Unzipped

by Lauren Blakely

  Ouch.

  I’ll have the bruise marks on my ego for days from that gut punch.

  “I’ll do that, Bruce. I’ll work on old-school funny,” I say, since I don’t have any bargaining chips.

  “But listen, Fin. I’m rooting for you. Maybe add a kissing scene too. Some flirting. Dress your lead in fishnets. You want to run anything past me, you know where to find me.”

  “Thanks,” I say, but he’s already hung up.

  I stare at the phone as if it’s a device from an alien planet.

  Maybe I should have tucked it into my bathing suit. Maybe it would have been better waterlogged.

  With leaden feet, I walk to my lemon-yellow, two-story rental home on the outskirts of town.

  I unlock the door, my mind speeding away from me as I recall the bundle of enthusiasm the network execs wrapped me up in when they picked up the show after years of me pitching, writing, revising, getting rejected. Lather, rinse, repeat.

  It’s about real life! We love it! Don’t make it like everything else on TV. We want something different! Be quirky! Screw the tropes!

  That’s what I delivered for the first thirteen episodes—a baker’s dozen of shows that were critically acclaimed, but disastrously under-watched. The ratings are so low it feels like I could personally email every viewer and ask for tips for new storylines. Hell, I could visit their homes and serve them pancakes for breakfast while shooting the breeze on what they like and don’t like about Lane and Amanda, my hero and heroine.

  My stomach rumbles as I lock the door, wanting those pancakes.

  As I head toward the kitchen, shock still rippling through me, I wonder if there is un-mined comedy in pancakes. Some hilarious bit about that time Amanda went to a friend’s house and her friend served those terrible pancakes from Trader Joe’s that taste like soap, and Amanda called them soap cakes, and that becomes a bit on what to do when a host serves awful food?

  Best friends and former roomies Amanda and Lane would laugh about it, and it would help them buddy-comedy their way back to living under the same roof.

  But as I turn on the coffee maker, I don’t know if soap cakes are funny.

  As the coffee drips, I don’t even know if Speedos are funny. And I should know the answer to that.

  Most of all, I don’t have a clue how the hell I’m going to pull this off in a mere six episodes.

  The ironic thing is that deep down in the squishy, soft part of my heart, I knew this was coming.

  But knowing something is coming doesn’t make it hurt any less.

  With a cup of joe in hand, I flip open my laptop and try to play with all the ways a lime-green Speedo can spawn humor.

  2

  Him

  This is a foolproof blueprint.

  I run through a drill one final time in the driveway of my brother’s home in Oakland. Everything goes off without a hitch. When I’m done, I hold my hands out wide, raise my eyebrows, and ask, “Am I ready or am I absolutely, no-questions-asked, one hundred percent good to go?”

  “I’d say you’re ready, but are you really doing this?” My oldest brother, Ransom, marches up to me, a curious glint in his brown eyes, his infant son attached to his chest, courtesy of a Baby Björn.

  “You don’t think I should?”

  He laughs, shaking his head. “I think it could definitely work. But I also think a phone call could work.”

  I cut a hand through the air. “No way. Phone calls are for guys who don’t make an effort.”

  “That’s clearly not you.”

  “Damn straight. I am the king of effort.” I narrow my eyes, the same shade as his. “Besides, didn’t you win Delia’s heart like this?”

  He seesaws his hand. “Not entirely like this. But I did propose to her at the office and carried her out of there like Richard Gere did Debra Winger.”

  “Minus the naval uniform.”

  “Obviously.”

  I point to his kid and the home behind them, the reminders that life can work out fantastically if you big-gesture a woman the right way. “So it worked.”

  He holds up his left hand and wiggles his ring finger. “Damn straight.”

  “And this will work.” I look at his son, talking in a singsong voice. “What do you think, Harlan?”

  The three-month-old gurgles.

  “Clearly, he agrees with me,” I say.

  “Then you better hit the road. You need to be there at dusk. Timing is everything.”

  It’s my turn to laugh him off. “I’m an engineer. I’m well aware of the need for precision timing. I built in time for traffic, for unexpected road closures, and for any other unforeseen circumstances.”

  “You’re such a nerd.”

  I smile proudly, owning it. “I believe I’m what’s known as a hot nerd.”

  He rolls his eyes. “You do know you’re not hot, right?”

  “We share the same genes so if I’m an ugly bastard, you are too.”

  “Takes one to know one,” he says, clapping my back as we say goodbye in our usual style.

  I let go and tap the hood of my Tesla, giving myself a final pep talk. “I’m ready. As ready as I’ll ever be.”

  “I can’t believe it’s been eight years since you were a sophomore in college. I hope you wind up taking her to Nash’s restaurant tonight.” Our brother works as a sous chef a few towns over from where I’m headed.

  I salute him. “I’ll report back later.”

  I open the door to my car, switch my regular black glasses for prescription shades, and head up the coast.

  May was the month when my college girlfriend issued her directive at the end of what was shaping up to be an epic night.

  Try again when you get your act together. Show up when you know what you want.

  She made it clear what I needed to do, and I’ve spent the past eight years doing exactly that. I have become the kind of man who deserves a woman like her.

  The first few years of college, I was aimless. The consummate slacker, I hardly knew what I wanted. With her sharp, swift kick, I got my act together, focused all my energies for once, pulled my average grades up, completed my engineering degree, earned a master’s, and went on to become a designer of thrill rides.

  So yeah, I owe her big-time.

  And from what I’ve seen on social media, the girl I once thought of as the best thing I’d ever done is successful, funny, and just as beautiful as she was then. Better yet, even though I haven’t friend-requested her and learned the true skinny on her life—I don’t want to ruin the surprise—Facebook shows her relationship status as “single.” Now that’s something worth pulling out a grand gesture for.

  Especially since I haven’t met anyone since who can hold a candle to her.

  Fine, calling her might be easier. Picking up the phone and asking her to dinner could work too.

  But why do anything halfway?

  You either go big or go home.

  No one ever said the big gesture was easy. That’s why they work. They show that the hero is busting his ass to win back the woman.

  As I exit the highway into the little wine country town, I don’t see how she can say no.

  Ione Skye couldn’t turn down John Cusack, after all.

  The thing you learn as an engineer is to prepare. To plan. And to test scenarios.

  Don’t go into any situation blind. The more data you have, the better off you’ll be.

  I looked up my girl on Zillow. I checked property records. Not like a stalker checking out an ex, because that’s not cool, and I aim to be cool. Especially since I spent so much of my younger years being thoroughly uncool. Which might explain why I do my damnedest to avoid social media now. I’m not sure I’d know what to say or post, so why bother?

  Since I still have Cassie’s phone number—a reverse number search tells me she didn’t change it from college—the plan is to call her and ask her to come to the window.

  But first, since I’m one hour and twenty-seven minutes ea
rly, I stop at a coffee shop, grab an iced tea, and review the projects I’m working on, as well as the requests to use my patented safety feature. I check the time, tuck my phone into my jeans, and head to the restroom to brush my teeth. Fresh breath is a prerequisite for any big gesture. I comb my fingers through my thick brown hair then nod at my reflection.

  Yep, I look good.

  I get back in my car, turn on the GPS, and head to her home, smiling as I set eyes on it. Yellow. Her favorite color.

  Somehow, seeing she hasn’t changed that much makes me feel like this can work. She didn’t need to change. I did. I park a block away and do my best to ignore the nerves that are flickering around in my chest.

  Tom Cruise wasn’t nervous when he was being chased by Guido the Killer Pimp. I don’t need to be, and my hero, Lloyd Dobler, certainly wasn’t either when he pulled up in his Chevy Malibu.

  I grab the clunky boom box from the front seat. Thank God for pawnshops because that’s where all boom boxes have gone to die. Or to find second lives. When I picked this out amid the old electric guitars and gaudy jewelry at Twice Around, a pawnshop near where I live in San Francisco, the grizzled, tatted dude at the counter shook his head in amusement. “Never thought I’d move this bad boy,” he’d said.

  “Maybe it was fate that it was waiting for me,” I’d suggested.

  “Sure. Fate. How about forty dollars and fate can be yours?”

  That was good enough for me. But tracking down a boom box of this size and shape wasn’t even the hardest part. The toughest thing to do? Getting her favorite song, “Unzipped,” transferred onto cassette tape. Ransom’s wife said her parents were pack rats and kept everything, so she found an old mixtape in her folks’ garage, and with a Mac and some elbow grease, I managed to jury-rig a solution to transfer “Unzipped” on top of Debbie Gibson, saving me the trouble of waiting for Amazon to ship me a new cassette tape.

  Of course, that also means I get to give my brother’s wife a hard time about how much she loved the bubblegum singer and her tunes like “Lost in Your Eyes” and “Only in My Dreams.”

  But then, we’re not that different. Even though I was a kid in the ’90s and a teen in the first decade of this century, I always felt like I was born in the wrong decade. The ’80s are where it’s at for me.

  Technically, I could stream “Unzipped” on my iPhone and hold that above my head in the driveway.

  But I could also design a roller coaster that doesn’t get above twenty miles an hour. What’s the point of that?

  As twilight falls, I walk along the sidewalk. For a moment, I consider the risk I’m taking. Neighbors might get pissed. I could get cited by the cops for disturbing the peace.

  Most likely scenario? Since I’m a glass-half-full guy, I’ll say it’s that the love of my life will hear our song, run out the front door, throw her arms around me, and say, “Kyler, I’d been hoping you’d show up today.”

  When I’m a few houses away, my stomach nose-diving with nerves, I dial her number. It rings, and rings, and rings.

  Voicemail.

  Nope. Won’t go there. Dudes who leave voicemails end up on the never-date list that gets circulated to all women. I hang up.

  But I don’t fret, because when I reach her home, a light shines by the front window, and another one flickers upstairs. A car is parked in the driveway. A little red Honda.

  Excellent.

  I walk halfway up the stone path and plant my feet in a wide stance. I hit the play button and hold the silver beast high above my head at full volume, waiting for the opening notes of the ballad.

  Briefly, I wonder if Lloyd Dobler felt at all like he was about to make a gigantic fool of himself. But I decide Lloyd Dobler didn’t feel that way at all. No matter how dorky or nerdy he was, that dude knew how to get things done.

  The tune begins, and my jaw drops.

  What the hell?

  No. No way. No fucking way.

  Scrambling, I kneel, setting the boom box on the grass as I stab the stop button. But I hit fast-forward instead. Crap. I hit play once more, and it’s Debbie Gibson, singing about her dreams, and there’s no way this is happening.

  No way at all.

  I cannot serenade my woman with Debbie Gibson.

  I can’t serenade any woman with Debbie Gibson.

  I need the Peter Gabriel soundalike and his rocker cool, taking it slow and easy, melting women.

  I hit the fast-forward button again. The player makes another squealing noise, and I notice a gray-haired lady a few houses down, peering over her porch swing, watching me.

  I slap on a play-it-cool smile even as my heart ticks a million miles an hour.

  Finally, when I reach the end of the pop princess’s “Only in My Dreams,” my heart rate starts to settle as “Unzipped” comes on.

  Minor snafu.

  That’s all this is. I check out the house. She’s not even at the window yet.

  Whew.

  I can do this. I can right this ship.

  Especially since there’s a shadow behind the curtain, almost as if she knew she had to wait for me to cue up the song. She knows I’m not the smoothest guy, and she’s okay with that.

  I hit play. Take two.

  This time, our song begins, and as it echoes around me, so do memories, fantastic ones of her and me dancing, laughing, planning to spend the night together.

  As the chorus starts, I see feminine fingers tugging at the white curtains at a window on the second floor.

  Yes. Come a little closer.

  “I want your love unzip—”

  The crooner’s voice shorts out and stops.

  Just. Stops.

  My shoulders sag, and I groan in epic frustration.

  Take three.

  Hitting buttons over and over again, I try to get the song to play. But no music sounds. Instead, the noise that fills the air is the boom box eating the cassette tape. This is why we went digital.

  And this leaves me with only one choice.

  I raise the boom box above my head a third time, and I do something I only do in the shower or the car.

  Sing a cappella.

  I’m no Peter Gabriel. I’m definitely no Debbie Gibson. But this will have to do.

  I sing my off-key, no-one-would-even-want-to-hear-me-sing-Happy-Birthday heart out.

  And what do you know? It’s working. Oh hell yeah, it’s working so damn well she yanks back the curtain, flings open the window, and waves.

  I blink.

  The woman peering back at me is definitely not Cassandra.

  3

  Her

  It is a truth universally acknowledged that any ice cream will do when you’re wallowing.

  Häagen-Dazs. Ben & Jerry’s. Talenti. It doesn’t matter.

  Mint chip. Chocolate peanut butter cup. Salted caramel. They all fit the bill.

  I hold up the pint, talking like a ringmaster to my audience of one—me. “Step right up, ladies and gentlemen, children of all ages, welcome to the big top of . . . Chunky Monkey.” I let my voice reverberate like it’s carrying through the circus tent and I’m surrounded by peanuts and sawdust, a tent and a trapeze.

  “Watch as the forlorn TV writer tunnels through a pint of Chunky Monkey. Marvel as she uncovers every single chunk of chocolate and consumes each piece of walnut. Thrill at the way she reaches the bottom of the container in less than thirty minutes.”

  I let the empty carton drop on the marble counter with a weak thump, grab a bottle of Chardonnay from the counter, and use my imaginary megaphone again. “Prepare to be amazed as she adds alcohol to the party of one.”

  I find a corkscrew and get to work.

  Holy hell.

  Did someone say opening wine isn’t exercise? Because that person is dead wrong. I can literally feel my triceps growing as I speak. I am totally adding opening wine bottles to the calorie-burning counter on every website ever.

  I grunt as I yank the cork higher, then at last, triumphant, I toss the cork
to the ground, briefly considering whether I should use a glass.

  Only briefly.

  I down a thirsty gulp straight from the source.

  I return to the kitchen counter and my open laptop, where I did indeed bang out a scene today, thank you Speedo very much.

  Even when I’m sad, I write.

  Because Tina Fey, the goddess of comedy, said it best in Bossypants when she wrote, “I’m unstoppable because I don’t know how to stop.”

  I am definitely not unstoppable. But if I act like Tina Fey, maybe, just maybe, I can finagle that six-episode renewal.

  As I peruse the scenes, the opening notes of a song filter from the front of my townhome. What the hell? Did I leave the streaming app open on my phone? I step away from the counter and head to the front door, looking for my phone, even though I swear I had it with me in the kitchen.

  The song grows louder, and it’s not coming from my cell at all. It’s coming from outside. I peer through the peephole.

  I jerk back.

  Rub my eyes.

  What the hell?

  Am I really seeing what I’m seeing? I don’t think I had that much wine. I had one sip.

  Fine, fine. One large sip. One very large, very hearty sip. All right, it was a gulp.

  But I can’t possibly be hallucinating, can I?

  I peek again, and holy smokes.

  There’s a guy on my front lawn going full Lloyd Dobler.

  The hair on the back of my neck stands on end, and my paranoid brain leaps three thousand steps ahead. Did he escape from Alcatraz? Is he going to bang down my door? Attack me?

  I pivot and grab the baseball bat I keep handy. As the youngest sister of two older brothers, I’ve learned a few valuable lessons: boys are trouble, pizza is good cold, and always keep a baseball bat near the door and/or bed.

  With my bat in hand, I scurry to the kitchen to grab my phone, then fly upstairs to the bedroom, taking the steps two by two.

  I race into the bedroom, set the bat at my feet, and keep my phone clutched in my hand, ready to call 911 if need be. I pull back the white curtain a smidge.