Page 34 of Second Chances

“No, Henry, that’s not true,” Effie said. “Josh thinks you hung the moon. You are an incredible father who gave up his own dreams for his family. You gave Josh the freedom to discover himself, and he became a doctor…a surgeon…to honor you. That’s a testament to how incredible you are.” Effie wiped her eyes just before Josh walked back in.

“Here are the jeans. May they bring you the cute butt my fiancée thought I should have,” Josh laughed.

“Well, babe, why don’t we let your dad get ready?” Effie withdrew a second shirt from his wardrobe, a Western one in almost the same shade as the one he already wore, with tiny snaps down the front that glinted. “Henry, if you’re wearing the Wranglers, I think this shirt would be killer.”

“Thanks for stopping by. You gave this old man a chance to look halfway decent,” Henry told them.

Josh pulled Henry into a hug. “You look great, Dad. Have fun tonight, okay?” Before letting go, his son said in his ear, “You deserve to be happy. More than anyone else I know.”

Almost Forty Years Ago

Except for her little sister, no one had ever believed in Melanie Novak. After discovering her dream of being a star in Hollywood, even her own mama told her, “You’ll never make it, Mellie. You’ve got nothin’ that special.” Hell-bent on proving all of them wrong, she fled her hometown of Pensacola, Florida, the week after her high school graduation, bound for the West Coast in a rusty (her mama liked to say vintage, but it wasn’t even that old, just a piece of crap stored in the garage) Ford Pinto. Her mama had never allowed Melanie to touch the car after she got her driver’s license. Too bad Mama hadn’t been as strict with her boyfriends when it came to her daughter. When Melanie was sixteen, her mama had gotten divorced for the third time, finally swearing off marriage for good. Unfortunately, that hadn’t included swearing off men, and the string of losers she dated assumed Melanie was included as part of the package. Was it her fault puberty hit her like a hurricane at fourteen, giving her a well-developed figure practically overnight? To give the pervs credit, they hadn’t all possessed grabby hands, but their leering looks and sexual innuendos more than made up for it. But she would show them all that she was better than that.

Melanie figured now that she was done with school, she should capitalize on her looks while she had them, and that meant heading west to California, despite her mama trying to convince her to take a waitressing job. Last summer, Melanie had made the mistake of working at the same shit hole Mama worked in, and she’d been stuck there, working every weekend until Christmas. It would be one thing if it was Red Lobster or another high-class place, but it was a rinky-dink greasy spoon, miles away from the beach. No one goes to Florida to be away from the beach, she tried explaining to her mama. In Melanie’s opinion, the beach was pretty much the only thing Pensacola had going for it, which was why she tried to spend as much time there as possible. She finally quit waitressing after her boyfriend got her a job selling t-shirts and other touristy items in The Beach Hut down by the pier. That was how, two months ago, she had met the man responsible for her future. Dressed in her very finest bikini top and cutest pair of cutoffs, the older gentleman had approached her.

“Excuse me, miss. Do you know you look just like Marilyn Monroe?” She’d been unfamiliar with the blond bombshell, but she’d heard from plenty of people that she looked just like Farrah Fawcett. “What? I can’t believe it. My dear, you are probably the most stunning girl I have ever seen.” His sunglasses hid his eyes while a devilish smile played on his lips. Now, this affirmation wasn’t news to Melanie; after all, she wasn’t blind. Plenty of time staring at her baby-blues and silky blonde hair in the mirror had told her this. Always taking the greatest care with her appearance, she began bleaching her sandy-blonde hair platinum a few years ago. Plucking her eyebrows to the finest arch, she did her best to keep herself from eating except once a day so every bit of her looked like Farrah.

Holding onto the business card he gave her, she went to his hotel room for an audition after she got off work. She hadn’t told her mama or her boyfriend about her plans, suspecting they would try to talk her out of it, if only to keep her from fulfilling her dreams. Because he had been so sweet at The Beach Hut, meeting him alone hadn’t freaked her out, but when she knocked on the door to his hotel room, he answered wearing only a pair of swimming trunks. Ignoring her unease, she told herself that he had probably just come from the pool and allowed herself to be charmed by his sophistication when he served her a martini, even though she was only seventeen.

As the man had fiddled with a video camera on a tripod set up across the room, he asked if she had ever done any acting or modeling. She hadn’t, but this was Florida, she had told him, where nothing exciting ever happened. “My mama is always telling me I have a flair for the dramatic.”

“I could make you a star if you came to Hollywood.” The man coaxed her to sit on the bed next to him. “You could be the next Marilyn.” She about died, even though she still didn’t know who Marilyn was.

“What about Farrah?” Melanie thrilled at the thought of herself on a poster.

“Baby, you could be anybody, especially with a body like that.” His eyes looked her up and down, and Melanie felt sick from the Snickers bar she’d eaten on her way to the hotel.

“Little old me, from nowhere?” Melanie smiled flirtatiously, ignoring the dread growing in her stomach as his thigh pressed against hers. She made herself stay still, letting him pull her closer. If Mama had taught her anything, it been to use what god gave her to get what she wanted.

“This is how we pick the next movie stars.” He topped off her drink from the glass pitcher next to the bed, even though she had only taken two sips, because it tasted disgusting. “You gals from smaller places are always so much more…talented.” Taking the glass from her, he stroked her cheek before brushing his lips against hers. Truly panicked then, and freaked out by the blinking light of the camera, Melanie told him she had to go to the bathroom before bouncing off the bed. Even though she’d had boyfriends since she was fourteen, and despite her mama dating every creep in the book, Melanie was still a virgin. Her womanly appearance often made men believe otherwise, but her mother’s revolving door of men made her reluctant to give away that private part of herself easily.

On her way to the bathroom, she noticed the door to the hotel room was unlatched, so without thinking twice, she flung it open and bolted down the stairs. Afterwards, of course, when Melanie replayed everything over in her head, she wondered if perhaps she had overreacted. Maybe that had all been part of the process, like he had to see if she would be good on camera? So she dug out his business card from the pocket of her shorts, dialing the number before she lost her nerve. Of course, a man as busy as he was didn’t answer his phone, so she left a very detailed message, explaining her mistake in leaving so abruptly (she even inferred it had been her time of the month, an excuse Mama had always said no man wanted to hear but always believed). Melanie added that she would do anything to get the chance to be in a movie or television series. To her relief, the man returned her call later the next day, but explained that it was too late—he was already back in California. But if she were serious, he said, then she should come to Hollywood after she graduated. She assured him that her only dream was to be a star and that she would do whatever it took, then sighed in relief when he informed her to call him when she got to town.

With her mind made up, Melanie spent the rest of her senior year trying to figure out how she was going to get to California. She wanted to show her little sister, Casey, that there was a way out of the Florida Panhandle.

Before leaving Florida in the early dawn, Melanie gathered up her graduation money and kissed Casey on the cheek as she slept curled like a baby. Slipping out of the house as silently as possible, she fired up the Pinto, hoping it wouldn’t backfire, like the last time her mama had driven it. For once in her life, fortune smiled on her, because it purred like a kitten. On the way out of town, she stopped for gas at the Texaco, then headed west, breathing easier with every mile. Unfortunately, right after she crossed the Alabama state line, the Pinto began to smoke, forcing her to pull off the interstate. A kindly man stopped to help her, refilling her radiator with water.

“How far are you traveling?” he asked.

“California.” She mustered every ounce of her pride when she told him.

He whistled. “Missy, why are you going so far on your own? You can’t be much older than my own daughters, both of ‘em still teenagers.”

Too bad her own daddy hadn’t cared for her like the man did for his daughters. He’d walked out on her mama when Melanie was just two and never looked back. Thinking he wouldn’t want to hear about the man from Hollywood in the hotel room, she fibbed. “My high school drama coach told me I’m talented enough to be a movie star.” She’d never even been in a play during school. He just shook his head, but he gave her twenty dollars, just in case she ran into more trouble. Which she did, right outside of Mobile, Alabama.

At a service station, a handsome mechanic informed her that the Pinto needed a new radiator and an oil change. Batting her blue eyes at him, she asked, “How much will that cost?”

This one wasn’t as taken with her looks as most men and quoted a price that had to cost more than her mama paid for the Pinto. “I can’t afford that,” she said, using her breathiest voice. Surely, he would see how much she needed him and give her a discount, she thought.

He asked only, “How far are you going?”

“California,” she answered, that time with a slight quiver. Men always came to heel when they suspected she was going to cry.

He, however, was unmoved. “You’ll never make it that far,” he gloomily predicted.

And the bastard was right. Just outside Hattiesburg, Mississippi, the Pinto sputtered and squealed before stalling completely on the shoulder of the road. A farmer offered her a ride to town in his tractor. Making a snap decision to abandon the Pinto (as soon as she became famous, she’d buy her mama a brand-new car), she had him drop her off at the Greyhound Bus Station. Melanie bought a ticket to Flagstaff, Arizona, the cheapest one on the list. Arizona was right next door to California, and she could figure out the rest later. Her mama always told her, “Why worry about tomorrow when you gotta get through today first?”

Used to the smothering humid heat of Florida, when Melanie stepped off the bus in Arizona, she choked on the hot, dry air. She rolled the last of her money, the twenty dollars Earl had given her, between two fingers, praying it was enough to get her the rest of the way to California. Surveying her surroundings, Melanie pondered what to do next. Maybe check out the truck stop at the edge of town the bus passed on the way in? Someone there had to be heading to Southern California. She tugged on her ponytail, shaking her hair free as the waves bounced down her back, and walked to the side of the bus to collect her suitcase. Before the bus had pulled into Flagstaff, Melanie took the time to clean up in the bathroom, wanting to look her best after three days on the road. In a pair of jeans that fit her like a glove, a bright white shirt tied at her waist, and heeled sandals that made her legs look as long as possible, she was ready to make the most of her looks if needed. Just about ready to ask the bus driver if he could do her a teensy favor and drop her off at the truck stop, something caught her eye from across the street.