by Amanda Heger
When she reached the top, Marisol turned to look out over the set. Stadium seating filled the back of the room, and from here the host would have a full view of every costumed game show hopeful in the building. Of every messy movement occurring on the stage below. And when she turned, Marisol had a perfect view of the hopeful, messy guy looking back at her.
Looking at her like that.
She inched forward, feeling more like the old Marisol. The one who kissed who she wanted, when she wanted. The one who was always ready for an adventure. Or three.
Evan’s gaze flicked from her face to something beyond her shoulder and back again. “I think we…”
Maybe it was the rush of standing on the stage of her childhood dreams. Maybe it was nothing but proximity and the loneliness of travel. But Marisol wanted to kiss him mid-sentence. She wanted to break off all his words and most of her common sense. She wanted to kiss this guy who probably tasted like mint and California sun.
“Can you guys scoot a little to the left?” Penny’s bored voice sliced through the air. “I can stick this one through a filter but that’s not going to help the weird shadows on your faces.”
• • •
Stupid, Evan. Stupid, Evan.
The words in his head matched the pace of Julia’s footsteps as she paced back and forth across the set. “Ten minutes. Ten. Not twenty. Not thirty.”
“It wouldn’t have mattered.” He gestured toward the overhead speakers, which kept playing the porno music—although someone had managed to get the volume down from ear-hemorrhaging to migraine-inducing. He did regret something about those stolen minutes on the game show set, but it wasn’t that he’d been away too long.
Should have kissed her. Instead, like a chump, he’d acted like the whole thing was a setup, posed for one of Penny’s Instagram photos, and then high-tailed it down the steps and back to the rented set.
“Fine. We have to be out of here in an hour anyway.” Julia said. “We’ll go with what we have. I don’t know why we even bother.” She growled and stomped her feet. “We are a professional TV crew. Why can’t someone figure out how to unplug a freaking CD player?”
Obviously, the sheen of yesterday’s hope had rubbed off after one night’s sleep and a quick shower. There had to be something else they could do. Incorporate the music? Scrub it out in editing? That would probably cost a fortune. Go somewhere else?
“Maybe we can shoot on location somewhere? Marisol?” he asked.
She appeared beside Julia, her features closed off. “Yes?”
“Are there any places in LA you really wanted to visit? Landmarks? Tourist traps?” he asked.
She tapped a finger against her chin. “The Hollywood sign. The place where all the handprints are in the ground. One of those buses that take you to all the celebrities’ houses.” Her eyes were starting to light up, to give off the flicker he kept searching for.
“We can’t do any of that stuff on a weekend, Newbie.” Julia kept her wrath aimed at Evan. “It’s a madhouse of bad khaki shorts and snotty children on the weekends. Hollywood Boulevard will be wall-to-wall weirdos.”
She was right. It would be nearly impossible to film anything in the crush of tourists. And Marisol had been perfectly clear that this weekend was all she could offer. Stupid, Evan.
“Tuesday afternoon I am supposed to come back to the studio to give my presentation to James. If you want…”
He definitely wanted.
“That gives us two more days to hammer out the details. See, Julia? It’s going to work out.” He punched the producer lightly on the shoulder and was met with a death glare. But Evan couldn’t bring himself to care. He didn’t know when he’d become so stupidly optimistic, but he suspected it had something to do with spending nearly every waking minute about to fall off a creative cliff with Marisol close by.
“Fine. I’m sending everybody home.” Julia threw up her hands. She stormed off and before long most of the crew followed, leaving Jerry to carry the last pieces of equipment from one end of the stage to the other.
“Hey, I, uh need to give Bourbon back his shirts. Want to come?”
“Sure.”
A second chance. There was no way he was going to be so stupid this time.
When they got to the Who’s Got the Coconut set, Evan ignored the booth of overpriced, over-glittered junk and popped open the door to the set. “I think I left my notebook in here.” Somehow, the lie came out convincingly.
“Which one? The one with all of our notes?” Marisol’s eyes widened.
“Yeah. Can you check the podium?”
Her response was a beeline up the spiral stairs. He waited a beat before following, watching her hips shift as she moved. Watching everything about the way she moved.
“I do not see it.”
He reached for her waist, praying his heart would stop pounding so damn hard. No dice. It only beat faster as she turned and met his gaze. And it nearly exploded when he laid his fingers on her neck, letting her dark hair flow over his hand.
“I found it,” he said.
“Found what?” But her smile said she’d found it too.
“This.” He pressed his mouth to hers, so gently at first—too gently. As if he might break her, or break them both, with how much he wanted this. Wanted her. Marisol’s mouth melted into his. Her arms wrapped around his neck, and then they were crashing into one another. Tasting. Breathing one another.
She pulled back, two fingers covering her lips. “Wow.”
“Good wow?”
Then they were kissing again, and Evan forgot everything. Where he was. Who he was. When he was. He shattered into a hundred thousand pieces with each brush of her tongue against his.
The lights flicked on and off.
They broke apart, but his body put up the mother of all protests. If it was Penny again, with her damn social media—
“Ahem.” The nasal voice came from below, and Evan peered into the audience seating. A tall, beanstalk-like guy in a red polo shirt adjusted his glasses, while a group of fifteen or so tourists with glittery name tags stared up at them. “Do you have permission to be here?”
“Oh. Uh, yeah.” Evan pointed to the red polo shirts. “Doing some last minute clean up.”
“It is them. The ones from the So Late clips.” A girl in the back elbowed the girl beside her. “We totally ship you guys. Everybody on my JV volleyball team watched it on the bus to one of our games. Do you—”
The cold sting of panic shot through his veins. He didn’t have permission to be here. And this girl was going to put them on the spot, ask them questions he didn’t want to answer. Not yet. “Watch out for Studio Seventeen C. I heard they were having some technical difficulties.” He grabbed Marisol’s hand, and they darted down the stairs.
Away from the stares of the crowd.
Away from the bright lights of the studio.
Toward—he hoped—another real moment together.
Day Seven
Nothing could kill the butterflies—all three dozen of them—floating around in her stomach. Not the lack of coffee in her hotel room. Not the six a.m. wake-up call. Not even the bonus check-in call from her mother.
“Sí. All of the interviews were cancelled that day. I am sure they will reschedule. I will find out today.” She pulled a sea green button-down from a hanger. Not even having to stuff herself into a suit seemed bad today. Not after a day like yesterday.
“Have you met anyone interesting there?” her mother asked. “Conferences are always a great way to network. Make connections. You never know when all those business cards will come in handy.”
Okay. Maybe lying to her mother murdered one of the butterflies.
“I am working on it.”
“I know you are, honey. Thank you.” Her mother’s sniffle traveled all the way from Puerto Cabezas and wormed its way into the cracks in Marisol’s heart. Her mom—the always level-headed, always prepared, always everything—had built Ahora from the ground up
. She’d fought for government grants, recruited volunteers, and somehow raised two children who wanted to be exactly like her.
And now everything she’d worked for balanced perilously on Marisol’s shoulders.
A dozen more butterflies: dead and gone.
“How is your back?” Marisol asked, trying to paddle her way out of the panic sloshing at her sides. “Have you heard anything from Felipe?”
“Back is about the same.”
“You need to have the injections,” Marisol said.
“We’ll see.”
Her mother’s code for “done talking about this.”
“Felipe?” Marisol prodded.
“Called yesterday. Said he’d been trying to get ahold of you.”
“What did you say?”
“Told him you’d been having phone trouble.”
Marisol sighed. She hated keeping things from her big brother—even if she knew keeping this secret was in his best interest. “I will email him.” She’d ignored her inbox—and every other electronic device—all weekend. It was easier to live in her bubble of funny people and funny things—and not so funny kisses—without the distraction of the computer or the television. But now it was time to head back to the real world.
Starting right now, with her brightest, most businesslike smile, a pair of sensible pumps, and a promise to her mother that she’d network the hell out of this place. And first things first, she’d march down to the registration desk and get her interview rescheduled.
One sardine-packed elevator later, she stood on the ground floor. She followed the DELLA SIMMONS PUBLIC HEATH INITIATIVE THIS WAY signs through a labyrinth of mostly vacant conference rooms, until she finally stumbled upon a line of people at least a hundred deep, all waiting to get in.
So much for marching in and demanding the interview.
“Well, hello. Mary Anne, right?” The woman smirked and shifted an expensive purse from one forearm to the other. Exactly what Marisol didn’t want to face this early in the day—or ever. Pube One, front and center on the first full day of the conference.
“Marisol.”
“Right, right. They’ve got quite the line here. Hope you don’t miss the first session.”
“Me too.” Marisol couldn’t quite tell if the woman was being genuinely nice or a genuine asshole. She put on a warm smile, just in case. “Did you have a nice weekend?”
“Oh, you know. The usual. Dinner with a few of the conference sponsors. Oh, we did a private screening of our documentary.” Her eyes widened. “Went really well. Here. You should come see it. The public screening is Wednesday night.” She pulled a sheet of paper from her handbag. “A little tip: get there early. It’s a fan favorite to win, and you don’t want another replay of this situation, do you?” She gestured toward the marathon-length line before she gave Marisol a little wave and strutted away.
Marisol crammed the paper into her folder without reading it. Her stomach twisted tighter with every step she took toward the registration desk. Why did she constantly feel like the only person who had no clue how to maneuver this whole conference schmoozing thing?
“There you are.”
Every head turned in the direction of the voice. Clint stood a head taller than everyone in the vicinity, and his suit was even more impeccably tailored than the one he’d worn the other day.
It should be a crime to look that hot this early in the morning. “Me?”
“Yeah. I think I found the guy to talk to about the interviews.”
“Not here?” She nodded toward the chaos ahead.
“Nope. Already waited in this line for twenty minutes just to be told they didn’t know. Come on.”
She glanced over her shoulder. Everyone stared. Every. One. The logical part of her brain knew they were looking at him. The Pube-induced paranoia part of her brain said they all knew about her appearance on the show—just like the girl the day before.
They strode past the line and down a hallway scattered with people in business suits. Wafts of hairspray and cologne hit as they marched by, and Marisol began to wonder if they were headed for a secret passage. Or maybe a wardrobe that would lead them to a magical land full of grants and kind interviewers.
“How was the taping?” he asked.
Marisol’s feet stuttered. “The taping?”
“Yeah, So Late It’s Early. You were going to see it the other day, right?” He laid a hand on the doorknob in front of them.
“Oh. Yes. It was… strange.”
His face broke into a grin. “That’s why it’s so awesome. I called my brother. He’s going to call his friend and see about getting me tickets. Ready?”
No. Definitely not ready. “Yes.”
Inside the room, the horrible Scorpion Pixie Lady sipped coffee while the man who’d raked her over the coals in the first interview scrolled through his phone. Other important-looking people filled the rest of the space, and suddenly Marisol felt like a wildebeest who’d wandered into a pack of lounging lions.
“Clint—”
“Ah, Mr. McIntyre.” Scorpion Lady sauntered over and draped a hand on his arm. She was old enough to be his mother, but the vibe she gave off was anything but maternal. “Did you finally come across your paperwork? It will be such a shame if we can’t consider Appalachia Together for the grant. You have such strong qualifications.”
He cleared his throat. “We’re working on it. In the meantime, I’d still like to reschedule my last interview.”
“Me too.” Marisol stuck her hand out. “Nice to see you again.”
The woman clasped her outstretched hand before leading them both to a table at the far end of the room. Marisol stared at her feet while Scorpion Lady flipped through a leather-bound planner. Clint had not only figured out the mystery of rescheduling, he’d gone out of his way to bring her along. He might have been her competition, but he fought fair. More than fair. And she kept spinning lies about the show. If she were a good person, she’d tell him the truth. See if he needed help with his presentation the way she did. Maybe James would let him sit in on her lessons.
“How about Thursday afternoon for you, Mary Anne? Say three o’clock?”
“Marisol.”
“Oh, yes. Sorry. I’ll put you down for three. See you then.”
Marisol started to protest. Her presentation was scheduled for two on Thursday. Getting from one to the other would be a flaming hot mess. But Scorpion Lady was already halfway across the room by the time Marisol found the words.
RIP: every last butterfly.
• • •
It should have been harder, running back and forth from the writers’ room to the coffee kiosk across the street. Making sure Penny didn’t get stuck sweeping off the stage and counting wristbands and running scripts between departments. But it wasn’t. Not when his mind could wander back to the set of Who’s Got the Coconut. To Marisol pressed against him with her face in his hands.
With those memories front and center, Evan walked to the parking lot with his stack of wristbands. He had hoped the weekend would give the show time to catch fire, so he wouldn’t be left begging for an audience.
Wishful thinking.
Maybe the stack weighed a little less than usual, but he’d still be hitting up the game show line for leftover superheroes and soccer moms who’d missed out on their chance at fame and housewares. And tomorrow he might have to pawn off an even thicker stack of wristbands if his sketches bombed.
“Figured you’d be inside gettin’ all done up.” Ted the Man Baby pulled a pack of cigarettes from his diaper before he swiped a wristband right out of Evan’s hand.
“Done up?”
“For the show. My girlfriend saw you on one of those celebrity gossip websites.” He jutted a thumb toward the woman behind him. Evan wasn’t sure what her costume was supposed to be. Cutoff shorts. Pink-streaked hair. A lightning bolt painted above her left eye.
“It’s pretaped.” Evan held out a wristband to the girlfriend. Earlier
in the day he’d watched as the crew edited together Friday night’s dinner “date.” Watching himself yammer on about D&D was embarrassing. Seeing himself watch Marisol’s every move was something more akin to showing up to gym class naked—with a giant boner.
He tried to ignore the beating late-afternoon sun as he handed out the rest of the wristbands. A few more game show rejects. A few random passersby. A handful of people who showed up and actually asked to watch the taping. By the time the seats were full, it was time to do the one intern job he’d been looking forward to all day.
Evan checked his pocket for the flash drive, grabbed the giant, floppy portfolio full of posters, and made his way out the door. When he arrived at the Hilltop, he expected his legs to propel him out of his car. Propel him straight to Marisol, who he definitely intended to kiss again. Maybe right there in the hotel lobby.
Except.
Long gone were the adults in fanny packs and their sugar-crazed children. The place buzzed with the drone of businesslike chatter. The laid-back, overpriced vacation vibe had been replaced by the haughty laughter of old men and the occasional buzz of someone’s cell phone.
This was not the kind of place where you could just grab a girl and throw her back into a kiss. Especially if that girl stood at the bar in a group of other well-dressed folks, commanding the attention of every person in a ten-foot radius.
Suddenly, Evan was all too aware of his sweaty T-shirt and jeans.
“Hey.” He waved her down and hung back a few feet. “I, uh, have your stuff.”
Marisol smiled, and Evan could see the relief in her features—something he wouldn’t have picked up on a few days ago.
“Excuse me.” She tugged his elbow, and he followed the clack-clack-clack of her heels to a table in the farthest, darkest corner of the hotel bar.
“Sorry. I didn’t realize you’d still be… conferencing?” When he’d dropped her off the night before, he thought there’d been a little more to his promise of bringing the posters by than either of them had said aloud. Maybe in the light of day, away from the artificial glow of Television City, she’d decided they’d been a fluke.
