Spur of the Moment

by Theresa Alan

  As she listed all the ways she needed to improve lest she become a washed-up, talentless old hag before she even turned twenty-five, she finally fell asleep.

  Ana wished she were the kind of person who couldn’t eat when she was depressed. She got the “couldn’t sleep” part down pat, but becoming miraculously skinny without even trying was not hers to be had. She was of the eat-to-feel-better variety.

  But she was enjoying her workouts with Chelsey. Chelsey worked muscles Ana didn’t know she had, and while Ana was inevitably a little sore after their sessions together, she liked to believe that burning pinching pain in her ass or wherever was the feeling of thousands of calories being consumed by muscles working overtime.

  She was eating well during the day, but at night when she came home and her evil trio of skinny male roommates bombarded her with offers of wine or beer or foodstuffs drenched in butter or cheese, it nearly killed her to make a veggie burger (110 calories, 2 grams fat) with a whole wheat bun (120 calories, 1 gram fat) with mushrooms and onions sautéed in Pam (15 calories, no fat) with a bowl of vegetable soup (100 calories). Chelsey said in six weeks, as long as Ana stuck to the plan, she would get over her cravings for fat and calories. But as Ana longingly watched Scott devour a heaping plate of nachos, washing it down with one beer after another, she feared this was a cruel lie. How could she ever not salivate over the sight of nachos and beer?

  After the first couple weeks of drinking heavily after Marin had gone to California, Ana was back to abstaining from alcohol. It just sucked watching everyone else have fun after the shows while she drank water with lemon and felt sorry for her fat ass. This is the price of fame, she kept repeating to herself. This is the price of fame.

  Ana washed down three glasses of water to trick her stomach into thinking it was full. Then she went up to bed to feel sorry for herself some more. Self-pity had become her new hobby.

  After a few minutes, Scott came in and slid into bed next to her.

  “You’ve been little Mary Sunshine lately.”

  “Yeah. I know.”

  “It’s because of Marin?”

  “It’s because I’m fat and untalented and hopelessly ordinary.”

  “Ana, you are gorgeous and wickedly talented and you couldn’t be ordinary if you tried.” He turned on his side, propping his head in his hand, his elbow against the bed so he could really look at her. “God, you really believe all those horrible things about yourself, don’t you? Let’s start at the beginning. You are not fat. You’re one of the sexiest women I’ve ever known.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Whatever.”

  “I’ve always thought you were totally hot. You’re busty and curvy and if you weren’t my best friend, I’d ravish you. You can ask Jason. I always used to groan to him about how hanging around you gave me perpetual blue balls.”

  “It’s nice of you to lie, but I’ve been friends with Marin for six years and guys hit on her like mad and ignore me totally.”

  “Marin is cute, I’ll give her that. But she’s totally skinny and her tits are way too small. Guys hit on her because she’s open and friendly. You always look stressed out about something. You scowl like 98 percent of the time.”

  “I do?”

  “Guys are terrified you’re going to claw their eyes out if they try anything with you.”

  “You really think I’m sexy?”

  “I think you’re gorgeous. You’re beautiful. You’re stunning.”

  “Beautiful? Stunning?”

  “Beautiful. Stunning.”

  Ana thought about this. “I can’t believe it, but that actually makes me feel better.” She chewed her lip, contemplating this revelation some more. “But if you think I’m so hot, how come you never put the moves on me?”

  “Because you’ve had a crush on Jason for six years. I can’t compete with pretty boy Jason.”

  “I think you’re cute.”

  “Not as cute as Jason.”

  “I’m over Jason. He’s too perfect. It’s exhausting.”

  “So I can put the moves on you?”

  Ana considered this. They had made out that one time, and it had been a wonderful time. Plus, it had been such a long time since she’d gotten any. Ana nodded.

  “Should we have sex?” he asked.

  “I think so.”

  “I’ll get to see your tits?”

  She nodded again.

  “Yes!” Scott punched the air in victory. “Awesome. I’ve wanted this for so long.”

  “Have you ever fantasized about me?”

  “All the time.”

  “But that’s so weird. We’re best friends.”

  “Whatever. I’m a guy. I have testosterone. You have enormous luscious breasts and the sexiest legs in the universe. You do the math.”

  “So how should we do this? Should we get some wine and light some candles?”

  “I don’t think that’s necessary. All we need to do is take off all our clothes and then start fucking like rabbits.”

  He began unbuckling his pants.

  “Scott, you dork, the door is wide open. I’m going to get some wine and light some candles and we’re going to lock the door and we’ll go about this like normal adults. Anyway, I don’t have any condoms. Do you?”

  “I might. But I think they’re from like 1979. Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve had sex?”

  She laughed. “You were six years old in 1979.”

  “I’ll go ask Ramiro for a condom.”

  “But then he’ll know what we’re doing.”

  “Yeah. So?”

  “So that’s so weird.”

  “Ram will be thrilled that my long crush on you will be requited.”

  Ana smiled. “Okay. Meet me back here in a few minutes.”

  Ana lit several candles and turned off the lights. She got a bottle of wine (she wasn’t supposed to drink, but it had been a year since she’d had sex and she was going to have a couple celebratory glasses of wine, damn it) and two glasses and brought it all upstairs. Scott was waiting for her on the bed with a box of twelve condoms.

  “Think that’ll be enough?” she joked.

  “For now anyway.”

  Ana sat on the edge of the bed and drank her wine quickly. Suddenly she felt nervous and awkward. What had she been thinking, agreeing to do this? She’d gone nuts from depression, dieting, and jealousy. What if this didn’t work out? They lived together. Their friendship would be over.

  Scott sat up and pulled her close to him. Ana took a deep breath, pushed her worries aside, and did what six years of improv training had taught her to do: She acted on her instincts.

  Sex with Scott had been amazing. Sex was so much fun! Why hadn’t she done it in such a long time? It was awesome!

  They made love three times that night and once in the morning, and though Ana was sore, she wanted more, more, more.

  All day at work, she looked over at Scott and smiled. She couldn’t wait until they went home so they could have more sex. She wished one of them had a van so they could go in the back of it and have sex for their entire lunch hour.

  She thought of the way he’d kissed her neck, the way his face had looked with his eyes closed as he strained toward orgasm, the way his fingers felt trailing their way from her cheek, down her neck, across her collarbone, between her breasts, then making their way to her hip bone, where they lingered for quite some time. Scott had told her she had the sexiest hip bone he’d ever seen. It was an odd compliment, to be sure, but Ana loved that someone thought a part of her body she’d never stopped to consider was the sexiest one of its kind.

  Ana crossed her legs. It would do no good at all to get horny at work.

  She couldn’t believe how a little nookie could improve her spirits so much. She still felt the ache of depression, but the world seemed decidedly brighter today than it had the day before.

  There was no question that all the usual clichés about feeling in love were apropos: She did feel like she was walki
ng on air—no, actually she felt like she was skiing on air, down a treacherous, out-of-bounds black diamond mountain at a zillion miles an hour. But in a good way, an exhilarated way. She didn’t know what she was doing or where she was going or if there were cliffs and forests coming up, but somehow she had this strange sense of ease, that everything was going to be all right.

  A box popped up on her computer screen informing her that she had new mail, and wondering if she’d like to read it now. “Yes,” she clicked.

  To: anajacobs@abbott.com

  From: scottwinn@abbott.com

  You are the sexiest, smartest, most talented, funniest woman I have ever known. I crave you in the most amazing way.

  It was crazy, but Ana felt the same way.

  Ana hit REPLY.

  To: scottwinn@abbott.com

  From: anajacobs@abbott.com

  Dear Mr. Winn,

  I’m simply scandalized that you’d abuse work resources in such a manner.

  PS: I’ve been thinking about having sex with you all morning. I’m still thinking about it in fact. Right now I’m imagining taking you into my mouth . . .

  Ana hit SEND. She couldn’t stop smiling.

  That night, Ana called Marin at the hotel where she was staying.

  “You’re never going to believe it,” Ana said. “I had sex with Scott.”

  “God. Finally. I’ve been waiting for you to hook up forever.”

  “You have?”

  “We all have. It’s so obvious Scott is madly in love with you and you guys are best friends and are practically joined at the hip.”

  “He is? We are?”

  “So how was it?”

  “It was awesome. It was so much fun. I love sex! I’d forgotten how yummy it is.”

  “Good for you, girlfriend. You deserve some good loving.”

  “He’s a really good kisser, too. And his hands . . .”

  “That’s enough! There is only so much I want to know about Scott.”

  “So how are things with you?”

  “It’s pretty intense. We tape an hour-long show every six days. I think the shortest day I’ve had here was twelve hours. Listen to this. In the first episode, I do a stand-up routine at a comedy club, and I do really well, right? Okay, but listen to some of the jokes they have me tell. ‘What is the difference between men and women? Men are crabby all month long.’”

  “No, not a PMS joke. That’s so late eighties.”

  “I know.”

  “Anyway, I don’t get it. Is that supposed to be funny?”

  “They just play the laugh track, so no matter how unfunny I am, I get laughs.”

  “Can’t you make some suggestions for jokes that are actually funny?”

  “I tried. I thought I was really nice about it, but the director bit my head off. Apparently they don’t much care for nobody actors trying to rewrite their teleplays.”

  “But you’re a comedian.”

  “Yeah, but they don’t want my opinion, just my pretty face reciting their lines.”

  “You think the series will be a success?”

  “Not with writing like this.”

  “What a bummer. Why don’t they get the writers from Felicity?”

  “I loved that show.”

  “It was the best. It’s so, so wrong that it was taken off the air.”

  “The world is just not as bright without Keri Russell every Monday night.”

  “That rhymed. That would actually make a great song lyric. We could do a skit where we lament all the TV shows that we liked that were taken off the air.”

  “Ooh, I like it.”

  “How do you like the rest of the cast?”

  “Devin is awesome. She’s hilarious.”

  “I don’t like you making new friends.”

  “That’s very mature.”

  “Look, I know it’s not mature, but you’re my best friend and you’re not supposed to go off and make new friends and have all these adventures without me.”

  “Ana, nobody is ever going to replace you. You’re my best friend and I love you.”

  “Yeah, I know, I just want to be sure that everyone else knows it. I want you to wear a T-shirt that says, ‘Ana Jade Jacobs is my best friend in the universe and no one can take her place, so Devin, don’t even think about it.’ ”

  “Okay.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Ahh!”

  Ana heard a thunderous crash. “Marin?”

  A few seconds later, Marin got back on the phone, laughing hysterically.

  “Marin? What happened?” Marin was laughing so hard, Ana couldn’t make out what she was saying at first.

  Then, “I fell off my chair!”

  “You fell off your chair? I don’t understand. Have you been drinking?”

  “No! I had . . . feet up . . . leaning back . . . tipped over. Ah ah ah!”

  Ana cracked up. For a couple of minutes, the only sound over the line was their laughter.

  “You are such a loser!” Ana said at last, wiping the tears from her eyes.

  “I know.”

  “I miss you.”

  “I miss you. Well, I guess I should get going.”

  “Okay. You should put a helmet on if you’re going to do anything dangerous like sit on the couch or pour a glass of milk.”

  “I will. I love you.”

  “I love you.”

  “Smooch smooch, babe.”

  The best thing about sex with Scott was how much Ana laughed with him and how much fun she had with him. She loved how quickly a simple touch from her could transform his penis from a springy mushroom-looking thing to its full purply veined ridiculousness. Once he was hard, she liked to make him laugh so his penis would spring back and forth like a metronome on crystal meth. This would induce paroxysms of giggles from Ana.

  After a couple minutes, Scott stopped laughing and swung his naked body over her so he was straddling her.

  “Are you making fun of my manhood?”

  “No, I’m making fun of your throbbing manhood.” She kissed him and then made a thoughtful expression as she considered the term manhood. “Manhood—isn’t that a funny term? Did you know when I went to cheerleading camp, one of our instructors was from the South and she told us to put our one hand between our ‘personalities,’ and we were all like, what? It turned out she meant breasts. Can you believe she’d . . .”

  He shut her up with a slow, deep kiss. She was ready for him instantly, but he tortured her with light teasing caresses, kissing her on the inside of her thighs even though every thought and synapse in her body was pointing arrows that said, “Psst, over here, just a couple inches higher.”

  He turned her over on her stomach and gave her a long massage. She couldn’t remember ever feeling so relaxed. Then he got to her butt and thighs. He slid his fingers inside her until she was making noises that she was sure were embarrassing and unladylike but she couldn’t care less.

  Ana didn’t know how long they made love. She never once looked at the clock or thought of errands or chores she really should get done tonight before bed. She didn’t worry about her day at work or what she’d have to get done tomorrow. She tuned out the world and just focused on how good her body felt. Her mind went to this place where she didn’t think at all, it just swirled with colors and sensations.

  They fell asleep entwined in each other’s bodies, still sticky with sweat.

  33

  In the Shadows of the Limelight, Part One

  Being on a television set was nothing like Marin had imagined it would be. The main thing about it was that it was boring. Excruciatingly so. She’d have to be at the set at four in the morning, then she’d sit there for an hour doing nothing as the techies fiddled with the lights or whatever, then she’d perform for two minutes and then go sit down again and wait for an hour till she performed again.

  Television was a surreal experience, completely different from performing in a play. A play was acted out linearly, so one event trigg
ered the next. Television was completely different. They taped the easy stuff early in the week. The scenes that involved any outdoor lighting or things that couldn’t be controlled in a studio sound stage were done last. They worked the taping so that only the people who were in the scenes they were taping that day had to be there. Many of the scenes they’d have to run through two or three times so the camera could capture different angles or cutaways shots. Nothing happened linearly, so in a moment Marin might be yelling at Jessica yet didn’t know what it was that had supposedly pissed her off. Or she’d have a heart-to-heart talk with Alex and have no idea what the event they were talking about was.

  None of the women were needed on the set on Friday, so Thursday after they got off the set at two, they went home, napped, showered, gussied up, and headed out for a night on the town.

  Jessica had done careful research about the trendiest clubs in L.A. She’d created a list and insisted that the three of them hit every one before they finished taping the show, “Just in case it doesn’t get picked up and I have to return poor and unknown to Nevada.”

  The taxi—working on a television show had enabled them to indulge in luxuries like a taxi, and it wasn’t like buses were big in L.A., if they even had them—dropped them off at the Good Luck Lounge just before eleven.

  They found a circular table, and Jessica and Devin sat on the barstools encircling it.

  “I’ll get the first round. What do you guys want?” Marin asked.

  “Dirty martini,” Devin said.