Page 49 of Love Scenes
“You are just like your dad. Feeding me a steady diet of compliments.” She takes a bite of her salad. “I catch Sarai doing it too.Mom, you look beautiful today. That’s a good color on you. Your nails are so nice.”
“That’s funny. I love that kid so much.”
Melanie laughs. “She’s a handful, but I love her too. She’s still asking me why she’s not in this movie with the rest of us.”
“She texted me yesterday begging me to get her in.”
“Of course she did.”
“Guy wanted to write a part for her, but I said no. If Sarai ever finds out, she’ll be big, big mad,” Melanie says.
I make a zipped-lip gesture and toss away the key.
The conversation turns to what Sarai will be when she grows up. Melanie sees her becoming a TV personality. Someone who should have her own talk show. “First of all, she’s too obsessed with this business not to end up as some part of it. Second, she’snosy. But she can look you in the eye and ask the one question everyone wants to know, and the way she asks, you answer even when you shouldn’t. That’s a gift.”
“I think I’d like doing talk shows about one hundred percent more if I got to be on one with Sarai.”
“Then the next thing you know she’s got you talking about why your ex-boyfriend wrote that album about you, and which song you think is the least true, and how you feel about your mom and your old stepmom sharing a love scene together.”
We laugh until it hurts.
“God, that’s so true,” I say. “And then she’ll ask why our moms both broke up with our dad.”
“You know what you should say? That your parents found each other before they found their fame, and your mom was rising faster than he was, and he didn’t like it one bit.” She shakes her head. “And then you drive it home by saying that sometimes the people you love the most are the ones you’re least likely to tell how you feel.”
“I think both my parents would have me professionally blacklisted if I ever dared.”
“Nah. Kitty’s got a good one in Guy. He keeps her from getting too hot.”
I give Melanie a knowing look. There’s no way she hasn’t heard about the fight between Mom and me, especially after Mom made her give me the whole speech about how the two of them found their unlikely friendship.
“Well, most of the time,” Melanie corrects.
“What would Sarai say? About you and Dad?”
“If she values her life, she wouldn’t say a damn thing.”
We share a good laugh over that one.
When Joseph’s notaround, I notice all the spaces he’d fill. The funny way he interrupts a silence with humming and tapping. How when someone says something he likes, he slaps his hand on his leg. How his authenticity directly correlates to his level of comfort. When he’s nervous, he blazes through it with heavy-handed charm and sweet talk. When he’s at peace, he’s curious in the way a baby’s curious, staring at things for far too long, full of quiet wonder.
I skip up the steps and knock on his trailer door. Music is playing on the other side, so I know he’s here. “Joe,” I call out. “It’s me, Sloane.”
The door opens. But it’s not Joe. It’s Daya—my father’s fiancée—mussing her hair.
“Oh. Sorry. I’ll... come back.”
I rush down the stairs in a fit of confusion, turning to walk the wrong way. It’ll take too much pride to course correct, so I commit, heading toward the next soundstage with full conviction, decked out in a plaid dress that’s undeniably from the 1940s. It’s far from the strangest thing anyone’s seen around here.
I get a good ten feet past my own trailer before I remember it’s mine now. I could’ve gone in there. I’m so used to going to Joseph’s.
What was Daya doing in there? I don’t want to assume the worst, but there’s no good explanation coming to me. My ears keep ringing. My cheeks are hot. I can taste bile in my throat.
Was that why she invited him to our dinner?
There’s bold, and then there isbold.
“Sloane! Sloane!” Daya’s calling after me. She’s almost sprinting to catch up. When I don’t slow down, she says, “Do you think we could maybe cool it on the Usain Bolt pace so I can explain?”
