It wasn’t to be.
I relied on myself, lived my life by myself.
That was better.
Except . . . I wasn’t really by myself, was I?
I had Artie and Pierce. I had Damon. I had my agent, my publicist, Maggie. I had loads of people . . . all of whom I paid or who’d been responsible for my paycheck.
With the exception of Damon.
No connection aside from . . . a connection.
We’d done Pizza Night the previous evening and it had been light, almost impersonal. He’d shown me some pictures he’d taken at Joshua Tree National Park and for as much as he liked to tell me that he wasn’t a good nature photographer, his shots of the harsh landscape and alien-esque trees were stark but beautiful.
But he hadn’t stayed long, just for carbs, photos, and one episode of a documentary called McMillion$—it followed the McDonald’s Monopoly scandal and was as crazy as it was interesting. But Damon and I were still tentative after our night together, after the scene in my bedroom.
He hadn’t worn long sleeves, and the Band-Aids on his arm were a blatant reminder of what had happened between us.
It made me quiet.
And sad.
And . . . the persistent ping in the back of my mind telling me that I was missing out, that I could have more if I only just—
Enough.
I pulled out the script and my pencil and started going through it again. There was a scene toward the climax that was going to be tricky to balance the comedy aspect of the film with my character’s growth.
And yes, I understood it was a comedy, but without proper growth and development of the main characters, it was going to be boring and very one-note for the audience.
My phone rang just as I’d turned to the scene, and speaking of people I paid, Maggie, my publicist, was on the phone.
“Hey,” I said, putting her on speaker.
Maggie was an awesome publicist, had first worked with athletes, training up in San Francisco with a big firm called Prestige Media Group, but had then transitioned to celebrities and Hollywood and was now running her own company.
Artie had recommended her to me, and it had been one of the best things I’d done for my career.
Maggie made it so I didn’t have to think about anything except for acting.
No games. No going out to be seen. I could just be me, sitting at home in my PJs, picking the films I wanted, and not overexposed by unnecessary press and interviews.
So, yeah, maybe I gave Maggie a paycheck, but I was also lucky enough to have her steady presence in my life.
“You ready to go?” she asked. “I’m not interrupting?”
“I’m good,” I said, setting the script aside. I was fussing and tinkering when I just needed to stop. Rehearsals would begin tomorrow, and I needed to be fresh enough that my performance wouldn’t be stale.
“Good. Just a couple of things. The studio wants to get a couple of publicity shots, so they were hoping you could do that Monday or Tuesday.” A pause, and we’d been working together long enough that I knew Maggie was waiting for me to chime in if I had a problem with that. Since I didn’t and I remained silent, she went on, “People wanted to see if you’d give a quote for the importance of female representation in Hollywood. I agreed, since Artie is doing it as well. It’ll be a bit of a fluff piece, but it fits in with your brand. I’ll put something together and you can approve.” Another beat. Another moment of me keeping quiet since that was fine.
Maggie kept working down her list, all minor commitments, all easy to do now since I was in L.A. for the time being.
“You’re easy today,” she said.
“I’m easy every day.”
She laughed. “That’s true enough. You never create drama for me.”
“That’s because I don’t have a personal life.”
“You do give me a challenge in that way.”
I frowned. “What?”
“It’s all about image, babe, you know that,” Maggie said. “And you’re the Queen of Single.”
My brows drew further together. “Um—”
“Oh, no,” Maggie said. “I’m not trying to say that’s a bad thing at all. You do you. Be happy. Be single. It’s just that the press sometimes loves nothing better than a good relationship story, and so I spend half of my time killing stories about your potential boyfriends or fiancés, rather than talking about all of the good things you’re doing, work wise.”
“Oh.”
“And the shitty thing is that if you were in a relationship, it wouldn’t be any different. Every other story would be about when you two were getting married or is Eden Larsen wearing a ring or is that a baby bump?”
Slice.
Slice.
Slice.
Married. Ring. Baby.
Damn, the past would just not stay tucked away.
I heard Maggie suck in a breath and realized that I’d been silent too long. “I . . . uh . . . that would be fine if you were pregnant or secretly engaged . . .”
The careful question at the end of her trailing off snapped me out of it. “Sorry,” I said. “You won’t be able to use your Secret Agent Ninja PR skills on me right now. I’m not engaged or pregnant. I’m not even dating anyone right now, let alone having a sex life.”
One night didn’t count as a sex life, right?
“It would be okay if you were.”
I snorted.
“Sorry, that sounded asshole-y,” Maggie said, contrite now. “I just meant—”
“I know,” I said. “I’m just doing my part to not be easy all of the time. Okay, so let me play celebrity gossip columnist. What about you? How’s Ben?”
A sigh. “Ben is now firmly in the category of ex.”
“Ugh. I’m sorry.” Her tone told me it hadn’t been a pleasant breakup.
“He decided that being tied to one woman was too much pressure for him . . . and also that he wanted to sell my lingerie on eBay.”
“Ew.”
“Dirty lingerie.”
“Double ew.”
“I know.” A beat. “Men suck.”
“Yes,” I agreed, but even as I
