TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER
Grant Olsen's grin was so wide I thought it would tip his glasses off. “And that, as they say in the business, is a wrap.”
“Thank God,” I said, as a production assistant wrapped a towel around me. “I look like a drowned rat.”
Phoebe handed me a hot coffee. “I would tell you that’s not true, but I like to keep my relationships honest.”
I stuck my tongue out at her.
The set for the music video to “The Lighthouse” was a black, windowless boxy room with cables and lines snaking all across the floor. Two flood lights with blue and green filters beaming down on the water tank I’d spent the last three days in.
The director Grant hired had envisioned a girl trapped in the tank while a man—his face always obscured by shadow—was just out of reach on the other side of the glass.
Using some fairly expensive CGI, they were going to pull the video of me in the water and superimpose it on shots of people in everyday life: at a cocktail party, at an apartment, in the bedroom of my cheating boyfriend and his lover.
I would be the Drowned Girl, always submerged, while life went on around me.
I appreciated the theme of a cheating boyfriend and not a dead one. I wouldn’t have agreed to do it otherwise. I would never have let some actor portray Jonah in a dramatic rendition of us. It would’ve felt cheap and disrespectful, exploiting what we’d had for a silly video.
Even with the changed narrative, I thought the shoot would be emotionally draining.
But the video was shot out of order, chopping and shuffling up the story until it was unrecognizable.
Take after take, until the takes blurred together.
The constant technical adjustments. The stops and starts.
The dauntless struggle not to let air bubbles leak out of my nose and ruin a scene.
After three days, I was tired of “The Lighthouse.”
I dried off while the Olsen's updated me on record sales. “You're a hit, girl,” Phoebe said, shuffling some papers. “This video is going to put you over the top.”
“Thanks to you guys. None of this would have been possible without you.”
“Just don't forget us when you're accepting your Grammy,” Grant said, still grinning.
“I won’t.”
“You can’t,” Phoebe said, her eyes flashing. “We put it in your contract.” She flicked her fingers at her brother then. “Go away. We have girl talk.”
“We do?” I asked.
She waited until Grant was out of sight. “Matt Porter asked me if you were single.”
Matt was the graphic designer doing the cover for Shattered Glass. Cute, dry sense of humor, nice smile.
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah.” Phoebe nudged my arm. “So?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ll think about it.”
Even saying that sent guilt curling around my heart, and that unsettled feeling I’d told Theo about hit me with a vengeance. If I wanted to shut that door the Tarot card told me about and start a new chapter, I had to do something. Or maybe a bunch of Big Somethings.
I drove my little car home, where I stood in the entry. Home, yet feeling untethered. I had success now. Money in my bank account, good friends and a career that seemed to be taking off.
Shut the door. Do something big.
Before I could talk myself out of it, I called my parents’ house in San Diego. The ringing went to the answering machine. After my mother's halting voice said to leave a message, I sucked in a deep breath.
“Hi, Mom. Hi, Dad. It's Kacey. I haven't called in almost eight months. I don't know if you tried to call me. I got rid of my old cell phone, but I have a new number now. I’m living in New Orleans. My music career is taking off—as a solo artist this time—and I'm taking care of myself.”
I took another breath, feeling the urge to hurry. If the machine cut me off, I wouldn’t have the guts to call again.
“I’m doing really well, and I just wanted to let you know.
I’m okay. And also…” I exhaled and sat up straighter.
“This is the last time I'm going to call you.
I can't keep trying and getting no response.
If you want to talk to me, I'm here. Okay, Mom? If you want to talk, you call me. If not…Well, then I hope you both have a long and happy life.”
I left them my new cell phone number and hung up. My heart was pounding, and tears stung my eyes, but I wiped them away and huffed a breath.
That’s a start.
I glanced around my shabby little place with its second-hand, mismatched furniture, old linoleum floors, cruddy tile countertops and cheap, stained carpet.
The bones of the house—as they were always saying on the HGTV shows—were good.
It was a classic New Orleans shotgun. It deserved better than this.
I called the bank that owned the house and set up an appointment for the following day. I didn’t call Theo that night and for whatever reason, he didn’t call me.
I went into the bank the next day at two p.m, and by five o’clock, I was in escrow.
Outside the bank, I paused to catch my breath, my heart racing for the amount of money I'd just committed myself to paying. $64,000 wasn’t a huge mortgage payment but I took out a loan for $75,000 in order to make some renovations.
I’d never owed more money in my life. But I wanted roots.
A place of my own where I could dig in, stay grounded.
I wasn’t about to be whisked off on a road tour or lose myself in the big Los Angeles music industry.
My pounding heart slowed, but inexplicably, it left me left me with that same hollow feeling I’d had before I left for the bank.
What is wrong with me?
I’d settled up with my parents, bought a fucking house for crying out loud, but I still felt like something was missing.
I called Phoebe and told her I was free on Friday if Matt Porter was still interested. She assured me he was, and she’d give him my number.
I hung up. I waited to feel satisfied.
I felt slightly nauseated instead.
That night I picked at my dinner while sitting on the couch, and then watched Big Trouble in Little China until midnight. It was ten in Vegas, and Theo was out of class.
“Guess what?” I said, my dinner suddenly churning in my gut.
“You finished shooting the music video,” he said.
“Yesterday,” I said. “Also, I called my parents for the last time. Left a message. If they want to talk, they can call me, but I'm done offering my hand only to have it slapped back.”
“Good for you, babe,” Theo said.
It was eighty degrees in my house, but a shiver slipped up my spine, morphed into a nervous laugh that burst out of me.
“Babe?”
“Ha, sorry. Kace,” he said.
“You have too many women to juggle,” I said, plucking mercilessly at the couch cushion. “I can see how we all start to blend in.”
“Yeah, okay.” He coughed, cleared his throat. “So, it’s good you settled things with your parents. Kace.”
“That's not all I settled,” I said. “I bought my house. I'm a homeowner. Shoot me now.”
“You did?” A short silence. “Wow, that's…great. So, I guess you're in New Orleans for good?”
I twirled a lock of hair around my finger. “I guess so. I think so. I think it’s what I need to do. To settle somewhere that’s mine.”
“Permanence.”
“Exactly. And it feels right to be here and not in Vegas,” I said. “I thought about it. Tried to picture myself back there, and I just can’t.” I hunched my shoulders. “I hope it doesn’t upset Beverly too much.”
“She’ll understand,” he said.
I bit my lip. “In other news…I have a date on Friday.”
The silence stretched out taut. I checked my phone to see if we’d been disconnected. “Teddy?”
“I’m here.”
“Yeah, I just… I think there might be the tiniest shred of a possibility I’m ready for it.” I laughed nervously. “Won’t know until I find out.”
“Guess not.”
He sounded flat. Bored. It didn’t seem to faze him, about the house or the date.
Because we’re friends.
I yawned loudly. “I’m tired. Buying a house wears a gal out. Talk to you tomorrow?”
“I’ll be here. ‘Night . ”
“Goodnight, Teddy , ” I said, but he’d already hung up.