“Sorry to hear that.”
Halle’s eyes narrowed because she suspected that secretly, I was pleased. Which I was.
“Second,” I prompted.
“What makes you think there’s a second?”
I sighed.
“Because no one says ‘first’ if there isn’t a ‘second.’”
“Oh.”
“And …” I prompted.
“Everyone got mad at each other, and I think they all broke up,” she said, and then paused. “Again, I think you were right.”
She shouldn’t keep saying that. Once, and a guy thinks he got lucky. Twice, and we start believing we’ve been right all along.
“What triggered all that?” I asked.
“It might have been me,” Halle said as she served me scrambled eggs and toast.
“And …” I had to prompt again to move this along.
“I got mad at Ben when he acted like he did me a favor by being a two-pump chump. I made it clear I should have stuck with you because you at least knew what you were doing. Then Isabel agreed that you were a much better lover. Ben got pissed and left,” Halle explained.
Great! Somehow, I got put in the middle of all that, despite not being there.
“What happened with Zak and Bec?” I asked.
“Oh. Bec caught Zak with some random chick. He blamed it on you bailing because if you’d stayed, then Isabel was going to be with him. He felt he was owed some ‘strange,’ as he put it.”
Again. Great!
“So, it was all my fault?” I asked.
Halle just nodded.
“The guy who warned you this was a bad idea and wanted nothing to do with it?” I asked, to clarify.
“Pretty much,” Halle agreed and showed me a satisfied smile.
There it was, the cost of being ‘right.’ I should have known.
The universe had self-corrected once again.
◊◊◊ Monday February 27
I came downstairs to find my parents drinking coffee and talking to Rosy. She pushed a plate of huevos rancheros in front of me. If I lived in LA, I would steal her away from Rita because this woman could cook.
“Have you checked social media or any of the entertainment sites this morning?” Dad asked.
It had to be bad if Dad was the one asking.
“No. What’s going on?” I asked.
“There are ‘reports,’” Dad shared with air quotes, “of you going wild last night. Did you go skinny-dipping?”
“Not last night.”
I was proud of how I’d lawyered that response. My mom caught it, but Dad just kept on with the litany of my reported transgressions. Most were made up. Some I wished I’d done, like riding a crotch rocket while being chased by police at three in the morning at speeds exceeding a hundred miles per hour.
“Here’s my favorite. It says that you got drunk with Grace Moreau and the two of you now are an item. The story goes on to say that you two were seen last night leaving a party together. You’re the new Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher,” Dad said with an amused expression.
That was probably a fair comparison. I think the age difference between those two was about fifteen years. My guess was that Grace was in her early thirties.
“I only had one beer last night.”
“I, on the other hand, can’t remember what happened last night,” Grace Moreau said as she walked into the kitchen.
Rosy ran and grabbed Grace a cup of coffee as she joined us at the table.
I don’t know which I found more entertaining. There was the look on my dad’s face when he assumed that I’d hooked up with her. Then there was my mom’s grin at having kept Grace’s presence a secret from him. And finally, we had Grace herself, who looked like something Precious had dragged in. Thankfully, she’d at least had the chance to shower and borrow some clothes from Rita.
“David brought you home, and Rita and I helped you to bed,” Mom said.
Halle came down with Bandit. He jumped into my lap for his morning chest and ear rub.
“What was the big talk you gave everyone on New Year’s Eve? Take a drunk girl home?” Halle asked.
“I’ll let Halle explain what happened last night. I need to go do my interviews, and then we have a flight to catch,” I shared.
◊◊◊
We went to IDC – Public Relations’ in-house studio for my remote interviews. Frank and his team had managed to get a giant poster made showing me in
Before we got started, Frank took me aside.
“Grace Moreau’s publicist called. He requested that if anyone should ask, we should say that she’d eaten something that didn’t agree with her. And that was why she had some tummy trouble outside of the party.”
“Like a bottle of vodka?” I asked.
“I think they’re trying to avoid the discussion about her drinking,” Frank clarified.
“So, are we a couple now or what?” I asked.
Frank barked out a laugh.
“You’re getting better at keeping a straight face,” he said to praise my acting ability. “No. You were just her friend and helped her last night.”
I gave him a dramatic sigh, even though it was easier to keep close to the truth. The only flaw in his narrative was that Grace Moreau and I were not, nor would we probably ever be, friends.
“I haven’t had a fake girlfriend in like …
“What’s up with him?” Scarlet asked.
