Marnie
“I think I might very well fucking murder everybody.”
Carmen had told me to meet her at Mademoiselle Gray, the beachfront bar of the Majestic Hotel, for lunch. And a side of hyperbole, perhaps.
She rubbed her temples. “Let’s recap here. Give me the facts, things you heard firsthand.”
The server had cleared our salad plates and brought over a pot of black coffee. Carmen poured some in both of our cups, without asking. We knew we’d be heavily caffeinated all week.
Especially after what happened at the Don’t Be Sad! party.
Carmen was waiting for me to speak, but I hesitated. She was so mad, I wasn’t exactly eager to be the messenger.
“There definitely was some screaming,” I started carefully. “You know I was very discreet when I asked around, because we don’t want to make it worse, but several people confirmed it. And it was directed at one of the producers on the movie.”
“You’re sure it wasn’t Dorian Fisher? Because that would be fucking catastrophic.”
The veteran actor was a producer on the movie and had made an appearance at the very end of the party, no doubt after attending all of the official events of opening night.
I shook my head. “Positive. Whatever that was, it happened way earlier in the evening.”
The party had gotten off on the wrong foot.
Odetta Olson had complained about something or other—no vegan option in the food selection, maybe?
—and Carmen had pulled me off front door duties to focus on party logistics.
I’d spent the evening roaming the venue with eagle eyes, making sure glasses were always filled and the music was neither too loud nor too quiet, but I hadn’t witnessed any of Odetta Olson’s alleged bad behavior.
And now, after quietly contacting guests all morning, I couldn’t find anyone to confirm what the gossip sites were claiming.
“We need to do so much better than this,” Carmen said.
I felt like she’d slapped me but tried my hardest to not let it show. This wasn’t even about getting the promotion. It was my annoying need to please the people around me, lest they realize what an average bore I was.
“Obviously,” I agreed. “This party should have set the perfect tone for the movie. Total missed opportunity.”
“We need to pivot. A sharp fucking pivot.”
Tonight would be the premiere, and the after-party, this one organized by the studio. More opportunities for Odetta Olson to ruin our lives. Carmen ripped opened a small packet of sugar and dumped it in her coffee. Behind her stern face, I could see the mechanics of her mind; I knew her that well.
I also knew exactly what she liked to hear. “The problem is, we’re not Odetta Olson’s publicists. If we were, you’d be having a word with her right now.”
Carmen shook her head. “Girlfriend needs to pull her act together. She’s done this long enough; she should know better.”
“But we’re only working on the movie, and the studio has to approve everything we do. We both know they want everything safe and square.” My cup of coffee was halfway to my lips, but I put it down again. “What would you do differently if you didn’t have to play so nice?”
Carmen raised an eyebrow. “If I didn’t have to show these studio execs that I’m an angel descended from heaven to bestow good press upon their cash cow, cough, cough, I mean masterpiece?”
I stifled a laugh and nodded.
“If you can’t get good publicity, there are ways to deflect the spotlight. Some more respectable than others.”
I was about to ask what she had in mind when she changed the subject.
“Where’s Golden Boy supposed to be right now?”
Carmen had met Ben a handful of times at work functions, and she hadn’t made much of an effort to disguise that he wasn’t her cup of CBD-infused tea.
He’d been friendly and polite, fetching her drinks and asking meaningful questions about her business.
So of course she’d started calling him Golden Boy.
Carmen wouldn’t let anyone get away with trying too hard, the ultimate sin.
I shrugged. “Back at the hotel, chasing his next burst of inspiration.”
Carmen roared with delight. “Do I detect a hint of sarcasm piercing through Marnie Redd’s impeccable armor?”
She wasn’t wrong about that.
“He’s just been working at this so long,” I said, more neutrally.
“Did he ever hear back from the producer contacts I gave you?”
I froze. Carmen was a busy woman with a thriving business.
She didn’t have time to remember that my boyfriend had begged me to ask her for industry contacts, which she had been generous enough to give.
Carmen had worked in entertainment PR for two decades, she knew a lot of important people and was owed her fair share of favors.
But Ben didn’t know that, because I’d never passed along those contacts to him.
“I don’t think so,” I said, looking away.
“He didn’t tell you?”
I shook my head. “Sometimes I think he’s embarrassed about all the rejections. It’s hard on him.”
Carmen glanced behind me, distracted. “Is it?”
“He wants this so much. That’s all he talks about. He’s going to be a big shot screenwriter and write the next great American movie.”
So why had I kept those producer contacts from him?
Well, Ben’s work was… not good. He had a way with words and did really well at his day job writing ads and web copy.
But his screenplays? Awful. The dialogue was stilted, the characters one-dimensional.
The plots were somehow both cliché and hard to follow.
I hadn’t always felt that way. Ben and I met a few months out of college at an evening short story writing class.
He’d been working on screenplays for a few years already and had faced dozens of rejections.
But he didn’t let that get in the way of his belief that it would happen for him.
So he signed up for a different kind of writing class, to see if that would help unlock his creative juices.
On my end, I’d always enjoyed writing, too.
At school, essays were the one thing I truly loved working on.
I’d been journaling since I was twelve and kept a running list of story ideas in my notes app.
I wrote a chapter here, a few pages there.
It was a fun hobby, nothing more. The summer after college, my two older brothers took me out for lunch on my birthday.
They’d been in college when the whole divorce went down, and they always felt guilty that I was at home fending for myself after our father left.
With school behind me, I was struggling to get a real job and was down in the dumps.
My oldest brother Aidan had a friend who’d just taken a short story writing class and loved it.
The boys signed me up for the following semester.
The class was good, but I liked it even more because of the handsome curly-haired guy who always raised his hand to read his stories.
Everything he said sounded like pure gold to me.
Three months later, I got the job with Carmen.
Ben and I had just started dating. I finished my last short story and never looked at it again.
I had a new boyfriend and a good job. I didn’t care about anything else.
Carmen made a face. “I don’t think he’s writing the next great American movie right now.”
She pointed behind me. There was Ben, sitting down on the other side of the terrace, diagonally across from us. He was with the blond from the hotel bar last night.
“Do we know who that is?” Carmen asked.
I reached for a lie, as if it was as easy as plucking one down from the branches of my mind.
But Carmen saw right through me.
“Interesting. I didn’t think Ben had it in him.” She caught the horrified look on my face. “Kidding. If you want to go over there and punch his squeaky-clean face, I’ll hold your purse. I’ll swear he started it, whatever you need.”
I didn’t want to go over there. And despite what I claimed, I was in no way ready to accept he might be sleeping with someone else.
I wasn’t that evolved. Ben and I didn’t fight.
We were happy together. When I’d come home from last night’s party, he was already asleep.
This morning, I’d slid out of bed undetected and was glad he still hadn’t woken up by the time I left.
“I’m fine,” I said, aware that I sounded anything but. “Let’s get back to work. I’m going to get to the bottom of the whole Odetta Olson and Fiona Pills drama. The more informed we are, the better.”
Carmen shook her head. “You monogamous people. I’ll never understand you. But fine. Keep me posted.”
“Of course.”
She checked her phone. “I need to go meet Pascal and Anju from the studio so they can tell me how we’re already ruining our chances of winning the Palme d’Or.
Put this on the company card,” she added, meaning our lunch.
She glanced toward Ben. “That’s why I didn’t like the idea of him crashing our Cannes affair.
That girl is too pretty, and I need you focused. ”
Carmen didn’t have to walk past Ben’s table to exit, but she did it anyway. I assumed she gave him a big smile, making sure he’d notice her. He did, and then he scanned the space until he found me.
There was no avoiding it now.
By the time I walked over to him, he was sitting straight in his chair, a serious look on his face.
“Hi,” I said, addressing them both like they were acquaintances I’d bumped into.
“This is Harper,” Ben said immediately. “Her boss is a top agent at CAA.” She smiled and Ben rushed to add, “She’s going to be a big agent soon, too.”
Harper scooted her chair back so she could stand up and shake my hand. “We’re staying at the same hotel and met at the bar last night. Ben started telling me all about his fabulous new project, and here we are.”
Ben blushed like I’d never seen him blush before. Then again, to my knowledge, no one had ever called his work “fabulous.”
“I’m sure you’re busy,” Ben said to me. And then, to his new friend, “Marnie is doing publicity for Don’t Be Sad! That’s why we’re in Cannes.”
So they hadn’t talked about me last night.
Harper beamed. “I can’t wait to see it. Do you think you could get us into the premiere tonight?”
Ben gasped in delight. “That would be amazing! Could you?”
“I don’t even get to go,” I said in a way that I hoped didn’t sound too miffed.
Harper made a disappointed face but quickly bounced back. “There are other screenings on the schedule this week. We can figure out how to get into one of those.”
I couldn’t believe she was we-ing my boyfriend like that.
“Well, I have to go work,” I said.
Ben caught the look in my eye, and I finally saw a glimmer of understanding.
He swallowed. “Right, well, same. I’m here to make connections.”
Harper opened her arms wide and laughed. “Ta-da!”
I didn’t find it funny.
But I should have. I should have wanted to make Ben happy because he made me happier than I ever thought I deserved to be.
Especially after my parents’ ugly divorce—when I was fourteen—sent my mom and me off to that moldy apartment an hour away from all my friends.
With my brothers gone, I was the one left to deal with her incurable sadness, when it wasn’t rage at my dad’s new girlfriend.
I was the one who had to fill up the fridge and clean the house because Mom worked twice as hard to patch together an income.
She acted like she was the only one crushed under the loneliness of having lost all the family she had.
But I was there, crying myself to sleep more nights than not.
“No, but seriously,” Harper said now. “When Ben told me about his screenplay, I couldn’t wait to read it. I begged him to email it immediately.”
She giggled as she glanced at Ben, who was suddenly studying his empty glass.
“You’re being too nice,” he said, all flustered. “And Marnie has to go.”
“Are you always this modest?” Harper said, playfully smacking his hand. She looked at me. “Is he always like this?”
I was confused and trying hard to hide it.
Ben had submitted his work to endless competitions and fellowships over the years.
He’d pitched agents, the odd producers he managed to meet.
It never went anywhere. And on his first day in Cannes, he’d somehow impressed a big agent’s assistant to the point of having lunch with her?
“Well, it’s incredible,” Harper said, giggling like a hyena, or what I thought a hyena might sound like. “I’m sharing it with my boss and I already know he’s going to love it.”
“Stop it,” Ben said teasingly, but there was an edge to his voice.
“You’re going to be a very successful screenwriter,” Harper continued, oblivious.
Questions piled up in my head. Why wasn’t Ben jumping with joy? Why hadn’t he rushed to tell me, even if just over text? Why was he avoiding looking at me?
I wish I could say that I started to put the pieces together then, that I could pretend to have an inkling of what was going on right under my nose.
But that was the problem with being in love.
Just like I had once believed that Ben was a brilliant writer, I was also convinced he was a fantastic boyfriend who would never try to hurt me.
Even if I’d done something that would shatter him in a million pieces.
And no, I’m not talking about keeping Carmen’s contacts from him.
That wasn’t the first time I’d betrayed my boyfriend.
What I did to Ben was so much worse than that.