Take Two (5 page)

“Thank you
, Sophie
. Did you get my review about the latest
Matt
Sterling film?”

“I did.
I printed it and handed it to Mr. Maxwell
about
two hours ago.”

“Great. Would you book me a return flight from Memphis?”

“Sure, f
o
r what day next week?”

“T
omorrow.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely,” I hung up.

I couldn’t
hide
and sleep
in Memphis
forever.

Matt

“Joan remembers everything,” I mutt
ered as I took my seat at Per Se
.

It was the
site of our first public date a
nd the staff had gone out of their
way to recreate the memory: Our table was
adorned
with sonata lilies, daffodils,
and orchids.
W
hile the other patrons’
tables were
draped
in white linen, our
s
was draped in black—
homage
to
a comment Selena made
two years ago
.

Selena was late
as usual
but I didn’t
mind. I needed time to think, time to figu
re out how to break things off.

Twenty minutes past the reservation time, Selena sa
untered into the restaurant
wearing a dress so revealing it made me want to reconsider.

“Happy anniversary
baby,” she kissed me on the cheek.

“Happy anniversary
Selena,” I
pulled out her chair and
signaled for the waiter.

“Good e
vening
Mr. Sterling, Miss Ross
,” he set the menus on the table
. “
May I interest you in some wine to start your evening?”

“We’ll have
Chateau Guirad,
the 2001 please. And we’ll have
Chef Keller’
s nine
courses for dinner, no lobster
for Miss Ross.”

“Excellent selection,” he
picked up our menus and
walked away.

“Well,
”
Selena
grabbed a
lily
from the center of the table. “I see you remembered.”

No, Joan remembered.

“Yea
h
,” I shifted in my seat. “We need to talk.”

“I wa
s going to say the same thing.”

“Oh really? Well, ladies first. You go ahead.”

The waiter poured
us both a glass of wine and placed
the bottle on the table.

“I know that our relationship hasn’t been the most ideal and that things keep getting crazier and crazier in the press,” she looked off to the side.

I think she’s going to dump me…YES!

“Go on,” I sipped my wine.

“
I want you to know that I do care about you and I’ll always be your friend regardless of what happens to
us
.
And in saying that, I think that the next step for us…is marriage.”

I spluttered the wi
ne back into the glass and began
coughing. People in the restaurant became quiet and shot
curious
glances over to our table.

“Are you alright
sir?” the waiter rushed over.

“
Yea
h
,
I’m okay. T
hanks
. C
ould you brin
g me some Jack Daniels please?”

“Certainly
sir.”

“Are you out of your mind,
Selena Ross
?” I whispered
.

“What do you mean?”

“
Marriage
? Are you crazy?”

“We can always say things didn’t work out six months from now.”

“Selena, we’re not in love. We barely
even like each other any
—”

“Don’t sit there and act like that’s
shocking
Matt
.
Us
dating each other is what the public wants. It’s what they
need
.”

The waiter set down the Jack Daniels.

“Why do we need to get married
?” I took a
large
gulp of whiskey. “What’s wrong with the pseudo dating we’re doing now? And actually, you know what’s
better
than an engagement? A breakup.
”

“No, no, that’s not true. Engage
m
ents definitely get more press
and
I’ll need all the extra press I can get if I want this next role. I need to show that I have a domestic side.”

“Jesus, Selena. Do you hear yourself? What happened to you? Is fame all you care about?”

She sipped her wine.
“Yes
.
”

The waiter set down the first course and another glass of Jack Daniels.

“Two months,” I took another gulp of whiskey. “That’s as far as I’m going with this charade.”

“Great!” she smiled and looked around the restaurant. When she was sure no one was looking, she slid a small box acro
ss the table. “It’s from Lorraine Schwartz
.
I had my assistant pick it up today.”

“You want me to propose
here
?
I don’t think there are
enough people around…
Plus, the paparazzi won’t be a
ble to fully capture the moment
. I’ll take you to the right place after dinner.”

Her eyes lit up and she lean
ed over to kiss me. M
y stomach was churning at the mere thought of proposing,
but
I wasn’t going to turn down the chance for more exposure. If we were going to do this, I wanted to d
o it right.

The next morning, I awoke to an empty apartment. There was a note on my pillow from Selena:
“
I had fun last night—Mrs. Matt Sterling : )
”

There were a lot of words that described f
ake-propo
sing in Times Square, and I was
pretty
sure
“fun”
wasn’t one of them
.

I sighed and walked over to my win
dow. New York was gray today, unusually gray.
It was
the type of day that forced me to remember things I wish
I had
forgotten,
the type of day that forced me
to
see
how empty my life really was.

I had no real friends,
just
leeches who insisted on stroking my ego so they could en
joy the perks of fame.
Unfortunately,
I didn’t realize they were
“
leeches
”
until it was too late. I
t was
years after my first hit
film—
years
after
partying every night, bedding endless
models
,
and
mak
ing tons of “fast friends”—when
I realized fame meant perpetual loneliness.

My mom had
warned me about it, told me how she’d seen countless stars turn into shells of themse
lves and become
remnants of who they used to be. I always thought I was different, until
I became annoyed with her lectures and
cut her off completely.

Over the past two years, I’d definitely become a shell of myself, a “casualty of the high life” as my mom would say. Photo shoots, premieres, and parties were no l
onger exciting. I was only happy
when I was readin
g stage plays alone on my yacht,
when I was far removed from
paparazzi, fake friends, and press commitments.

My cell phone rang. “Hello?”

“Congratulations Mr. Number One at the box office!
Summer Nights
is officially on track to debut with $25 million!”
Shelby practically screamed.

“Thanks
Shelby.”

I’d almost
forgotten about
Summer Nights
. We
finished
filming
it
last year, but the distribution contracts
dragged on for too long
and it wasn’t released when it should have been. I
didn’t even go to the premiere.

“And I’m reading all about your night with Selena Ross,” she cooed. “Why didn’t you tell me you were planning to propose?”

Because I wasn’t!

“I guess I was just nervous.
”

“Aw
w! How romantic! Listen, I’m
still
in
talks with Ralph Lauren’s people regarding your contract. I’m flying out to meet with them today and I’ll touch bases with Joan about any schedule changes later. I’ll talk to you—”

“Wait
. What were the local numbers for
Summer Nights
?”

“Y
ou’re number one in the country
Matt
! Why do you care about local numbers?”

“Shelby,” I pressed.

She sighed. “The local numbers for New York were among the lowest, about $700 per screen.”

“Okay
thanks.”

I called Joan. “W
here are you?”

“I’m in route sir. I just picked up your suit from Tom Ford. You’ll ne
ed to wear it for your
interview session with
GQ
today
.”

I forgot all about that. Jesus,
she’s the greatest.

“
Before you get here,
I need you to print out the local reviews for
Summer Nights
.
”

“Yes
sir. See you in half an hour.”

I didn’t feel lik
e doing an interview today. The interviewers
always asked
the same questions
: “What’s it like to be a high profile actor?” “What are your favorite types of roles?” “How’s Selena?” “How do you stay in shape?” “What do you do in your free time?”

Sometimes, the questions would intri
gue me, but most of the time I
just s
a
t there with a fake s
mile on my face, acting as if I hadn’t heard the questions a
thousand
times before.

“The price you pay,” I
slid out of my cloth
es and hopped in the Jacuzzi.

Joan coughed to announce her presence an
d hung my suit on the back of the
bathroom door.

She was always so put together, so neat.
Every outfit she
wore perfectly complemented her olive skin tone and jet black hair.
Today she was wearing a tailored gray suit with a
silk
purple blouse.

“Sir, we’ll
need to leave here in about three
hours for your interview. You’ll also need to sign a few posters
in the car
.”

“Where’s the interview again?”

“It’s at Daniel. Chef Bruel
is preparing your favorite.”

“Great. A
nd the reviews?”

“All
press up until nine this morning regarding you and Miss Ross’ engagement is
in this
blue folder,” she held up two folders. “And all local reviews for
Summer Nights
are in the yellow folder
.
”

“Could you read me one of t
he reviews?”

She nodded and sat on the counter
. “
Matt
Sterling’s latest contribution to the realm of film is so horrid and appalling that I can only think of six words of criticism for him: Pleas
e. Give. Up. Your. Career. Now.

“Alas, I can’t submit such a short synopsis so I
shall bore you with the details:
Matt
Sterling plays Sam, a down on his luck photographer, struggling to make it big in Hollywoo
d. One day, while shooting
“
the
light reflectin
g off the coast,
”
he runs into Mariah Stone (
Natali
e
Portman
), a medical recruiting
m
anager who never takes a break.