by S. E. Law
I just did my usual stuff: exercise, shower, emails, and coffee. I made sure to check on Tammy periodically. She was out like a light. She actually fell asleep while we were in the hammock, about halfway through Rear Window. She really did try hard to stay awake, but I may have picked a few too many films. Overexcitement will do that to you. Hopefully, over time, I’ll get to show her all of my favorite films, and she’ll get a bigger peek into that side of me.
Getting her out of the hammock had been an exercise in problem solving, but I managed it. What surprised me more was that Tammy stayed asleep throughout the entire ordeal. She was a lot more tired than I’d realized. It made me feel kind of bad for keeping her up so late, but we had a good time, so I didn’t feel too bad.
Now, I’m ordering us breakfast. My staff came back to the house around 8:00 this morning. I didn’t have the full staff come in today, just a few people I thought we might need. Tammy was still asleep when they arrived, so they haven’t had much to do. But now, I put in our breakfast orders and go to join Tammy in the dining nook. It’s a comfortable place to have breakfast between two people. The big dining room is nice, but that is for entertaining a large number of folks.
I find Tammy sitting on the bench that’s affixed to the wall, staring out the window.
“Hey.” She turns around when she hears my voice. Her hand gently pats the cushion, so I join her on the bench. “Our breakfast should be brought in soon. The chef is making it.”
“You have a chef?”
“Yeah. I don’t always have a lot of time to cook for myself, but I also don’t like going out to eat too often.”
“Who else works here?”
“Oh, um,” I take a breath, “there are a few maids, two butlers, and a groundskeeper who has his own team to help him. Those are the people I keep on year-round. I also have a few seasonal employees and people I bring back when I’m hosting certain events. There’s actually a guesthouse. One of the maids is married to one of the butlers, so they manage everything here for me since I’m not here very often.” Tammy looks out the window like she’s trying to find the guesthouse. “You won’t be able to see it. It’s far enough away that they have a good amount of privacy. Plus, the trees hide it.”
Tammy nods, and I can see the thoughts racing through her brain. I was a bit on the fence about having her come here. It’s a lot to take in, especially for someone who isn’t used to this lifestyle. I don’t want to scare her off, but I also knew doing the whole movie thing would be a lot easier if we were here.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” she nods. “I’m just trying to understand how you live, I guess. It’s so different from my lifestyle. I feel like my life is so plain compared to yours.” She seems a bit down because of that. That’s not what I wanted. I wanted Tammy to have a good time, and I think we did last night.
“I don’t put a lot of stock in all of this. I mean, I like my life, but I would never look down on you or think your life is plain just because you don’t live in a house like mine or do the things I do. I like you for you, Tammy. That’s why I keep wanting to see you.”
“You want to keep seeing me?” she smiles.
“Of course. I’ve never had this much fun with someone before.” She makes me smile and laugh, and I’m constantly trying to impress her. There might be something deep between us, and I want to explore it.
Just then, one of the butlers comes in with our breakfast and places it down on the table.
“Thanks, Joseph. That should be all for now.” He nods and leaves the room. Once again, Tammy and I are alone. The two of us go to the table and dig into our breakfast. Tammy has her toast and tea; I had the chef make me my usual omelet with a side of fruit.
“What time do you have to get back home?”
“I told my parents I’d be home for dinner, so around 5:00 would probably be best,” Tammy answers. “Why?”
“I just thought we could have some more fun before you had to leave.”
“What kind of fun?”
“All kinds. Plus, you haven’t really gotten to see a lot of the house. I think I’ll send my staff home for the day, so we can give each room a thorough examination.” Tammy giggles, and we continue eating. This time with a little more speed, so as to get to the house tour a little faster.
Tammy and I have been going on our secret dates for a few months now. It’s crazy to think about. We haven’t made anything official yet, but it feels like she’s my girlfriend.
Given the amount of time we spend together and how happy she makes me, I’d like to think we’re in some kind of a relationship.
Jesus Christ. I’ve never analyzed any of my relationships this deeply. I’ve only had one other real girlfriend before Tammy, and that was when I was a teenager. Everything else has been casual. Deep relationships have just never been a high priority for me.
In the beginning, when I was planning our dates, I make sure it was a big to-do. But then Tammy told me that I could slow down a little. Not everything we did had to be spectacular. That’s when I realized I was putting a whole lot of energy into us.
It’s been nice, though. So I really have nothing to complain about.
On top of this brand new relationship, I’ve got a whole new deal I’m working on with Brick Productions. If it all works out, it’ll be huge.
“Knock, knock.” I look up to see Robert standing by my door.
“Hey, Robert. Is everything okay?”
“Yeah, I just wanted to check in and get ready for our meeting.”
“Isn’t that tomorrow?” I pull out my calendar. Maybe I’ve been a little distracted lately, but I don’t think I would get the date of such an important meeting mixed up.
“It is, it is,” Robert holds up his hands to reassure me. “Sorry if I freaked you out.” He steps into my office and closes the door. “I just know I’m going to be busy tomorrow before the meeting, so I thought it would be a good idea to talk things over today.”
“Yeah, of course. Sit down,” I motion to a chair. Robert takes the seat in front of my desk. I’m waiting for him to start, which he usually does, but he has this funny look on his face. “What is it?”
“I did come here to talk about the meeting tomorrow, but there’s something else I was hoping we could discuss too.”
“What else do you want to talk about?” He’s got me a little worried now. Robert rarely comes to me so serious. Usually when he does, it’s because something has gone very wrong. Occasionally, it’s because something’s gone very right.
“You’ve been rather different lately.”
“Different?”
“Your mood. I’m not the only one who’s noticed. A lot of the employees have noticed as well.”
“Is my mood bad?”
“No,” Robert states rather deliberately. “You’re actually quite cheery. I would say happy even.”
“Is that a bad thing? I’d say a happy CEO is good, right?” I haven’t noticed anything different around the office, but I guess if it’s me that’s different, I wouldn’t notice. People have been throwing me weird looks recently, but I hadn’t thought much of it.
“No, I wouldn’t say that it’s bad. But the reason it’s been weird is because not everything has been going super smoothly with this deal, yet you’ve been pretty high in spirits throughout all of it.”
“I just want to keep a cool head. It’s not good to always be down, right? I have to stay positive.”
“Sure…” Robert doesn’t sound convinced. “But it’s not just that. There have also been some delays that were caused by entirely avoidable circumstances. Once again, George had a misstep, and you showed quite a bit of mercy. You even managed to stay cheerful. Is something going on, Brick?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Well, what about that girl you were seeing?”
“What about her?”
Robert rolls his eyes.
“Are you still seeing her? Are things going well bet
ween the two of you?”
“Yeah, we’re still together. Things are going well, I’d say.”
“Are you going to tell me who she is?” I don’t say anything, just look at him. I wasn’t expecting so many questions about my relationship today. I knew eventually Robert would find out; I just didn’t think he’d get curious so quickly. “What if I guessed? Is it Tammy Thompson? George Thompson’s daughter?”
I’m shocked, not sure how he figured it out.
“Um, yeah.”
“Are you wondering how I figured it out?” Robert only waits for a second, not giving me a chance to answer. “In the beginning, you were being rather sneaky, but lately, you’ve gotten a little sloppy, and I picked up on the clues. Plus, I remembered the whole not firing George deal. Basically, I connected a bunch of dots.”
I rub my eyes. This is added stress I do not need. If Robert was able to guess who I’m seeing, has anybody else? Could this all get back to George?
“Look, Brick. I don’t think anyone else has found out what’s going on between you two. You guys just need to be a little more careful is all. If the goal is to not be found out, that is. I’m not here to police your relationships. I’m just here to make sure everything on this side of things stays good.”
“Okay, okay. I understand. I’ll tighten things up around here.”
“Great. Then we can drop it and get back to talking about this meeting. It’s a really big one, and I don’t want to fuck anything up.”
“I know. I have all of the paperwork ready. Your copies are in this folder,” I pull them out of my drawer, handing the papers to Robert.
“Was there anything else added? I read over the last iteration that was sent to these guys but never checked out their reply. Have we finalized it?”
“Yep. This is what we’re signing tomorrow.” It took a while to get the contract to the place where everyone was happy with it. There was a whole lot of back and forth, which is pretty standard in this business. I’ve just never wanted a deal as much as I want this one, so the back and forth was a little frustrating at times.
“Awesome. There really isn’t much I wanted to go over for tomorrow. I’m assuming I’ll be doing most of the talking, per usual. Since the signing is more of a formality, I’ll have Nancy bring in champagne. And we’re doing five copies, right? One for you, one for me, one for our lawyers, and the other two are going to the other guys.”
“Yeah, they only wanted two. The copies will be in the meeting room tomorrow. I gave Nancy a rundown of everything she’ll need to do. We’re all ready to go with this.”
“I can’t believe we’re really doing this. International expansion! I know this has been the goal since the beginning, and I knew it would take a while, but now that we’re here, it just feels crazy.”
I feel the exact same way Robert does. Our movies have been pretty successful, but we’ve never done any award campaign. Luckily, we got a few awards without even having to do any campaigns. That really helped put us on the map.
“Here’s to next year being our big year.”
“I’ll drink to that tomorrow when the bottle is popped.”
With those parting words, Robert leaves to go take care of his work for the day. I have a few things left on my plate to do, and then I’ll walk through the studio to see how everyone else is doing. I’ll probably stay late tonight because tomorrow I have a date with Tammy. I’ll want to leave earlier then so that I can pick up a few things. Even though I am the boss, I rarely take the opportunity to leave early. It just feels weird when there’s so much to do.
I ask a lot of my employees, so I try to give just as much.
“Are you ready for this meeting?”
“We’re just signing the papers, Robert. It’s really not that big of a deal. I mean, it is a big deal, but we don’t need to make a big to-do with the preparations. As long as nothing goes horribly wrong, we’re about to finalize the greatest deal in our company’s history.”
“I know, I know. I’m just trying to get us hyped for the meeting. I want us high energy, high expectations.”
“Okay, buddy,” I pat him on the bicep before going into the conference room. I want to do a double-check before Perry and Sally arrive. They’ve been our access point with this international producer. We’re hoping that with this deal, we will not only expand our market, but also have bigger budgets to make even more fantastic films.
I give the room a once over; everything looks to be in place. Nancy made sure to set the room up perfectly.
Perry and Sally should be here any minute, so Robert and I take our seats, waiting for them.
Not too much later, there’s a knock on the door.
“Mr. Barrister, Mr. Maple. Your guests are here,” Nancy says as she opens the door.
“Yes, please bring them in.” She moves aside to let Parry and Sally in. We greet each other, asking all of the polite and obligatory questions before sitting down at the table.
Robert starts.
“So, we’ve got all five copies of the contract here. I was thinking that we could just send them around in a circle and sign on the dotted line.”
“Sounds good to me,” Perry says. Sally nods in agreement, and we send the contract around, starting with Robert. It takes about ten minutes to get all of our names signed. Once we’re done, we divvy up the contracts.
“Well, well. It looks like we’re in business,” Robert claps his hands together, rubbing them for extra emphasis.
“Yeah,” Perry leans back. “Hopefully, we’ll get to make a lot of beautiful movies together.”
“I can drink to that.” Robert stands up and grabs the champagne bottle. He pops it open and pours everyone a glass. “I’d like to give a toast to our new partnership. We’re going to make great films.” We clink our glasses and take a few sips. With the contracts signed and everyone having had a bit to drink, we part ways, promising to talk soon to figure out a couple of good starter projects.
Once Perry and Sally are gone, Robert and I have high-five. I know I said this meeting wasn’t that big of a deal because it was a pretty sure thing, but I’m still beyond excited that we’ve finally got this whole deal done.
“We did it, man! We did it! We’re going international.”
“Fuck, yeah!” Robert replies. “Maybe you’ll finally let a few passion projects through.”
Robert and I have talked about how strict my acceptance policy has been. With this deal, we’ll be able to be a little more lenient with the scripts. Or I guess since it’s more of a me issue, I’ll be more lenient with the scripts.
“Yes, I’ll let a few more things get funded. I can also be a little less of a jerk about it as well. I know people think I come down a little hard, even if they don’t say it to my face.”
“You just do whatever you want to do because now we’ve got the means, my man.” Robert and I finish our glasses, but when he offers me the rest of the bottle, I turn him down.
“I’ve actually got to head out a little early. I have a date with Tammy tonight, so there are a few things I need to pick up beforehand. I’ve got to keep myself nice and sober for now.”
“A date with Tammy, huh? You guys getting serious?”
“We’ve kind of just been seeing one another so far.”
“Mm-hmm, yeah. Have a good night either way, man. I’ll see you tomorrow, eh?” Robert finishes his goodbye and then takes the champagne bottle with him. I’m sure he’s about to have a good night.
Just like I plan to.
19
Tammy
Brick and I have another date tomorrow. These past few months have been magical. Who would ever have thought that I’d be happy in a relationship with such a perfect man? At the beginning of all of this, I thought Brick might just be trying to scratch an itch, and I was more than happy to be his scratching post. But as more time goes by, it’s starting to feel like a real relationship.
Mamie has been the perfect confidant. I’m so happy I let her know a
ll of the details. It’s nice to have someone to talk to. The bubble Brick and I had was a nice bubble, but having Mamie in the bubble has only made the experience better.
She helps me see if I’m overthinking things.
“Sometimes, I wonder if he’s too perfect,” I confess to my friend.
Abigail let me off early today, strangely enough. She’s been very different lately. As a boss, I still don’t like her. She’s difficult, demanding, and never admits when she’s wrong, but in the past couple of weeks, she’s been making attempts to be more understanding.
I wonder if that’s because she’s been feeling a different energy from me recently. I’ve noticed myself that I’m not rolling over as easily. I’ve started standing up for myself, and I guess that’s made her realize she can’t do whatever she wants to me.
But I’m not going to read too much into it. So many things in my life are looking up right now, and I’m not in the business of questioning a good thing.
Unless it has to do with Brick. When it comes to him, I question almost every damn thing. I can’t help but get these gnawing feelings about him occasionally.
“Oh, come on, Tammy. Don’t get all in your head about Brick. The guy adores you. He fucking tries to sweep you off your feet, and may I add he succeeds, like, every week. The dates he’s taken you on were absolutely amazing. Just hearing about them makes my ovaries burst.”
“I know, I know. He’s everything that makes up the perfect boyfriend. He’s attentive and kind, he listens to me, he makes me laugh, and we have fun together. It’s really all great, but…” I trail off.
“But what? Don’t leave me in suspense!”
“I’m not his girlfriend. I mean, we do everything that a boyfriend and girlfriend do, but he hasn’t, you know, made things official. It’s making me question our relationship and wonder if what we have feels as serious to him as it does to me.”
“Oh, Tammy. He’s a guy. He probably thinks you guys are already a couple simply because you do couple things. If you don’t tell him you need a formal declaration, he might not give it to you. Trust me, men are some of the most clueless creatures on this earth. All you have to do is ask him. I know the man is crazy about you. He wouldn’t work so hard to make you happy if he wasn’t.”