“It’s so cool how you can do that!” Tabitha, my latest PA, scurries after me as I make my way toward a free hammock. She’s pale and uptight, and very overdressed in a navy blue, polyester pants suit that feels a little like a costume or a uniform. She reminds me of an agency nanny. For adults. “Have you always had this amazing talent?” Her solicitousness borders on patronizing, but I prefer it to the checked-out PAs I’ve had to fire in the past. It’s so hard to find a decent PA.
“I guess,” I shrug. “We ate out for pretty much every meal when I was growing up. I got good at menus.” I don’t tell her that my momager was always too busy taking calls and reading scripts to talk to me. Or that I would have been too exhausted to hold up my end of a conversation, even if she’d tried. So I read the menus. I memorized every last item. I could tell you the sides available at all the diners, cafés, burger, and sushi joints in a ten-mile radius of the studio where we filmedMoxie. I could tell you what the average prices of the entrées were, and whether they offered fries, onion rings—or both—with their burgers. Not that the momager ever let me order fries. I was on a strict diet of side salads, protein shakes, and the occasional scrambled egg. Moxie McAllister was the kind of kid people liked to call “string bean,” not “butterball.”
I climb into the striped hammock and cocoon myself.
“Do you need more water? Sunscreen? Bug repellant? Handi Wipes? Snack?” Tabitha buzzes over me in the hammock like a pesky beetle. “Are you sure you’re going to be able to manage without me this week? I just hate the idea of leaving you alone. If my sister wasn’t getting married … Maybe I should tell her I can’t come.”
“Aren’t you a bridesmaid? I’ll be fine, Tabitha,” I assure her. “Stop worrying about me. I’m going to be working your ass off all summer. Enjoy the week off.”
“I’m just going to go sit in the shade while we wait for the food. Text me if you need anything else from me, Lorelei.”
“I’m fine!” I say, closing my eyes. The sun is shining, and it feels so good. Not too hot. The air smells piney and fresh with underlying notes of newly mown grass and sunscreen. Someone’s been hitting the classic Coppertone. I listen to the pleasant buzz of the cast and crew around me. It reminds me of my acting camp summers at Idyllwild, the closest thing to a normal childhood I ever experienced. Snippets of conversation. The hum of bees. Laughter.
I snake a finger under my jet-black wig to scratch my scalp, wishing I could take it off altogether. But only my PA, Rafe, and my stylists have seen my natural hair since I started growing it out a year ago. I was surprised to discover that I’m a curly girl and a natural blonde. When you dye your hair every three weeks from the time you are ten till you are well into your twenties, you lose track of your roots.
My natural hair color and texture also could not be further from the stick-straight, black hair that’s been my signature look for the last decade. It would be so much easier, not to mention more comfortable, to take the wig off. But of course, I can’t just do that. I’m not a real person. I’m a brand. Normal people can change it up any time. People like me need to consult their manager and their agent and a life coach, aka the “advisory board,” first. It feels like every little change has to be run by a team of professionals and a focus group.
On the plus side, the wigs are easy. I don’t have to spend hours blowing my hair dry or styling it. I just pop on a wig and go. As long as it doesn’t get too hot here, I should be fine.
More laughter drifts up from the stage. A group of local teenage girls, one of whom was cast as Helena, are standing center stage and giggling. I open one eye to peek to see they are clustered in a group, making silly faces at a phone that one of them is holding aloft. I’m jealous of these normal girls. Acting in this show is probably a dream come true for them.
“Hey! Ladies! Watch where you’re pointing that thing!” I hear my PA chastising the girls. “Don’t forget the NDA you signed.”
“Leave them alone, Tabitha,” I call out. Not that I want to appear in their photos. But I also don’t want to spend the whole summer being roasted for acting like a bitchy diva. “They’re fine.”
kenna
The paparazzo is waitingfor me when I get back to the diner. This time, when I remake his drink, he takes it without comment. And he insists on paying. He pushes another generous tip into the tip jar before settling himself on a stool at the counter.
“Kenna, is it?” He uses my name. “Or do you prefer to be called the ‘coffee witch’?” He gestures at the embroidered legend on my barista apron.
I smile at him and nod, without really answering. He makes me uneasy. I suddenly feel incredibly sorry for the celebrities he must habitually stalk.
“Do you ever take pictures of other stuff besides celebs with that camera?” I ask him, pointing at it. His camera is clearly his baby. He doesn’t even set it on the counter. He cradles it.
“What, you mean like puppies and kitty cats?” He laughs disdainfully and wrinkles his nose. “That doesn’t pay my bills, sweetheart.”
His clothes are shabby. I notice the hem of his jeans are frayed and his cuffs are worn. It makes me wonder if he’s actually a very good paparazzo.
“Well, you must have started out wanting to take pictures of something besides celebrities,” I prod, because now I’m curious. “You didn’t pop out of the womb with a lens like that and a penchant for catching pop stars picking their nose, did you?”
The paparazzo laughs. “Nose-picking shots aren’t paying what they used to back in the day when using coke was a scandal.”
“Shame.” I shake my head in mock sympathy.
“You’re telling me.” He swivels and fidgets in his stool at the counter as he sips his coffee. “But no, you’re right. Sort of. I started out doing wildlife photography. Whales mostly. But the seasons are short, and the only whales most folks care about seeing are pregnant supermodels on beach holidays.”
“Delivery order up!” the cook yells from the back. He and Carlos carry two large boxes out from the back and set them down on the counter.
Carlos counts the bags of fries and matches the sandwiches against the order that was phoned in earlier as he loads it all into insulated bags. “Are you sure you don’t mind doing the delivery to the theater?” he asks me.
“Of course not! It’s not far. I think I’ll take the bike, actually,” I say. Last summer, the uncles bought a custom-painted, three-wheeled cruiser trike for making deliveries here in town. “Think it will all fit in the basket?”
“Just barely,” Carlos says. “Let me help you get it loaded.”
“Thanks, Carlos,” I say, picking up one of the bags. When I turn to say goodbye to the photographer, he’s already gone. There’s just an empty cup sitting on the counter.
* * *
