“That’s great,” I effused with every ounce of energy I could muster. “Hey, look, I think I’m going to bow out of dinner tonight—”
“No, listen, Liv! This film that she’s shooting—it’s a romantic comedy. Costarring Hamish MacDougal!”
“Oh, Fi—”
“I already talked to Katherine, and you and I are going to the set! Next Tuesday, you get to talk to Hamish again!”
“I . . . I don’t know what to say.”
She frowned. “You don’t seem very excited. I thought you’d be happy.” Her eyes darted toward Liam and back to me, and if I wasn’t mistaken, Jocelyn’s eyes were doing the same. And then Fi looked around the entire room as if the realization that things were not normal had just hit. “What’s wrong?”
Only Landon, whose attention was directed toward a muted baseball game on TV, wasn’t looking at me. The walls were closing in.
“I am happy. Of course I am. Thanks for arranging that.” I wanted to close my eyes and breathe through the waves of nausea, but it was more important to act normal for a few more moments. “It just makes me nervous. Because I don’t have a screenplay, I mean.”
She seemed to accept that as the source of my uneasiness, and she was once again smiling as her eyes concentrated solely on me. Whether Jocelyn accepted everything as copacetic or not, I didn’t know. But she’d seemingly lost interest in the dynamic of the room in favor of the Marie Claire she was flipping through.
“I know you aren’t done with the screenplay. I thought about that, but I don’t think it matters. Just touch base with him. Who knows? You might hit it off! He is single, I hear . . .”
I took a deep breath. I had to get out of there. And then I could cry. And Liam could move on with his life. And Fiona could be happy. “We’ll talk all about it later. You have to hurry if you’re going to make it to Matisse.”
“Hang on. You’re seriously not coming?” Fi asked me with disappointment and concern in her voice. She looked at her boyfriend. I guess in that moment it made sense to her that he was looking at me instead of her. Not that making sense seemed to be his top priority. “Liam, didn’t you make the reservation for the five of us? Should I call the restaurant and see if we can add—”
“No, no, it was for five. I have a couple errands to run, and I’m behind on work. But I want the four of you to have a wonderful evening together. You hear that?” I choked out a chuckle as I looked at Liam, who was leaning against the kitchen doorway, still never taking his eyes off of me. If only I could have been as oblivious as everyone else.
Any remaining warmth and hope in his eyes faded as he realized I was giving him my blessing. He understood that I wanted him to go ahead and propose to my best friend. He understood that I didn’t love him.
He understood nothing.
February 4, 2009
“I don’t care what you say, Liv. You’re coming tonight.”
“Fi, I can’t. I just can’t!” I glanced up from my computer screen briefly to look at her, but even as I did, I felt myself getting behind. “This story is just flowing out of me like . . . butter? No, that’s stupid. Like water from a pitcher, gently rushing down toward—”
“Are you writing right now? I mean, seriously?” She shook her head in disbelief. “Are you actually revising the first draft of our conversation, right here in real time?”
I took my eyes off of her and focused them on the screen once more. “I can’t help it! That’s what I mean. I am so filled with words and ideas I can’t even keep up. I’ve been waiting years for a creative burst like this, and if you think I am going to interrupt it to go to some fundraiser for some charity, you’re insane. Besides, it’s Ironic Day.”
This year I’d decided to give in to the existence of the curse. For whatever reason, the universe or the calendar or Alanis Morissette was out to get me, and I figured the best thing I could do was get out of their way. Just try to screw up my life when I’m home alone in track pants and a Boston College T-shirt, Alanis. Just try!
Fiona walked over to my laptop and closed it on my fingers before quickly apologizing as I began to panic that my work would be lost. In spite of my panic, she didn’t stop what she was doing, and soon the computer was behind her back.
“Olivia Ross, you listen to me. I’m taking you because it’s February 4! Your ticket was free, but we’re going to pretend it wasn’t. This is a fifty-thousand-dollar end to the irony. You’re going to have the time of your life, you’re going to flirt a little, you’re going to eat a lot, and before you know it, it’s going to be February 5, and the world will still be spinning. You’ll see. Besides, this isn’t just ‘some fundraiser’ for ‘some charity.’ This is a fundraiser I am in charge of, for a charity I work for. Every single late night and early morning over the last five months, every boring meeting and high-pressure call from New York . . . It’s all been for this night. Walking away from Shondaland and saying goodbye to that magical moment each morning when Patrick Dempsey said hello and got my name wrong—this is what it was all for, Livi! And I need you there with me tonight.” Her tone and her face softened. “Please.”
Well, how could I possibly resist that?
“Of course I’ll go.”
“Of course you will!” she trilled, validated in her certainty that I couldn’t say no to her. “Great! Okay, I’ll be back in an hour to get ready, and we leave in two hours.”
It was a miracle we were still friends at all, I knew. The fact that she loved me enough to want me to accompany her on such an important night humbled me, and the exuberance on her face made me regret my selfish February 4 preoccupation.
“What?” she asked, an amused grin on her face as she handed my laptop back to me. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
“You’re just the best. That’s all.”
There had been plenty of highs and lows over the course of the last year. The first few weeks after Liam and I kissed hadn’t been pretty, and the recovery had taken some work. Truthfully, a whole lot of work—and careful, nonstop consideration of what should be discussed and what shouldn’t, what could be lived with and what couldn’t. By both of us. And that was just to salvage the friendship. I think what we each went through individually was even worse.
I had broken the heart of the man I was pretty sure was the love of my life, and Fiona Mitchell had been dumped for the very first time.
“You’re weird,” she responded to my affectionate declaration before hurrying over to me, giving me a quick hug and repeating, “We leave in two hours.”
“What should I wear?”
She groaned as she pulled away and headed back toward the door. “Are you actually asking me that question when you have a breathtaking dress perfect for the occasion just wasting away?”
“Oh, seriously? I have to dress up that much?”
“Liv! I wasn’t kidding. Tickets to this thing are fifty grand. Yes, you have to dress up!”
In that case, my breathtaking, sleek, ivory-silk gown with an intricate black-lace overlay, courtesy of Vera Wang, would be put to use. I’d had my eye on it that day in Vera’s Paris shop, and it had shown up, hand delivered to my door in Rome by a courier, about three months later. Ever since, it had been hanging in a closet. I’d not attended a single formal event in all that time. Actually, I’d attended few events of any nature.
“Next you’re going to tell me I have to wash my hair.”
“At least brush it!” Her words echoed as she left and closed the door behind her.
The moment she was out the door, I was tempted to open up my laptop and get a little more writing in. But I knew that once I started, there would be no chance of being ready in two hours, much less any chance of my hair getting brushed, as Fiona had insisted. Instead, I set my laptop on the couch and walked to the calendar on the wall, where I had pinned the invitation to the event, in an effort to remind myself what cause I was bothering to surrender my messiest of messy buns for.
“Well, that doesn’
t help,” I mused as I read the name of the charity.
The Lakeside Society.
Was it for environmental preservation? A hospital? A country club in need of a new eighteenth hole? I had no idea. How could I have no idea? Surely Fi had discussed her job in some detail in the five months since the mysterious Lakeside Society had stolen her away from Shonda Rhimes, right?
I pinned the invitation back in its place, and as I did, the date on the invitation stood out, taunting me with its mystical cruelty.
“And a happy Hamish MacDougal slash Liam Howard slash I’m Going to Die Alone and Have to Write My Own Bereavement Heartlite Card Day to you, as well,” I murmured to myself.
That had been probably the worst thing to come out of 2008’s Ironic Day. I had started caring about things like dying alone. Not that I thought about dying. And not that I was all that bothered by the thought of being alone. What did bother me was knowing that if not for one choice on one night after one amazing kiss, I would be with Liam. Again. Still. Forever.
One year ago, after I’d fled the scene, Liam had driven to Santa Monica with all three Mitchells and acted as if everything was okay long enough to make sure Fiona had the fabulous evening at Matisse with her parents that she had been promised. And then her parents took a cab to their hotel, and Liam and Fi took a walk on the beach and ended their fourteen-month relationship. And I was at the center of the end, just as I had been at the center of the beginning.
He told her that he was still in love with me and that he had kissed me, but that it had been all his fault. By the time Fiona got home—where I was waiting after hours of torment, preparing to answer for myself if Liam had told her what happened or congratulate them if he’d gone through with proposing—the stage was set for me to step into my role as Guiltless Bystander #1, who had been taken off guard by his kiss and soon chastised him, refusing to be party to any further betrayal. Technically that was all true. My role in what had happened looked pretty innocent on paper.
And Liam had certainly portrayed it that way—probably for reasons that went so much deeper than simply a noble attempt to salvage the friendship of two women he loved. That was the single biggest reason my heart still ached. By the time all was said and done, he had no reason to believe I loved him. No reason to believe I had ever loved him. And if that was the case, it was primarily a one-sided betrayal. I could be accused of nothing more than getting caught up in a moment.
What made it possible for him to walk away from me was also what made it possible for Fiona and me to move forward together.
And that was where the constant dance of figuring out how much to say began. I didn’t want to lie to her, so I told her that the kiss had not been as one-sided as Liam had indicated to her. Though I’d given in to my attraction to him and some lingering, unresolved feelings, I hadn’t realized that he loved me. I instantly regretted kissing him—and when he began speaking as if he and I should be together, I shut it down.
It was all true. True enough that Liam did not shoulder all of the responsibility, but not so true that Fiona and I could never recover.
I couldn’t tell her that I was still in love with him, and I certainly couldn’t tell her that I had been in love with him every single day that he had been her boyfriend. If I told her that, she would know how many lies I had told. How many emotions I had faked. How could I tell her any of that without also letting her know what a struggle it had been? Without telling her how desperately I had wanted to kiss him again? Without confessing that I had weighed her heartbreak against my own and for a moment considered letting her suffer? It was, in my mind, the ultimate betrayal. So much worse than a kiss, and so much more impactful than a single evening.
I had refused him—in spite of my love for him, because of my love for her—and it was the most difficult thing I had ever done. That was the truth I had to live with. There was no point in making Fi live with it too.
As for Liam, neither one of us had heard from him since. I’d called his office on his birthday, but it was no longer his office. And a returned Christmas card told me that his home was no longer his either.
Okay . . . a few more writing minutes. I grabbed my laptop from the couch.
I couldn’t talk to Fi every time I thought about Liam, of course, so all those pent-up conversations and emotions had to go somewhere.
Name: Jack Mackinnon
Role: As the recently elected single and alone district attorney of Landing’s Edge, Jack is faced with the unexpected fight of his life single and alone when he unearths a path of corruption and deceit that affects almost everyone in town, all the way to the top. but especially the people who are single and alone. Possibly including Alicia Moran, the first woman Jack ever loved, and the last person he ever wanted to see again, after she broke his heart. the woman who left Jack single and alone. As Jack races against the clock to save Landing’s Edge who cares . . . he’s alone . . . he realizes that Alicia may be the one person he can trust . . . even if he isn’t ready to trust her with his heart. is destined to die alone.
Physical Description: Greek-movie-god Hamish MacDougal. Not Phantasm Hamish MacDougal. To Be Determined
Though progress had been made on the screenplay, I’d made the decision that, regardless of its status in 2013, I would not be presenting my work to Hamish MacDougal. I would not be returning to the coffeehouse “just in case.” What was the point? The nice, cute guy who had made the nice, cute comment about making a movie with me had become a superstar who no longer had to rush away to auditions and who would probably never again be able to sit in a crowded coffeehouse unrecognized by the masses. As I thought back over the past few years, I knew that even I, in all my plebeian splendor, would have forgotten about that day were it not for the people in my life who constantly forced me to remember. I could have no doubt there were no such desperately-seeking-excitement influences in his life.
And on top of all that, missing our on-set visit to meet him as arranged by Katherine Heigl—because both Fiona and I had been so emotionally wrecked we forgot all about it—had been just the wake-up call I needed. There were real people and real emotions and real choices and real consequences in my life, all around me. The time for daydreaming had passed.
* * *
Two hours later I was ready and actually looking pretty fabulous, though I do say so myself. I was surprised by how much I liked the way I felt in Vera Wang. I made a mental note to pull the dress out at least once a month or so, even if just to go to the post office or whip up an omelet.
“So where is this thing?” I asked as Fiona continued to drive us farther and farther up into the hills. I’d been so preoccupied trying to figure out what cause I was supporting that I’d given no thought at all to where I would be supporting it.
Within a second her answer was redundant. “The Getty,” she said nonchalantly as she made one final turn of the steering wheel of her Audi and the breathtaking stone and glass of the Getty Center appeared before us, along with its unrivaled views of Los Angeles.
I couldn’t take it any longer.
“I’m sorry, Fi, but what is the Lakeside Society? I feel as if I should know, and I’m sorry to have to ask, but . . .”
I had to dress in my best (and only) formal Vera Wang gown, they had stolen Fiona away from the hottest show on television, and this little fifty-thousand-dollars-per-person fundraiser that I’d tried to get out of was taking place at one of the most exclusive venues on the West Coast. I couldn’t help feeling as if I had missed some information somewhere along the line.
Fi laughed. “Water. The Lakeside Society exists to bring attention and awareness to the plight of the many countries of the world where there is not enough water to sustain life.”
I brushed away the snide and insensitive remarks that were threatening to burst out of me—not in response to the work of the organization but to Fiona’s well-rehearsed, straight-from-the-pamphlet pitch. Instead, I focused on the unfortunate irony all around me, courtesy of the b
eautiful, bountiful water-flowing fountains of the Getty.
“You ready?” she asked with a smile as she shifted into Park and waved flirtatiously to the man working valet parking.
We got out and walked in, and the adrenaline of victory surged through my veins when I made it all the way without tripping on my heels or snagging my lace on anything. Not only that, I felt quite a few appreciative male eyes on me as we entered. Yes, Fiona was with me, and usually I would assume the eyes were on her and I was just catching a few leftover peripherals, as if I were her accessory. But on this particular night I looked the best I had ever looked. I knew it, and they knew it.
“So, don’t you have to get to work or something?” I asked her as I grabbed a glass of champagne from a passing waiter and took a look around at the oyster that was my world—at least for that one evening.
“No. I’ve put in all the work already. We’re just here to enjoy ourselves. We deserve it!” She clinked my glass with her own.
“Wow!” I breathed as we stepped into the ballroom and I took in all the surrounding splendor. “You did this, Fi? Wow!”
I was as close to speechless as I figured I ever could be, silenced by the perfect lighting and the subtle opulence and grandeur of it all. It was breathtaking. But what was even more formidable and impressive than the majestic chandeliers and the ideally placed string quartet was the sense that everyone was enjoying themselves. Designer gowns and tuxes could so easily lend themselves to stuffiness, but Fi had created a luxurious atmosphere of warmth and comfort.
The room was Fiona.
“You really think it’s okay?” she asked, her voice trembling slightly.
“‘Okay’? Fi, it is so much more than ‘okay’! This is the most beautiful room I have ever seen in my entire life. This is amazing!”
She took a deep breath. “Thanks.”
“Are you okay?” I whispered. I’d rarely seen her so vulnerable and uncertain—especially when her genius was as glaring and irrefutable as it was that night.
Plot Twist Page 10
