Love-struck Trainer: Instead of posing as a somewhat humorous, sarcastic, devil-may-care princess to hide your bitterness, why don’t you tell guys something useful? How do you get over losing the perfect girl?
My entire body goes cold from head to toe. Is that how I come off? A somewhat humorous, sarcastic, devil-may-care princess to hide my bitterness. If that’s true, I’ve sunk so low. My hands rise and hover over the keys.
Rapidly I type: I’ve been told that my comments are witty and funny.
I hit send and wait.
Ding: A non-denial denial. Why won’t you answer the question? Or can you only dish out and not be helpful?
I really shouldn’t respond. I’ve had too much to drink but, fuck, there is something in his first question really hitting home right now. How does this stranger in cyber land know exactly what I’m feeling today? Maybe, it is obvious.
Click, click, two words: You don’t.
Crap. What made me say that? An honest answer. Exactly what I had just been thinking.
For some reason, I am suddenly fully alert, plugged in and engaged in this random moment with a virtual stranger. I stare at the screen. Waiting. Waiting.
Ding: Is that why you’re bitter? You lost the perfect guy?
I rapidly respond: Nope. I lost the perfect imperfect guy.
Love-struck Trainer: You are witty and funny.
I bite my lip, feeling a smile trying to take shape, and then the chat box announces he’s left. That’s it? Gone. Love-struck is usually good for at least an hour of diversion.
I log off my blog, switch off the light, and go to sleep.
I’m late. Sunday hangover always equals Monday late. I really need to stop that Saturday night drinking and blogging shit. It’s no way for a twenty-five-year-old girl to live. Isn’t that what everyone keeps telling me?
I hit the button for the garage door to open and wait impatiently for it to lift. Why does everything near the ocean move at a snail’s pace, even the garage door? I put the car into reverse, back into the driveway, hit the button and wait for the door to fully close in case Muffin the cat is lurking and decides to slip in. If the garage sensor pops the door open again, there is no telling what I’ll find within, leaving a house open all day in Malibu.
OK, you can close anytime.
While I wait, I study the stunning beachfront concrete and glass structure. It really makes me feel like a fraud to live here. Struggling independent filmmakers should live struggling lives if they want their art to be good. But then, the house was vacant since Dad finally married Mom shortly after my eighteenth birthday, and finding livable conditions for manageable rent in Southern California is just a bitch.
The house may cost me nothing, but there is rent. It may not cost US dollars to live here, but I do have to live with the memories, the memorabilia, and history contained within the walls of the Malibu house. I’m not talking about the photos of my parents, but the legacy of lovers that is always present within the rooms. Dad loved Mom here. Mom left Dad from here. And I live alone without Bobby here.
The door closes and I start to ease carefully from the driveway. Second battle of the day: getting onto Pacific Coast Highway during the commuter rush without getting hit. I merge into traffic and again everything is moving at a snail’s pace.
I pull into the drive-thru Starbucks to grab a morning tray of coffee for my creative team. I hit the notes icon on my iPhone, where I artfully conceal the list of everyone’s preferred drink. It’s a nice touch to always get it right, and it’s the little things that seem to keep the team humming happily. It sure isn’t the money I pay them since, according to my business checking account balance, I really am a struggling independent filmmaker.
If not for capital injections from Dad, my start-up film company would have folded long ago. I pull up to the window to pay.
“Thirty-seven dollars, twenty-eight cents,” the barista announces.
“Really? I only ordered six drinks. I’m not buying Starbucks.”
The girl doesn’t laugh. OK, so this isn’t one of my wittier and funnier moments but, heck, I’m in a rush and I’ve got a headache today. I rummage through my purse for a credit card.
I smile as I hand it to her. “Thank you.”
No response. Monday, Monday, Monday: they seem to bring out the worst in everyone. I wonder if the barista would notice if I started to secretly film her. There’s got to be a story in this and that’s what I do, film little bits of this and that all through the day until the next great documentary inspiration strikes. I peek at her out of the corner of my eye. Nope, better not try it. This girl looks pissed.
My credit card is shoved back at me and I have only a moment to drop it on my dash before I have to grab the tray closing in on me.
“Thank you,” I say.
Nothing. Not even a smile. Maybe I should start another blog: How to Train Your Barista. I put my car into gear and pull out of the drive-thru lane. That’s one of the things I miss about Bobby; he’s the only person I’ve ever known who always thought my quirky sense of humor was funny. I admit, I’m an acquired taste.
Thirty minutes later, I pull into the parking lot in front of the shabby industrial space that houses my fledgling company, KKK Productions. Another mistake of my quirky sense of humor, the KKK thing that started back in high school when I started to sell my hand-painted Vans on the Internet: Kaley’s Kustom Kicks. I thought it was memorable—KKK—but I guess it wasn’t one of my smarter branding moves because sometimes I get the most interesting mail from viewers who’ve seen one of our documentaries. And the KKK thing is definitely misinterpreted.
I pull my cross-body purse over my neck and scoop up the drink tray. Note to self: learn to contain quirky sense of humor when making business decisions.
I push with my hip through the double glass doors and pause at the reception desk.
“Morning, Veronica. Is everyone here?” I ask, setting the tray down and searching for the soy latte.
“They’re in the conference room,” she informs, smiling as I hand her the coffee. “You’re late. Rough weekend?”
I force my expression into something I hope looks saucy. “The roughest kind.”
Veronica laughs. “I’m free for lunch if you want to tell me about it. Mine was totally dull.”
“I never kiss and tell,” I counter with heavy meaning.
I grab the tray and continue down the short hallway to the back office we’ve converted into a conference/screening room. Struggling to balance the tray in one arm, I open the door and the room quiets.
“Sorry to keep everyone waiting,” I say in a rush, moving quickly toward my seat. “Traffic,” I add lamely, wondering why I felt it necessary.
Maybe it’s because I’m the youngest person in the room and it still feels kind of strange to sign paychecks. Or maybe because someday they are going to figure out that I haven’t a clue what I’m doing and haven’t since the first moment I took over this defunct production company and inherited this team.
The business acquisition was a mistake, it was too burdened with debt and I should have listened to my dad about that, but I was excited about starting my career after graduation and the team is definitely a winner. I may not like each and every one of them, but I respect them, they are enormously talented and I’m getting great on-the-job CEO/documentary-filmmaker training here.
I smile and start to hand out the coffee drinks. I pull out a notepad from my bag and it gets a few funny stares. All around the table are laptops and tablets. I like paper, so shoot me. I grab a pen and start to tap it on the scarred wood table.
A sheet of paper is shoved across the table at me. “Should we start at the top of the agenda?” Justin asks.
I quickly scan the list. Jeez, there are a dozen bullet points here. Who has time for that much meeting? Too much discussion with every gathering of the creative team. No wonder this company released too few projects and went bankrupt.