CHAPTER 5
Cameron
“He got you an audition?” Jessie asked Kennedy as Cameron sat down next to her girlfriend on the sofa, with Jessie on Kennedy’s other side.
“Yes, but not one I’m excited about,” Kennedy replied.
“It’s still something,” Cameron said. “And something is better than nothing, right?”
“It’s not even a role I want. I think they’re just doing it as a favor to Zane. He probably sent them a bunch of really good booze or something. I can’t believe I still even have to audition for things like this. I’ve been doing this for over twenty years.”
“Maybe you won’t have to audition as much or even ever again once we rehab your image,” Jessie suggested. “Cameron threw the glass, in everyone’s minds, but you were the one who walked up and yelled at your girlfriend in public, so you both have work to do.”
“I know. I’m here, aren’t I? Let’s get this over with.”
When Kennedy held out a bowl of popcorn, Cameron took a handful and ate it.
“No butter?” she asked.
“Make your own if you want butter. I’ve been eating way too much butter, cheese, and everything else that’s bad for me in large quantities recently.”
“But it’s just dry popcorn. Did you even put salt on it?”
“Cam, do you want to get a bowl, take some of this, and add salt and butter to it?”
“Yes,” she replied.
“Here.” Kennedy placed the bowl into her lap. “Jessie, can you put whatever you want to show us on the TV?”
“Sure.”
Cameron took the bowl into the kitchen, pulled another from the cabinet, put half into that one, and got butter out of the fridge.
After putting it in the microwave to melt, she found salt and pepper, loving a little kick to her popcorn; nothing major, just a little pepper in the mix.
She finished preparing it just how she liked it and put everything away.
Then, she stood there in her kitchen as if she couldn’t move.
They were about to review all the couples who had submitted an entry.
That meant that soon, they’d be sharing a house with one of them for a weekend, and Cameron would have to smile, laugh, and pretend that everything was okay with her girlfriend.
Filming the ad for the whole thing had already been hard enough.
Kennedy hadn’t been happy with the script they’d given her at first, and they’d gone through many revisions before they’d gone through even more takes to get it right.
They had come home after, and Cameron had been so tired, she’d passed out on the couch.
Kennedy had gone to bed and hadn’t even bothered waking Cameron up to go with her.
When Cameron had woken the next morning, Kennedy had been in the shower, so she had decided to ask if she could join her, thinking they could reignite something there.
“I’m almost done,” Kennedy had replied instead.
They still hadn’t touched each other, and she was now less sure that they’d make it through the weekend intact as a couple if they couldn’t even fall asleep next to each other or share a shower in private, when no one was watching them, expecting them to be the world’s most perfect couple.
“Here you go,” she said when she returned to the living room and handed Kennedy back her popcorn.
“Thank you,” Kennedy replied.
Cameron sat back down next to her and looked at the screen that Jessie was now standing next to.
“She hooked up her phone to it,” Kennedy said before taking a bite of her popcorn. “I feel like I’m about to watch the world’s most boring PowerPoint presentation.”
Cameron laughed a little, reminded of how funny her girlfriend could be at times. Then, she leaned back and ate some of her own popcorn as she waited for Jessie to begin.
“We had over ten thousand individual donations, which is amazing. The minimum dollar amount that they could’ve donated had been five, so that means, even if everyone had only donated that amount, the charity made fifty thousand dollars.
Most donations were much higher than that, though.
We had five hundred and four people pay the minimum donation of a thousand dollars for your prize. ”
“That’s it?” Kennedy asked.
“Babe, that’s a lot of money.”
“For charity.”
“Kennedy, come on,” Cameron said.
Kennedy hadn’t always been wealthy, but because she’d had a hit TV show from age fifteen on, she sometimes forgot what it was like not to have money.
“Go on, Jessie,” Kennedy said.
“Okay. So, to the point: five hundred and four.”
“Please tell me you aren’t going to make us look through all five hundred and four of them,” Kennedy said.
“God, no,” Cameron added. “I don’t think I can handle that, either.”
“No, I whittled it down to a top twenty and shared my thoughts with Zane. He got back to me with his top ten, and I agreed with eight of them, so I’m presenting those eight.”
“Thank you,” Kennedy said.
“Okay. First up.”
Jessie pressed something on her phone, and a picture of a couple showed on the screen.
“There are pictures?”
“They were required in the entry as well as some other information,” Jessie said. “This is Hollywood. I hate to say it, but we want attractive people. It’s just the way it is. So, this is Michelle and Matt Colby. They’re–”
“Pass,” Cameron said.
Kennedy turned to her and asked, “Why?”
“That guy has crazy eyes. Look at him.” She pointed.
“He does not have crazy eyes,” Jessie replied and took a step back as if to check for herself. “Oh. I guess he does. I must have missed that.”
“I’m not saying he’s a serial killer, but it wouldn’t surprise me if bodies are buried in his basement.”
Kennedy laughed at her joke and said, “Agreed. Next.”
“Okay. Fine. This is Letisha and Andy. They’re both accountants. Seem pretty tame on social media. Andy doesn’t post much at all. Letisha mainly just posts cute animal videos. She’s a fan of Cameron’s and entered because she had a sister die from leukemia when they were kids.”
“Fuck,” Cameron said. “That sucks.”
“I put them here for obvious reasons: that’s something you could all talk about on the date weekend, and it would get some sympathy points,” Jessie said.
“I’m not exploiting her sister’s death,” Kennedy argued.
“Yeah, me neither. Wouldn’t that just backfire on us?”
“Possibly, if we don’t handle it right. Let’s just hold off on them for now and check out the rest.” Jessie brought up another photo on the screen.
“These two seem great. Very little on social, but I did find that one of them reviewed Kennedy’s last movie on a blog and loved the performance, but didn’t rave about it, so a fan, but not someone who thinks you hang the moon and would be a risk.
One is an accountant. The other is a vet.
Seem pretty solid. Married for three years. ”
“Jessie?”
“Yeah?”
“Are there any non-hetero, non-accountant couples in the mix?” Kennedy asked.
“Two. Why?”
“Because we’re two gay women with massive platforms. I’m not saying we can’t pick one of these couples, but I’d like us to at least entertain the idea of picking a queer couple, if we can.”
“She’s right,” Cameron agreed.
“Okay. Well, I can skip ahead, if you want,” Jessie replied, and a picture of two guys appeared on the screen.
“This is Stephen and Ted. They’ve been together for fourteen years.
Married for six. They have a dog and twin girls, whom they adopted three years ago.
Everything about them seems solid to both Zane and me.
They donate to charity, have a decent-sized social following because they have a blog on being gay dads that they started when they got their twins, and seem to be all-around good guys. ”
“They’re on the list of possibilities, then,” she said.
“Agreed,” Kennedy added.
Then, Kennedy’s head moved to Cameron’s shoulder, causing her to freeze at the unexpected touch because they hadn’t even done this in months. Cameron smiled a little and felt like maybe this raffle thing had been a good idea after all.
“Okay. This is River and Lacey.”
Cameron looked back at the screen and saw two women.
One of them had long red hair, which she had lying over one shoulder in a braid, and big brown eyes.
The woman next to her was a brunette with shorter hair and blue eyes.
She had her arm around the redhead, and she looked a little more on the butch side.
They both looked like they could star in a movie with her and Kennedy any day of the week, but something was drawing Cameron’s attention to the redhead.
She swallowed and felt Kennedy’s head lift off her shoulder.
“Them,” Kennedy said.
“River and Lacey? Because they’re two women?” Jessie asked.
“Tell me more about them.”
“Lacey is a massage therapist. She works for herself, I guess; drags her table and whatnot to clients’ houses.
She’s on social media mainly to repost stuff, but nothing controversial.
The best part for me is this, though: River here.
” Jessie pointed to the brunette. “She runs one of those old-timey candy shops. It’s really cute.
I checked out the site, and she’s a co-owner with a friend, according to their story.
Anyway, she’s got a cool vibe going. She really only posts online about the shop but has a decent following because of it. ”
Lacey, Cameron thought to herself. It was a pretty name that matched a pretty woman.
“River?” Kennedy said.
“Yeah.”
“Pretty name,” Kennedy noted.
Cameron looked over at her girlfriend, who was staring at the picture of River and Lacey.
“They’re the right look, don’t seem to have any skeletons in their closets that could come back to bite us, and they are both out as evidenced by their socials.
The only thing that I think might not work for us is that they’re not married or anything.
They’ve only been together for about a year and a half, so there’s probably not a lot to mine there conversationally.
Some of the other couples have been together for years.
Most are married and have kids, or like the two guys, a blog that you can capitalize on to help promote or, at least, make conversation over. ”
“You don’t think these two can make conversation?” Cameron asked.
“I don’t know if they can. I’m just saying that there might be more to do with the other couples.”
“Cam?” Kennedy asked her.
“I’m good with either the guys or these two,” she said, not wanting to make it obvious that she’d much rather spend a weekend with Lacey and River.
Well, that wasn’t entirely true. In her entire relationship with Kennedy, she had never once looked at a woman and thought about anything other than friendship.
She’d always been a one-person person. But after months and months of no affection between her and the woman she was supposed to be with forever, Cameron’s mind was wandering and thinking about how she wanted to meet Lacey in person and, preferably, alone because she was single, and Lacey was also single.
It was wrong, so she quickly pushed it out of her mind.
“I’m good with these two. They’re not, like, crazy fans though, right?” Kennedy asked.
“As far as I can tell, they’re not fans at all.
They had to answer a question about you two, and whoever filled it out said they just saw Cam’s movie in the theater, but that movie has been out for a while, so I don’t think they rushed to check it out because they’re obsessed with Cam here or something.
And there’s nothing on social that has me worried. ”
Kennedy turned her face to Cameron and asked, “Are you good with this?”
“Yeah, sure,” she replied.
“Okay. Then, they’re the winners,” Kennedy told Jessie.
“Let’s send your top twenty a signed something, though, and maybe do a video meet thing with the guys and that woman who lost her sister.
I don’t want to publicize that, Jessie. I just want to thank them for their donations, okay? ” Kennedy said. “Privately.”
“Yeah, you got it,” Jessie replied. “I’ll notify the winning couple and make arrangements for the house and everything. They’re local. Well, sort of – they’re in Anaheim, so it’ll be a drive, not a flight, most likely.”
“Okay. Let us know, I guess,” Kennedy said.
“I’ll tell Zane. They were his favorites.”
“Because they’re both hot,” Kennedy suggested. “He thinks four hot women will help sell this thing better than two hot women and two gay dads.”
“Hey, Stephen was pretty hot. I’m not into dudes, but if I were…” Cameron joked.
Kennedy laughed, and that was the second time Cameron had made her girlfriend laugh in just a few minutes.
Yes, this was a good idea; at least, so far.
If they could turn it on in front of the cameras, they’d both rehab their images, and they could take it from there.
Maybe it would help them reconnect how they both seemed to hope but hadn’t said out loud to the other person.
If not, though, Cameron knew that she’d have to make a decision.