Love Felt Like This

Chapter One The Professional Bird

Chapter One

The Professional Bird

Beverly

Sometimes I wish I’d been lucky enough to inherit a resting bitch face. Life would be easier if I were consistent. Instead, I wear every single emotion the moment it happens.

Every. Single. One.

Tell me surprising news, and my jaw drops to the floor. I attempt to cover my mouth afterward, but I can’t pull that shock back in. If you publicly tell a joke that doesn’t land, I—God, I’m so sorry—feel your pain with a cringe that everyone in the room can witness.

I’m so sorry.

“Are you all right?”

And if I’m tired and haven’t slept in over twenty-four hours, my face falls like melted butter. I gain about three discolored creases beneath my eyes that I wish said Thirty-two-year-old woman working overtime to achieve dreams, but it’s more like That poor woman has the flu. Bless her heart.

I wave to the concerned production assistant at the end of the hall, clearing my throat to call over, “I’m all right! Thanks, Tara!”

Tara smiles. I smile. We have a blast pretending I told the truth.

Finch’s voice chimes through the phone pressed to my ear, “I don’t know who you’re talking to, but I bet they don’t believe you.”

“They definitely don’t,” I respond, giving a tight grin as the production assistant trails off, clipboard held close.

“Are you all right?” Finch asks.

“Absolutely not.”

I am five minutes away from appearing on live television. The risky steps I took to get here feel like a slow, inevitable march into a career grave I dug for myself.

Step one: Fly to Los Angeles to live with my now ex-boyfriend and pursue puppetry, like my grandfather before me.

Step two: Deplete my savings account to purchase the intellectual property of a canceled children’s show.

And step three: Appear on this live variety show solo, as a last-ditch effort to find sponsorships for my revival, all before moving back to my hometown in two days, penniless and a loser.

Nationwide television exposure could prevent the whole penniless part.

Or not. Especially since I’m not supposed to be performing solo.

“Please tell me you’re close,” I plead over the phone.

Finch’s mournful sigh responds. “I’m still stuck in traffic.”

Traffic.

Traffic in Los Angeles.

Repeating it in my head doesn’t make it an easier pill to swallow. I know better than to leave late and risk traffic, and so does Finch. But he’s also seventy, and he moves a lot slower now than he has over the past fifty years of spearheading Flock Workshop.

I pull in an unsteady breath and let it out.

“Bev? You there?” Finch asks. My mentor’s gentle voice could just as easily be delivered by an all-knowing wizard with a pipe. My grandfather sounded the same way. “My hearing aid is whining. Oh wait, or is that just you?”

I choke out a laugh at his joke. “Just figuring out which floor of this building has windows that aren’t barred so I can fling myself out.”

“The fourth.”

“Thanks for the tip. You’re an awful influence.”

Calmly, sagely, totally ignoring my freak-out, Finch asks, “How is Bernie taking all this?”

I bite my bottom lip and nod to myself. “He’s hanging around.”

Slung across my lap, Bernie Bird is just a sack of felt and feathers with his beak agape.

I smooth the blue feathers over his forehead.

They float back into place, guided by meticulous construction and maybe a little static.

This iconic bird puppet is valued at more than my gross earnings in a single year.

Well, what I was earning until recently.

Until our corporate sponsors didn’t renew their contracts.

Until federal grants were cut. Until Flock Workshop, our nonprofit that produces Birds on the Block, couldn’t stay afloat and we had to close up shop.

“You’ll be fine,” Finch reassures me.

“Yep. I’ll be fine,” I echo, more to myself than to Finch. I sandwich my phone between my cheek and shoulder so I can flick a speck of dust off Bernie’s eyeball. I stretch my fingers and shake out my palms. “We’ll be fine.”

“I’ll be there as soon as possible,” Finch assures me. “But you’ll have to go on without me.”

“So dramatic,” I tease.

“If you flop, I’ll keep an eye on the fourth-floor window. I’ll put out a mattress or a trampoline.” It’s terribly dark humor for two people creating silly voices for a living, but that’s the way of the industry.

I stand from my cross-legged position on the vinyl faux wood floor.

I can’t handle the way my feet bounce when I sit.

I turn my attention to my chipped blue nail polish, painted to match Bernie.

Maybe I should have repainted them, but my nail polish is packed up with the rest of my apartment.

Not that pretty nails matter. My hands will be shoved up one end of a sock sleeve in less than five minutes.

I halt when laughter erupts from down the hall.

The Late Night Laughs Show is in full swing.

People dressed in black turtlenecks and slacks rush past with headsets.

The skit onstage comes to its closing punch line.

I try to ignore the cackles from the audience—maybe they’re genuine, or maybe their laughter is prompted by monitors, who knows?

—because it feels like they’re taunting me.

Their joy is an insult to me personally, like How dare they be amused while I prepare to ruin all their fun?

Oh God, I’m gonna bomb onstage. In front of everyone.

The Late Night Laughs Show is a weekly sketch-comedy show. The show’s cast performs every Saturday, and it’s a live broadcast. Mistakes, breaks, and all, for the whole country to see. This is old hat for these comedians. For me? Not so much. My performances are always prerecorded. Not this time.

I need to breathe. Tonight isn’t all about me. I’m only one guest out of three tonight. But I bet neither the host nor the musical guest have as much on the line.

Tonight’s guest host is some older, classically handsome actor my momma adored back in the ’80s who is coasting toward the end of his career. The live feed could be cut, and he’d happily take his check and go back home to his mansion in Malibu. Easy night.

And then there’s the musical guest.

No, not just a musical guest—the golden-boy musician right now.

Griffin Harvey, heartthrob singer-songwriter, has absolutely nothing to lose if he makes a mistake onstage.

Griffin Harvey, who took home five awards for his debut album two years ago.

Five.

Best New Artist. Song of the Year. Best Rock Performance. Best Rock Album. Album of the Year. My friends saw Griffin Harvey in concert last year and claimed it was a borderline religious experience. I wouldn’t know. As a rule, I stay away from musicians now.

At least I know my family will be watching The Late Night Laughs Show for my performance.

They’re home in North Carolina, probably in the living room with the fireplace going.

I bet the January mountain breeze is pushing against the sliding glass door as they tuck into their thick quilts that Momma stitched.

The TV is on mute for commercials while Daddy makes popcorn in the kitchen.

Uncle Greg will have a crossword or a sudoku or whatever it is he’s obsessed with nowadays.

Nana will shush them all when I appear on-screen.

But aside from my family, Griffin Harvey is the only reason anyone else is tuning in tonight.

I can only hope that Griffin’s fans have kids and love Birds on the Block, but more than likely, his audience consists of a bunch of horny single people.

I could tell that all my former Flock Workshop colleagues were biting their tongues to keep from asking if I’d get his autograph.

My little brother, Rob, was the only one who sheepishly called me with the request, as if wanting Griffin Harvey’s signature would mean supporting me less.

Unfortunately, I’ll be lucky to get Rob a gum wrapper signed.

Griffin Harvey barreled through the backstage door earlier tonight, one full hour before his call time, announced by pounding footfalls of his black leather boots. The hallway fell silent, and I swear even the air-conditioning shivered off.

Griffin didn’t say a word or look at anyone.

He was a whirlwind of wild brown hair that flew well past his bulky shoulders as he made a beeline for his designated greenroom.

His sheer height and wrestler build had me convinced he’d have to sidestep through the doorway, but he fit snug, like a rectangular peg in the perfect rectangular hole.

There are rumors about Griffin Harvey. That he’s difficult and mean.

That he’s a diva on tour. That he literally growls at people as they walk past. I don’t know if I believe that one.

I try not to trust everything I hear, because LA’s rumor mill can be rabid.

I know that firsthand. But I’ve also had insight into a famous musician’s life before, and rumors… well, they can be true.

Griffin Harvey has been in his greenroom all night, only coming out once to refill his water bottle at the cooler down the hall. He glowered at everyone who passed by, including that kind production assistant, Tara, who simply asked if he needed a snack.

My brother will have to miss out on that autograph.

I won’t be another fawning fan stroking a celebrity’s ego.

There are far happier people I could get autographs from.

Maybe I’ll ask the production assistant.

She seems lovely. In fact, she was part of the crew who howled with laughter when I brought Bernie Bird to life during rehearsal.

Performing live can’t be any different, right?

My leg bounces again.

“Bev, you still there?” Finch asks. I’ve been quiet on the phone for too long.

“Yes. Jittery, but yes.”

“How many cups of coffee have you had today?”

I peer over at a discarded cup in the trash bin, thrown onto a pile of other coffee-stained cups littered in throughout the day—two or three of which are probably mine. I’ve lost count.

“That’s too personal of a question and you know it,” I answer.