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Part 1
Rekindling the Spark
Chapter 1
CruisingfromWestHollywoodto Santa Monica was the epitome of “cool” to teenaged Paige, who once considered The 10 her “turf.” Whether in her mom’s Jeep, her dad’s Chevy, or her own Honda, chasing the sunset beyond the Santa Monica Boulevard was once the pinnacle of her adolescence.
Freedom. Fresh air. Release. That was what driver’s licenses were made of when that young, dumb seventeen-year-old named Paige Powell used to cruise by herself, with her besties, and with the girlfriends she snuck behind her parents’ backs – not that she had to, because Paige had some of the most understanding California liberal parents who “already knew” when she came out during college.
Honestly, it had been a disappointment. Paige had been ready for her father’s tears and her mother’s delicious screams of“How could you do this to me?”
Yeah, Paige remembered blasting down The 10 with no cares in the world.
“Get thefuckoutta my way! What are you even doing?” Paige Powell, now aged 37, laid into her horn at a car that dithered between staying in the left lane or getting into the right. For the past half hour, Paige had been trapped on The 10, holed up like a kid with claustrophobia in a closet. Usually, the rush hour madness from her place of work in West Hollywood to her house in Santa Monica was a pain in the butt at best, and a downright nightmare at worst. Today, it somehow transcended night terrors and dove straight into the pits of despair.
She should have known better than trying to get anywhere on Memorial Day weekend.
Yet that was when most of her clients had time to physically come to her West Hollywood gym. Paige, a full-time personal trainer, knew that this was the time of year when the SoCal influencers wanted to chisel their summer bodies, baseball players became determined to be in top shape, and NBA stars grumbled about missing the finals and said,“Next season, I’m tearing up the court.”That was before the Hollywood A and B-listers sent their agents to schedule a “crash course to pecs” class for the next superhero movie to haunt Paige every time she opened a streaming app.
So here she was, stuck on The 10, a headache festering in her skull as she gave in to the urge to smack her forehead against the steering wheel of her SUV.
Her phone rang. Slowly, Paige lifted her head and saw her wife’s name on the screen.
“Answer it,” she grumbled to the AI that mediated her life.
Soon, Rhea’s voice pumped through the speakers. “Hey! Where are you?”
Paige sighed, her car slowly inching down the road. Eventually, she’d see the sign welcoming her to Santa Monica.Eventually.“I’m still stuck in traffic. Everyone and their furry offspring are heading to either Mexico or Canada for the holiday weekend. For some reason, that means they’ve blocked me in on The 10.”
Rhea didn’t respond for a few seconds. That gave Paige plenty of time to honk at someone else now attempting to slip through multiple lanes of freeway.
“I’m sorry.”
“Why are you apologizing,” Paige demanded of her wife. “I’m the one who’s late! Ugh, I should have left ten minutes earlier, but a Baldwin caught me on the phone and asked me a million questions about leg day.”
Rhea laughed. “Wild. Okay, well, I’m at the restaurant. Let me know when you’re five minutes away and I’ll order your drink for you.”
Paige wiped her wet bangs from her sweaty forehead. “I am a fucking mess. Didn’t have time to rinse off or stop by home first. I hope it’s okay if I show up in my work uniform.”
“Darlin’, half the people in this fancy restaurant are in their athleisure best.No te afliges.”
“Okay…” Paige drank another breath before sitting up straight in her seat. “It’s part of being Californian. Whenever you need to get somewhere quickly, there’s traffic.”
“At least it’s breezy in Santa Monica.”
“That’s why we live there.”
Paige cut the call. Too bad there was no respite from the sound of her wife’s voice. Because some jackass wanted to cut her off and he required a horn up his ass.
The waiter came back around two minutes after Rhea hung up on her wife. When she explained the traffic situation, the waiter sagely nodded, but Rhea was still compelled to order another cocktail for herself, lest she feel the crushing guilt of taking up a table in one of Santa Monica’s most romantic outdoor restaurants.
The reservation had not come easily, since everyone who fancied themselves in love (or lust) wanted a table atLa Mariposa,the Latin-fusion restaurant that had been heralded as one of SoCal’s “top hidden gems of 2022,” which guaranteed it was theoppositeof a hidden gem. For Rhea, it was a double-edged sword. She knew one of the chefs before his cookbook took off on the culinary nonfiction charts and he began making his living on the Food Network and Barnes & Noble circuits. She loved that the staff were making more tips than ever before, having their hard work acknowledged, and balancing the fact that most of them would never make it in Hollywood. On the flip side?Can’t ever get a table.The only way Rhea swung this reservation was by sitting on Google three weeks before she wanted one.
It was her and Paige’s anniversary. They had to dosomethingspecial, and Paige loved the crispy fish flautas (with house-made Chinese sweet and sour sauce) as much as Rhea fantasized about the sopapillas with honey drizzle. Right now, all Rhea had to keep her company was her phone, a margarita, and a plate of cheese and crackers that cost more than a Netflix subscription.
She opened her notes app and attempted to describe the terrace.
“Couples delight in more than their love for each other,”she quickly wrote with two thumbs.“They are enamored with the appetizers that fuse Mexican staples with Italian sensibilities; Spanish tapas with Asian flourishes. The sweet breeze blowing from the Pacific is our only reminder of our vast, salty friend.”She deleted that last part and instead wrote,“Our vast, familiar friend the sea.”
