puts poop on his porch and lights it on fire!”
At that, I’d clapped my hand over my mouth and began to profusely apologize even though she probably couldn’t understand me with my hands over my mouth. It was just as well. Me continuing to speak was only going to keep myself digging a deeper hole. I finally stood, gathered my things, and slowly backed out of her office apologizing for wasting her time.
To her credit, she didn’t say a word, but I didn’t like the look in her eyes as I scrambled to get away.
“Aaaaargh,” I groaned as soon as I’d gotten back into the car. “I hate you, Seth Morrow!”
How could the same person who’d ruined my career in Hollywood do the same thing thousands of miles away without even being in the same room?
Because he was Seth Morrow. That’s why.
I allowed myself a moment of weakness and a broken sob, then I sniffed, gathered myself back together like a true Southern woman, and decided one lost job opportunity was not going to defeat me.
I was going to put on my big girl panties and find something. Anything. Whatever I needed to do to put the pieces of myself back together, I would do.
I drove out of the parking lot of Exit Stage Left feeling emotionally cleansed.
But still way embarrassed.
I took some time to drive around my old hometown before going home. There were few places prettier than Asheville. I never thought LA was pretty at all. I wasn’t the kind of person to be swayed by glitz and glamour when a lot of it only served to cover up bitter personalities and infighting. I’d learned some hard lessons there, especially when I’d gotten tangled up with Seth Morrow, but I thought I’d come out stronger because of it.
Even though I was back home now with not much to show for it, I’d still lived a full life out in California. Plus, I’d escaped the kind of embarrassment that could ruin careers. I simply hadn’t been a big enough fixture in the acting scene to become more than a blip on someone’s radar.
Although I hated that I’d come home a failure, I did enjoy the fact I could walk outside with no one the wiser and do my own thing without people following me everywhere.
When I first got to California, I yearned for the paparazzi to follow me around like they did the bigger celebrities. But as I stayed longer and watched a little closer, I could see the strained expression on the celebrity faces as they just tried to get a smoothie or try to do something normal.
To be that exposed all the time felt like it would become a chore. Don’t get me wrong. I missed it terribly, but it was the acting that I missed. Not everything else.
Acting was a job I loved. I didn’t like the shallow veneer of everything else.
Perhaps I wasn’t completely cut out to be a big name anyhow.
I groaned as I thought about my conversation with Ruthie. I really needed that job. Plus, I really wanted it, too. It would be the closest I could get to real acting without resorting to community theater. Nothing was wrong with community theater, of course, but I thought I would be able to test my mettle out more as an actress if it was around people who had no idea I was acting. I also wasn’t crazy about Shakespeare or all those older classic plays some of the playhouses put on. The last time I said thee or thou was when the teacher forced me to read aloud in high school English class.
I swung into a little bakery I passed on the way back home. I hadn’t seen this place before, but the sign was bright, pink, and topped with a swirl of plastic icing.
The first thing to hit me was the smell, and I marveled at it. It felt like everything smelled good in this town. We had BBQ that even the Texans couldn’t turn their nose up at, desserts that would make the Food Network proud, hidden diners that the locals would fiercely protect to keep secret, and even Michelin-starred restaurants scattered around the town.
But this place smelled like I was cavorting in a bathtub full of the softest vanilla buttercream. Stepping into the place, the look of it was even more wondrous. It was like Willy Wonka himself had gone in and thrown up on the place. Brilliant multicolored walls made me blink in surprise. Black and white tiled floors gave it a strange retro feel, but the ceiling was decorated with what appeared to be chocolate fountains.
I frowned at that and stepped carefully around them just in case they were real. I’d just done my hair.
The woman behind the counter wore a hot pink button-down shirt with the name Beatrice stitched in black across the right side of her chest. Her bottle job crimson colored hair was hot rolled into a Rockabilly style and her face was perfectly made up with spot-on cat’s eye eyeliner and deep red lips.
“What can I get ya, doll?” she drawled.
I blinked at her and couldn’t help the smile that curled around my lips. This place was amazing.
“First-timer? We get that look a lot.” She pointed up at the ceiling. “Not real. The owner of this place is an artist. On top of being a killer baker.” She pointed up at the marquee menu. “Special today is our German chocolate cupcake and our lemon scones.” The woman wrinkled her nose. “Personally, I’m not a fan of any scone. Why eat something that tastes like a biscuit when there’s cake right next to it?”
I was inclined to agree with her. I stepped up and perused the menu. After today’s job interview debacle, I thought I deserved something nice, sweet, and delicious.
“I’ll try the German chocolate,” I said.
The woman punched it into the register. “Will that be all?”
My gaze caught on their cookie selection. I could have never eaten like this when I was still in LA. The disapproving stares would have turned even the most delicious thing into dust in my mouth.
“I’ll take a dozen crispy chocolate chip cookies.”
“Nice,” she said with a nod. “They’re a slow seller. Most people like a chewy chocolate chip, but I like mine to have a bit of a crunch.”
“Me too. Plus my parents like them, too.” I swung back around to look outside, trying to remember the name of the place.
“Pepper’s,” the woman said as if she knew what I was trying to do. “The decor takes everyone by surprise and they forget everything.”
“Pepper’s,” I repeated. “I’ll have to tell my mom about this place.”
She rattled off my total and went to gather up my goodies.
And that was how for the space of about thirty minutes, I forgot about Seth Morrow and how I probably blew a job interview over him.
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Acknowledgments
To the team at Sweet Promise Press, thank you so much for including me in this series. It was an entertaining experience, and I loved getting to know my new real (and imaginary) friends.
Sheryl Babin, you’re amazing, don’t forget it!
As always, to my Hottie Hubby, Jack Aspenson, without your patience and support, the people inside my head would take over and all kinds of interesting things would happen at home. We both know that wouldn’t be pretty.
To Carolyn’s Cozy Review Crowd, you all are priceless.
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Professional Mourning can be a deadly business. Luckily, these 6 out-of-work actresses are on the job!
Mourning Routine by S.E. Babin
Kitty Crawford reached for stardom and fell hard. Now, in desperate need of some way to make ends meet, she skulks back to her hometown of Asheville. Unfortunately, the employment offers are slim pickings for a has-been whose sole talent is being able to cry on cue.
That is, until one odd turn leads to another, which leads to the little-known profession of Personal Mourning. Here, the better Kitty can fake it, the more dollars she’ll find stacked up in her bereft bank account. Talk about a role she was born to play!
And townsfolk are just dying to hire her. Her first gig casts her as the bereaved girlfriend of one newly deceased Chase McCormick, someone she would never have dated in life. Still, Kitty will have to act like her life depends on it, because--OMG!--it does.
Can she perform an investigation that could turn out to be murder before she gets her own curtain call? Find out whodunit in this hilarious mystery series filled with fake tears and a very real body count... Order your copy and start reading today!
Mourning Crisis Page 18