by JJ Knight
“Date night with Christy,” he says. “It was on the schedule.” He angles his head toward Jessie. “Ask her to get a copy of mine to go with yours. That way you’ll know when I’m going to be gone.”
My belly turns to cement. “Where are you filming?”
“Some restaurant and ballroom dance place. We’re supposed to spontaneously perform. It’s all extras. They bought out the place.”
“Sounds fun. Isn’t she the one you’re taking to the condo?”
“Yep.” He shoves his hands in his pockets. “You going to be okay tonight?”
I nod. “Sure. Is Duke going to take me to the hotel? Our furniture was supposed to be delivered today for move-in.”
Blitz smacks his hand against the door frame. “Shoot. Today was supposed to be our first night!” He gives me a sad smile. “You wanna wait up for me there?”
At that, Jessie and the workout coach quietly exit the room. I don’t blame them. They probably think I’m about to make some big scene.
But I won’t.
“We’re not checked out of the hotel yet, right? I’ll ask Shelly to extend us one more night. We’ll let tomorrow night be our first night there.”
Blitz frowns. “I’m filming with Mariah tomorrow night.”
I let out a breath. “How late will these go?”
“They need night shots. I think I’m walking along the Santa Monica pier with her. It will probably go super late. I don’t even have rehearsal until after lunch either day.”
I bite my lip, holding back tears. “Well, in that case, I guess I’ll go ahead and move as planned. Shelly’s probably already got them packing our stuff and driving it over anyway.”
He steps closer and kneels next to me on the mat. “I’ll be there tonight, I promise. The part with Christy will go fast. We won’t be at my condo for long.”
I nod, resuming my sit-ups. I knew what I signed up for. Blitz has to put on a show.
“Hey,” he says, pressing against my back so I can’t go down into another sit-up. “I love you, remember? This is just work.”
He gathers me against him. I hang on. He smells different, like hair products and aftershave, things he doesn’t ordinarily wear. This helps. They’ve doctored him up for a role. He’s not my Blitz. He’s the version that belongs to the network.
I let him go. “I’ll be the one sleeping in your new bed,” I say.
“I can’t wait to see you in it,” he says. He stands up. “Jessie? You out there?”
Jessie steps timidly inside. “Yes?”
“What’s on Livia’s schedule for tomorrow morning?”
Jessie slides a messenger bag around her body, the one that carries all my things, cell phone, schedule, water, snacks. She unrolls a sheaf of papers. “Eight a.m. ballet workout with Caprice, then a dance rehearsal with Amara at ten. Wardrobe fitting at eleven.”
“Tell Caprice she won’t be at the rehearsal. We’ll be here for Amara at ten.”
Jessie nods. “I will.”
“Tell them Blitz said it, not Livia.”
Jessie nods again. “Got it.”
Blitz turns back to me. “Bought us a lazy morning at the new place.”
I squeeze his hand. “Thank you.”
He presses another light kiss on my mouth and stands up. “I guess I’ll go do this thing.” He straightens his tie. “Christy is easygoing. This one will be fine.”
“It’s Giselle,” we both say at the same time, and laugh.
“When is that lovely date?” I ask.
“Next week.”
“And mine?”
“You are Monday.” He heads to the door. “I got to choose the date, and they aren’t allowed to leak it to you.”
“Sounds like fun,” I say.
“See you at home,” he says.
“Bye, Blitz.”
By the time the workout coach is back, I’ve resumed my ab crunches. I feel better, despite knowing Blitz will be out with Christy tonight. The cameras will be on their every move.
Still, I picture him kissing her, which I’m sure will be scripted or at least highly encouraged, and my stomach turns over.
This is going to be way harder than I thought.
~*´`*~
Duke is with Blitz for the evening, and he feeds me shots of the date with Christy while I supervise the team who is unpacking all our clothes.
I sit on the freshly made bed in the master bedroom, chain-eating chocolate cookies, simultaneously scrolling through the shots and showing the two women which drawers will be mine and which will go to Blitz.
As weird as it feels to have someone else arranging my stuff, I’m too tired to do anything more than sit and eat cookies, which were left by the real estate agent Tammy. A whole dozen of them and a bottle of wine. I might eat them all.
Shelly was here for a while, but I sent her home. Supposedly some grocery service will arrive within the hour to fill the fridge and pantry. She’s mostly working with the chef’s suggestions, but I had her add more chocolate chip cookies. My life has been missing cookies since I got to LA. Tammy was good to remind me of them.
“I think that’s everything,” one of the women says. They are both Hispanic and friendly, and just looking at them makes me miss Blitz. Has he called his mother since we’ve been here? I’m not sure. I should remind him.
“Thank you,” I say. I’m too tired to even show them out, but thankfully, they leave on their own. Now that I don’t have an audience, I flop back on the fluffy cotton duvet.
Another buzz from Duke.
Yes, he kissed her, but it was a silly peck. Devon’s irritated.
A picture is attached, and I have to laugh. Blitz looks positively paternal as he leans in to Christy.
She looks incredibly lovely in an ice-white dress with little crystals along the neckline. They are at some restaurant on a dance floor and the lights make them look blue. It will be a good scene for the show.
I eat another cookie, hoping the grocery shopper brings some milk. Cookies and wine. Maybe that will do.
It will be hours before Blitz comes. They haven’t even gone to the condo yet. I roll off the bed and head to the bathroom, looking around. There are towels now, all in various dusty pastels. A basket of shampoos and conditioners. Body wash. Razors. They’ve thought of everything.
For a moment, I flash to the bathroom at my parents’ house back in San Antonio. My brother’s Star Wars toothbrush. The Ivory soap and discount shampoo. A wave of homesickness passes through me.
I wonder if my parents will ever speak to me again, or if they are lost to me. What do they tell Andy about his sister? That she ran away? That I’m wicked and full of sin?
I can’t even visit the places we used to go, so far away from Texas. I head back to the bed and my phone, pulling up Google Maps so I can zoom in on my dystopian park, bare ground and peeling equipment. Then down along the street to my house. The image shows Mom’s old white minivan, the license plate blurred out.
The front is the same, the green door against the white clapboard. I look closer and I see on the porch a red wagon. It was mine as a child, moved with us from Houston for Andy to use. I can picture him in it. After Gabriella was born and my belly went back down, I was allowed to pull him in it to the park.
Another message from Duke.
Headed to the condo. Not long now.
I know Blitz doesn’t even have his phone on him, but he might get it during the drive over.
And sure enough, a few minutes later, I get a message from him.
Shoot going okay. Sort of dull. The dance was fun. The extras at the restaurant were excited to be there.
I tap a quick message back.
House all set up. Waiting on groceries. Sprawled on the bed!
He responds to that.
Don’t move a muscle. Can’t wait to see you there.
I set down the phone. This will be okay. We will get through it. Of course timing would be bad. Our schedules are brutal.
&nb
sp; I reach over for my bag. Jessie got me a printout of Blitz’s schedule. Because of all the shooting he has to do, his dance rehearsals are shorter and less frequent now.
Tomorrow night he and Mariah will go to a nightclub, also populated with extras. They won’t do a showy ballroom dance like Christy, but something more casual and sexy. So the schedule says.
Mariah is the one who started all this mess. She filed the first lawsuit regarding the finale and got the other girls on board.
I roll back on the bed and stare at the ceiling. It’s ten weeks. We can make it.
Chapter 19
Blitz gets in around two in the morning. We don’t talk about the condo or his date. We have other things to do in our new home, and especially, the new bed.
When I wake up, I notice Duke sent me a couple pictures of Blitz and Christy sitting on his sofa, but I’m afraid to ask what happened, and what Devon and his cameras might have suggested happened. They’ll do what they have to do to make the show interesting for viewers. I trust Blitz.
Even Mariah’s date is no big deal. As I sit at home Thursday night, this time with a pint of strawberry ice cream, Duke reports that she’s stiff and unnatural around Blitz, as if she’s scared he’ll be mad at her about the lawsuit. They only go to the club and take a walk on the pier after. Their date is done by midnight.
According to the schedule, my official date with Blitz is on Monday. The location is marked as secret. We haven’t practiced any dancing for our date, so I assume ours will be different from the ones he did with Christy and Mariah.
When I arrive at the studio Monday, the workout coach puts me through only minimal exercises. Amara gives me some pointe work for the classic dance show number, and then I go straight to wardrobe to be prepped for shooting.
Jessie is waiting for me. There are three other women in the makeup room, one I remember from the finale.
“It’s finally Livia’s turn,” the one says, and reminds me that her name is Cecilia. Her hair is still spiky, this time with blue tips. She turns to a tall stout woman with square glasses. “Will her outfit mess up her hair when she puts it on?”
The other woman shakes her head no. “It zips.”
I wonder what they’ve picked out for me, and if that will give me a hint about where we’re going. My nerves are prickly, and my stomach flits with butterflies as if I didn’t see Blitz every night.
This will be different. There will be cameras. People telling us where to go and what to do. These shoots aren’t rehearsed, but Blitz said if something interesting happens, like if I trip and he catches me, they might ask us to do it again to get another angle.
Cecilia pats the chair and I walk over to sit on it. “Don’t you worry, girl, we’ll get you looking like a TV star.”
I guess I’m supposed to be comforted by this. Apparently I don’t look like one now? Does she say that to the other finalists?
I fold my hands in my lap. Cecilia unravels the braided bun. “Girl, you have so much hair,” she says.
“What are you going to do with it?” I ask.
“I have to do what the stylist for the episode tells me,” Cecilia says. “And I’m to make you look like a princess but prepare you for the elements.”
“So I’ll be outside?”
The square-glasses woman speaks up. “All the shoots are partially done outside. If the weather doesn’t hold, we often have to make you up to look exactly like you did the day before and try again.”
“Yikes,” I say.
“It’s going to be a beautiful night,” Cecilia says in a singsong voice. “You are going to shine.”
She starts rolling my hair into hot curlers. The other woman holds different color swatches next to my face. “Have Gigi tone down her skin, go blue,” she says.
My voice is a squeak when I say, “Blue?”
Cecilia laughs. “Not like a Smurf. Just cool tones to your base color, not warm ones. To complement your dress and this black, black hair.”
When all my hair is pinned up in rollers, the third girl approaches, angular with bangs cut in a dramatic straight line just above her eyes. She holds three skin-colored sticks and stripes them all on my cheek.
“Go blue, Gigi,” Cecilia says.
Gigi rolls her eyes. “The skin wants what the skin wants.”
“Well, Cameron wants blue.”
“Cameron can stick to fabrics.”
They continue to banter in this way as Gigi smooths more creams on my face. I’m turned away from the mirror, so I can’t see what she’s doing. She rolls a cart close and lifts the lid. It’s chock full of colors, little circles in every hue imaginable. I see the blues and grimace.
“Not a pretty look,” Gigi says. “It will cause wrinkles around the corners of your mouth.”
I straighten my face.
“Close your eyes.”
I try to relax as she continues to work. Without sight, the other senses take over. The smell of cosmetics and hairspray. The water running on the other side of the room. Hangers moving along a metal rack.
Then tugging on my hair. The rollers slide down my head. Nobody touches my face for a few moments, so I dare to open my eyes.
Gigi rummages around in her cart.
“What’s the humidity today?” Cecilia asks.
“Forty,” someone calls from deeper in the room.
“Forty,” Cecilia breathes, as if this is a puzzle to solve.
Gigi leans in again. “Try not to blink or breathe,” she says.
A mascara wand approaches my eyes. I try to keep them wide as she works. The square-glasses woman comes in again, Cameron, I guess Cecilia called her, this time with a pale blue dress. “Blitz called the color,” she says.
I almost smile, but Gigi stops me with a stern “Don’t move a muscle.”
Finally, she steps away, and Cecilia takes over my hair in earnest. I feel her pinning and back-combing. Curls brush against my shoulders.
“She looks like Jasmine from Aladdin,” Jessie says.
“Agreed,” Cameron says. “It’s what we were going for.”
“She must have some Middle Eastern in her,” Cecilia says. “Or maybe India.”
Gigi studies me. “Yes. Her hair is so black.”
“But she’s pale as a ghost,” Cameron says. “She would have more color.”
I try not to squirm as they all assess me.
“It doesn’t matter,” Cecilia says. “Only that she looks more classically beautiful than the others. Those were our instructions.”
Really? The world is a blur for a second as Cecilia whirls me around to the mirror. I feel like I did the night of the finale, needing to step down and get closer to this girl I see. The makeup is dramatic, and the sweep of my hair is broad, pinned almost like something from the forties, only to fall in a riot of curls down my shoulders and back.
It’s me, just not a me I’m used to.
A girl I’ve never seen pops her head through the door. “Transport to the shoot location in ten minutes,” she says.
“Get her dressed!” Cecilia says.
Cameron leads me deeper into the room, past the costume racks, to an area that closes off with a heavy curtain.
“Here are your underthings,” Cameron says, setting a pair of pale blue ruffled boy shorts and a strapless bra on a cushioned bench. She hangs the dress on a hook.
I wait to see if she is going to leave, but she doesn’t, so I take a deep breath and kick off my jazz shoes.
She taps her foot impatiently. “I need to make sure it fits properly before I go,” she says. “And I worry about the ruffles under the skirt.”
I nod and take a deep breath, shucking off the dance top and workout capris, then the athletic bra. Finally, my panties.
Gah. Naked in front of a stranger.
Cameron is all business as she hands me the ruffled shorts.
I step into them. They slide on like silk, soft and smooth on the inside. The ruffles are mostly flat, although they pop out a lit
tle on my rear, making me a little curvier than I am naturally.
The bra looks difficult. The cups are shaped into a sweetheart, dipping down in the middle. The back is small with a single hook.
I press the front of it to me, and reach around to try and fasten it. After a couple misses, Cameron sighs and steps forward, fitting the hook in the eye.
She pulls the dress from the hanger and unzips it.
“Dive into it,” Cameron says. “Arms overhead to protect your hair and makeup.”
I lift my arms high and bend over. Cameron fits the dress around me and zips it up the back. It doesn’t come up over my shoulders, but a band runs straight across the front and around.
The top is fitted, then as it hits the waist, it swings out. I do a quick turn, and the skirt flies up level with my hips.
“Now you see why the boy shorts,” Cameron says. “Everyone wants you innocent, and he might twirl you.”
She smooths the dress down to check the ruffles. “It’s good,” she says. “The fabric is heavy enough.”
“What shoes am I wearing?”
“You have two pairs,” Cameron says. She leads me back out to the main dressing room and picks up the boxes. “One is high heels, the other ballet flats. The stylist will tell you when to switch.”
She opens the box and extracts the flats. I take them and slip them on my feet. They are blue and match the dress exactly. The stiletto heels in the other box are very bare, just a tiny strap across the toes and another at the back. They will be hard to dance in.
She passes the box to Jessie. Gigi tosses some of her makeup into a bag and waits. I guess she is also going with us. Cecilia, however, sits back on a chair. “Have fun!” she says. “You’ll have a grand time. He’s your boy, after all.”
“Thank you,” I say to her.
The girl from before pops back in. “Car is waiting!” She seems a little anxious.
My little entourage heads to the limo. I’m hoping Blitz will be inside, but when the door opens, only Devon is there, wearing his usual jeans and turtleneck. “We’ll talk about what’s going to happen on the way,” he says. “Blitz is meeting us there. I want there to be a first look.”
