Waterfalls (22 page)

She flipped through the few dresses still on hangers. None of them jumped out and said, “Take me to cheesecake!”

The clothes on her bed looked frumpy and outdated. She hadn’t bought herself anything new this spring, and the newest outfit she could see was a long, navy blue, cap-sleeved dress with buttons down the front. She had only worn it once because she didn’t like the way the line of buttons twisted when she walked.

This is pitiful! Why didn’t I go shopping last week? I wonder if I can get away from the conference on Monday to buy something
.

The phone rang. She considered letting the answering
machine pick it up, but since this was Sunday night, it would be someone from her family or a friend. Probably Shelly was calling since Meredith had tried to phone her that afternoon and hadn’t caught anyone at home.

Feeling cheerful, Meredith playfully answered the phone, “Hello, you have reached Meredith’s answering service. If you would like to leave a message, please chirp like a bird at the sound of the beep. Beep!”

After a pause a rich male voice said tentatively, “Chirp?”

Meredith swallowed her giggles. “Jake?”

“Meredith?”

“Yes.” She freed her laughter and tried to explain. “I thought you were Shelly.”

“Oh. I was wondering,” Jake said slowly. “You said you have an early flight. What time do you arrive tomorrow?”

“Around ten-thirty, I think.”

“Is someone picking you up from the airport?”

“I don’t think so. I understood we were supposed to catch the hotel shuttle at the airport.”

“I see,” he said.

“Why do you ask?” Meredith ventured.

“Well, if you’d like, I could pick you up. I thought maybe you could stop by the studio. We aren’t filming tomorrow morning, but you could see the set design.”

“That sounds great! I’d love to see the studio.” She hoped she didn’t sound too enthusiastic. “Let me check my ticket and give you the info. I could meet you at the curb in front of baggage claim, if that would be easiest for you.” Meredith pulled her ticket from the leather briefcase Shelly had given her. “I arrive at LAX at 10:10 from Seattle. Should I meet you outside of baggage claim around ten thirty?”

“That would work.”

“Great. How fun! Thanks for thinking of this, Jake.”

“Good. Then I’ll see you tomorrow morning at ten-thirty. I drive a tan-colored Ford Explorer.”

“You’re kidding! That’s what I drive.”

“I know. I saw it the night Helen and I were there.”

“Isn’t that a coincidence,” Meri said.

“Yes,” he agreed, his voice matter-of-fact. “I’d better let you get back to your packing.”

“Okay. See you tomorrow. Bye, Jake.”

“Good-bye, Meredith.”

Oh, I love the way he says that! “Good-bye, Meredith.” My name rolls off his tongue like honey
.

“Meredith,” she repeated aloud, trying to catch his inflection. She lowered her voice a notch and slowly spilled out the word, “Meredith.”

Tomorrow I’m going to see Jake, and he’s taking me to the studio
. She smiled broadly at her bedroom mirror.
This is the face of a happy woman!

Behind her, in the reflection of the mirror, she spotted the mound of clothes on her bed. With a groan she turned to face all the pitiful rags. “Now what am I going to wear tomorrow?”

Three hours later, Meredith sat on her bedroom floor surrounded by every article of clothing she owned. There were piles here and stacks there. She had created a mess, but nothing had made it into her suitcase yet.

I realize there are greater problems in this world than my clothing crisis, but right now world hunger pales in comparison to this. What am I going to wear to a Hollywood studio?

Upset with herself for being obsessed with her appearance, Meredith decided to take a different approach. “Jeans,” she declared to the heaps of clothes. “I’ll wear jeans tomorrow. Jeans go with everything, anytime, anywhere, in any part of the
world, right? Now, which top?”

When Meredith stepped off the plane in sunny southern California the next morning, she wore her black jeans with a wide black belt and a short-sleeved, black mock turtleneck. A row of hoop bracelets jangled on her arm as she slung the leather bag over her shoulder and headed for the baggage claim on the lower level.

She had gotten three hours of sleep the night before since she had to be up at five to make her plane out of Seattle. The catnaps on the plane had helped some, but she knew her eyes were puffy. She was glad she could hide behind her sunglasses at least a little longer.

Her luggage came through with the first batch on the conveyor belt. She stepped outside, scanning the area for a tan Explorer. It was parked twenty yards away, right by the curb with its blinkers on. Meri felt her heart pounding as she pulled her wheeled luggage toward Jake’s car. She went up to the passenger door and, with an eager tug, opened it and said, “Hi!”

The overweight man in the driver’s seat was not Jake.

“Oh, excuse me. I’m sorry!” She slammed the door and began to hurry away.

“No, wait,” the man called after her. “Are you Meredith?”

She stopped and looked back at the stranger, who was hanging his head out the passenger window. “Jake sent me,” the man said. “He got held up at the studio.”

Meredith returned, feeling the warm, red glow that must now be staining her cheeks a deep shade of rose.

“I’m Chad,” the large man said. “You need a hand with your luggage?”

“No. I’ll just put it in the backseat here.” Meredith placed her luggage inside and then settled herself into the passenger’s seat. “How are you?” she asked the unlikely chauffeur as he pulled away from the curb.

“Fine.”

“That’s good.”

Chad drove silently, and she decided not to disrupt his concentration since the traffic was thick exiting the airport. They entered the freeway, and Chad turned on the radio to a rock station. Apparently he liked his music loud. Driving with one hand on the wheel, Chad hung his left arm out the open window and pounded on the door to the music’s beat. For the next half hour Meredith received a crash course on all the current rock hits in L.A., accompanied by Chad, the would-be drummer.

The breeze from his open window blew her hair like crazy and filled her nostrils with the acrid scent of fuel emissions rising in the warm, thick, morning air. She didn’t know why she couldn’t bring herself to ask this guy to turn on the air conditioner.

When they arrived at the studio, she was surprised at how boring it looked. They entered the first building in a row of what looked like three warehouses. A red light was hung over the door, and a bold sign read Do Not Enter When Red Light Is On. The red light was off.

A welcoming blast of cool air met Meri when she stepped into the studio. A narrow pathway led to the back corner of the building. All along the narrow path were thick cords taped to the floor with duct tape. Some of the cords were blue, some black, and some green. On the right wall were stacks of huge pressed-wood boards folded up, lights on tall metal stands, and ladders. More cords hung from the very high, dark ceiling. The studio was completely different from what she had pictured. Nothing was glamorous about any of it so far.

Chad led her through a set that was a kitchen, complete with kids’ artwork on the refrigerator. It seemed smaller than a real kitchen, and there was no ceiling. Hot lights bore down on
the dull linoleum floor. They walked out the kitchen door and into what looked like a props junkyard. The huge, open, middle area of the studio was surrounded by different stage walls fencing it in. Meredith guessed that each of those walls framed a set just like the kitchen they had walked through.

She wanted to stop and have a look at all the crazy props that had been laid to rest here in this no-man’s-land. A Tiffany lamp stood next to a stuffed gorilla and a recliner chair with a large basket of silk tulips on the seat. A coat rack held a leather jacket, a jump rope, and a baby blanket. A basketball and a painting of a sailboat were beside a patio table that was loaded with trinkets like at an estate sale.

Meredith had seen this kind of colorful mayhem only once before, in the drama-department props closet at her high school. But this studio was that prop closet’s mother ship. Walking through the middle of all this imagination waiting to be used filled Meredith with excitement.

They turned a corner, and there stood Jake. Meredith saw him first. Her heart flip-flopped. Jake had on khaki shorts, a blue denim work shirt, and his camel-colored loafers with no socks. His sunglasses were around his neck on a black leather string. He held a clipboard in his hand and was going down the list of items with a man who was holding a can of Diet Coke in one hand and a three-foot, multicolored butterfly in the other.

Glad I didn’t dress up for this
.

She smiled and waited for Chad to announce her. Chad didn’t say a word. He walked past Jake and went to an ice chest on the floor, where he fished out a couple of drinks. He came back and handed a dripping Cactus Cooler to Meredith.

“What is this?” she asked quietly.

“Soda,” Chad said, giving her a strange look.

“Oh. I’ve never heard of this kind of soda.”

He looked at her even more strangely, as if she had just arrived from Mars. Jake must have heard them talking because he looked over and caught Meri’s eye. His expression seemed to brighten. He said a few more words to the man with the butterfly and walked over to greet her.

“Hi,” he said. “I see Chad found you okay. Sorry I couldn’t be there. Thanks, Chad.”

“No prob’,” Chad replied, popping the lid on his drink and walking away now that he had been dismissed by the boss.

“It’s good to see you,” Jake said.

Meredith smiled. She wondered if she looked silly with her sunglasses on top of her head. Did her eyes look too puffy? Why was he smiling at her so warmly? Was he just happy to finally be in his own comfort zone with her?

“This is quite a place,” Meredith said, unlocking her gaze and taking a sweeping glance of the studio. “I’ve never been to Hollywood before.”

“I hate to disillusion you,” Jake said, “but technically we’re not in Hollywood. We were able to rent this studio for five hundred dollars a day less than the same size studio in Hollywood.”

“Sounds like a good choice.” She snapped open her can of soda and took a cautious sip. It was sweet. Very sweet. Sort of an orange soda with a twist of 7UP and lots of sugar.

“Did Chad give you the tour already?”

“Not really. He’s not much of a talker.”

“No, I guess he’s not. Let me show you around.” Jake gently touched Meredith’s elbow and directed her to the right. He let go immediately, but the memory of his touch lasted for the rest of the tour.

As Jake took her through all the sets and described each scene that would be filmed and where, she wondered what he was thinking. Was there a glimmer of a chance that this love
legalist might actually be experiencing a little bit of heart flopping himself? The way he had looked at her when she first came in was not at all the look of a man who is only interested in business.

Or am I making this up in my overactive imagination? Do I want him to be interested so badly that I’m willing to convince myself he might be?

But what if he is? How can anyone start a casual friendship with a man like Jake Wilde? And what about all the business arrangements? Will I jeopardize my professional integrity if I become involved in a relationship with this guy?

What am I thinking? He hasn’t given any indication that he’s interested in me. And I know how interested he is in a relationship! Commitment first, then feelings. This does not appear to be a man who is in a position to make a commitment to anything but his work
.

There, that makes it clear. Nothing is going on between us, and I have no reason to concoct something in my imagination because it will be one-sided. My side. And my side doesn’t need to get its hopes up and its feelings hurt
.

“So that’s about it,” Jake said as the tour came to a close. “Are you hungry?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact, I’m very hungry.” The pretzels and orange juice on the plane had burned off long ago.

“We have a caterer who brings lunch in for the crew,” Jake said, glancing at his watch. “They should be ready to serve in about twenty minutes. Could you stick around for lunch, and then I can have Chad drive you over to the conference.”

“Aren’t you coming?” Meredith asked. The thought of being carted across town by Chad was not appealing.

“My first workshop isn’t until tomorrow morning,” Jake said, walking over to the back wall of the studio and hanging the clipboard on a peg. A time clock and a bulletin board loaded with notices were also on the wall. “I have an appointment
with our casting director this afternoon and then a meeting with the wardrobe people. That reminds me—I wanted to show you this.”

He led her down a maze of pathways lined with cables and cords. They entered an open area that was well lit and had several long racks of outfits. “These are the costumes for Young Heart,” Jake explained. “I thought maybe you would like to have a look since you suggested we do photos for the covers instead of drawings. I like the idea because I think it will build continuity between the videos and the books.”

“I think it will, too,” Meredith said, trying hard to set her mind on this as a business situation and not a prelude to a date. It was difficult not to be a little disappointed that Chad, not Jake, would drive her to the conference. She dreaded the thought of spending the afternoon in thick traffic on that hot freeway with Chad’s music and drumming on the side of the car.

“This costume was the one I had in mind for the cover of the first book,” Jake said, pulling out a hanger from the rack. Draped on the hanger was a pair of deep green breeches with matching suspenders. The shirt was pale yellow. “Of course, if this works, we would like to have the cover of the videos and the cover of the books be the same photo.”

Meredith nodded.

A stagehand walked into the dressing area carrying a bowl of something white. Black flecks were sprinkled on the fluffy white substance.