The Balance Thing (16 page)

B
etween stress about Monday's Hollywood meeting and stress about Wednesday's WorldWired interview, I was a nervous wreck all weekend.

“Come surfing with me,” Vida pleaded on Saturday morning. “I swear you'll feel totally better.”

But suddenly I felt I had a lot to live for, so I decided I'd pass on being shark bait this once.

“It's Andrew Lloyd Webber night at Martuni's,” Max announced gleefully later that day. “Come with me! We'll see how many Sondheim numbers we can sneak in without anyone knowing the difference!” Tempting, but Martuni's meant martinis, and I thought it might be a good idea to live a pure life until Monday.

“Come over for dinner,” Connie had begged on Sunday night. “The couple I invited canceled, and if you don't come it's going to be just me, coquilles Saint-Jacques, and Ian.” There was a desperation in her voice that foreshadowed an evening of hard work on my part to keep the conversation moving. I mustered up as much regret as possible when I declined.

Finally, it was Monday.

 

JOSH PICKED ME UP
a half hour before the meeting. I had dressed in an impeccable fawn pantsuit accessorized with the tiniest black leather belt imaginable and a killer pair of Christian Lacroix pumps from my London shopping spree. I had also channeled my inner Shayla and done a fairly decent job on the hair and makeup. After all, Alan Turnbottom was probably used to movie stars, so I didn't want to look like some northern California nature girl.

Josh, of course, was in black.

We headed for the Waterfront, a seafood bistro at Pier 7 on the Embarcadero. I'd been to the “casual” dining area downstairs before but never to the “elegant” dining room upstairs. Today we'd be lunching elegantly on Alan Turnbottom's expense account.

“This should be nice,” I said as the valet whisked the car away. “I just wish I didn't feel like throwing up.”

Josh cracked his first grin of the day. “I'm glad it's not just me.”

He placed his hand on the small of my back and propelled me forward to meet our fate.

 

ALAN TURNBOTTOM
was Hollywood. We knew him immediately by the clothes (black cashmere V-neck over pristine white T-shirt), the hair (clearly hours of artful tousling had been necessary to achieve the perfect I-don't-care-what-I-look-like look), and the phone (minuscule and silver and permanently implanted in his left ear).

He stood to greet us, still talking to whomever (George
Clooney? Russell Crowe? these thoughts did not have a soothing effect on me). He took five more calls before the entrees came, pausing before answering each to apologize (insincerely) and tell us how fantastic it was to meet us and how he loved Vladima's high concept.

Josh shot me a look as the phone rang again. “At least the view's nice,” he muttered.

I had to admit, it was. A pretty summer day with a pretty blue sky and lots of pretty white sailboats to-ing and fro-ing under the Bay Bridge. But I hadn't come for the damn view.

“I'm so sorry,” Mr. Hollywood said for the umpteenth time, snapping the marvel of modern communication shut again.

“That's an adorable phone,” I held out my hand. “May I take a look? I'm shopping for a new one.”

He handed it over cluelessly, and I promptly shut it off and plopped it into my purse. “There, that's better,” I said with a bright smile. “Now we can really talk.”

Turnbottom slipped right past astonished into amused. “Am I ever going to get that back?”

“I'll make you a deal,” I told him. “I get to keep the phone until dessert so we can chat about how much you love Vladima”—another smile—“and in return I'll tell you whether the flourless chocolate cake or the crème brûlée will go better with your coffee.”

He turned to Josh. “Does she always get what she wants?”

That enigmatic Josh smile. “Why else would we be here?”

“All right,” Turnbottom agreed. “It's a deal.” He raised his sparkling San Pellegrino in a toast. “May it be the first of many.”

I took a deep breath. Game time.

 

TURNBOTTOM WAS QUITE A TALKER.
He talked about the youth demographic, and the necessity of appealing to both males and females in the critical eighteen-to-twenty-four range. He talked about synergy and branding and cross-promotional opportunities. Once he began to talk, it took me about two minutes to realize he had nothing whatsoever to do with getting a movie made. He was a marketing guy. It takes one to know one.

I let him babble on, using phrases like “goth/skateboarder/X-games vibe” and “major opportunity in action figures” while I speared my seafood and tried to come up with a strategy. I had plenty of time because he was apparently doing this speech from memory and required no feedback or input from us.

It wasn't until the waiter cleared our plates that Turnbottom finally paused for the praise he clearly expected. “Well?” He flashed a smile that had probably cost more than my loft. “What do you think? Can we do business?”

I did a quick Josh check and realized he wasn't just disappointed. He was mad. He gave Turnbottom a look I wouldn't have wished on Vladima's worst enemy. “Business?” he said acidly.

Hollywood was unperturbed. “I know you're used to thinking artistically, but you have to understand that ultimately moviemaking, like…cartooning…is a business. I'm sure you have to worry about your bottom line, right?” Another million-dollar flash of teeth.

“Actually, I don't.” Josh's tone could have curdled the foam on Turnbottom's cappuccino. “That's what I have Becks for.”

They both turned to me. Turnbottom's smile faltered just a bit. “So, Becks,” he said conspiratorially. “You haven't said very much. I was beginning to wonder if you were just a pretty face.” Which he clearly didn't realize was a truly stupid thing to say.

They were still watching me.

Fuck it.

I leaned forward so I could speak quietly.

“Alan, when you get on your plane tonight and you think back on this meeting, you're going to wonder why Josh brought along the passive-aggressive bitch.”

Four eyebrows went up.

“But here's the thing,” I continued. “I'm not being passive-aggressive here. I am well and truly passive. Because, in all honesty, I don't give a good damn whether you ever make a movie out of Vladima.” I leaned back and shrugged. “I really don't care. Because right now, we own the demographic you've just spent all afternoon describing. We're already there. And not just with some of the kids, but with the hip kids—the trendsetters.”

I caught the faintest whiff of an eye roll, and suddenly I wanted to hurt this man.

“The truth is”—I leaned in again, face to face with him—“there are going to be Vladima posters on the wall of every dorm room this fall, and the only question you need to ask yourself is whether you want the Fox logo to be on the lower right-hand corner of them. When you figure that out, you call someone who can talk to us about getting a movie made. Until then, I think we're done.”

I slid his phone across the table to him, rose, and walked away from the table, praying to God that Josh would give
him one of his patented darkly intense genius stares and follow me.

He did.

 

THE TROUBLE WAS,
all Josh gave me were a few of the same stares. The one while we waited for the valet to get his car was pretty fierce, and I took it as a fairly clear indicator that I was about to be fired. The one while I was buckling my seat belt (with hands that would not stop shaking) kicked the intensity up a notch. Neither of them encouraged conversation. Besides, I couldn't think of anything to say.

Josh drove wordlessly for about a block, then abruptly pulled over into a loading zone. He gave me another look, opened his mouth to say something, then shook his head and got out of the car. He crossed the wide sidewalk of the Embarcadero until he was at the water's edge, then gripped the railing with both hands and stared out at the bay.

I let my breath out slowly and told myself that if he fired me, at least I wouldn't have to tell him about WorldWired.

I got out and went to the railing. This time he didn't look at me. He just started shaking his head. Finally, I couldn't take it anymore. “Josh?”

Nothing.

“Josh, come on!”

He gripped the railing tighter.

“Look, Josh, just call Turnbottom and tell him you fired me, and that I don't speak for you or Vladima, and that I'm an unstable, alcoholic, lunatic—”

He finally faced me. “Unbelievable.”

“I know, I get that way sometimes. Poor impulse control. It was when he said the ‘just a pretty face' thing, and—”

“
You
are unbelievable.”

Hang on, he didn't sound mad. In fact, he sounded…what was it?

“Becks, did you even see that guy's face? And have you ever met a bigger asshole?”

I suddenly realized he wasn't shaking his head in a what-have-you-done sort of way, he was shaking his head in an I-can't-believe-what-you-did sort of way.

“You were
amazing
!” He grabbed my shoulders, and the look he gave me then wasn't darkly intensely anything. It was dazzling and open and unbelieving, and the heat from his hands on my shoulders burned right through to my skin. Suddenly I couldn't think straight, and my stomach did a series of backflips down onto the pavement and back again.

“Becks.”

He broke the spell and I broke away. I blinked and tried to pull myself together. “I'm glad you were pleased,” I said, every inch the professional. “It was a calculated risk, but—”

He was shaking his head again. “Max warned me about this.”

I swallowed. “About what?”

“That you'd be completely oblivious.”

“Oblivious to what?”

Which is when he muttered “Jesus, Becks,” pulled me close, and kissed me.

And the earth failed to move.

It was a good kiss. It definitely got a passing grade. But it was not a great kiss. Not a Hollywood kiss. It was…
fine. And I was hugely relieved. Josh had no effect on me. Thank God.

He pulled away and gave me a look. One of the dark intense ones. It was a lot more effective than the kiss had been.

He spoke. “Think we can do better if you're expecting it this time?”

I couldn't answer because I was trying not to burst into flames from the heat in his eyes. He nodded slowly, holding me in place with that look. Then he moved his hands to firm positions at the back of my head and the base of my spine, and he went in again.

This one was a bone-dissolving, you'd-swear-you-were-levitating-six-inches-off-the-ground, leaves-you-with-no-choice-but-to-whimper kind of a kiss.

And there was a lag time, a blissful period of unconscious, unthinking response, when I was kissing back for all I was worth, before it hit me.

This was Josh.

O
h…my…
God!”

I'd planned on meeting Vida at Max's that night to tell them all about the movie deal, but that now paled in comparison to the events that had unfolded after it.

“What did you do?”

“How was it?”

“Did you kiss him back?”

“Right there on the sidewalk?”

I held up my arms in defense. They finally wore themselves out, except for one final “Oh…my…
God!”
from Vida.

“Okay, seriously, Becks,” Max perched on the coffee table in front of me. “What did you do?”

“I…” I flushed with the memory. “I returned fire.”

Vida squealed, which was a little annoying. “And?”

I shrugged. “And then I realized how ridiculous the whole thing was, and I ran across the street and hopped on the light rail train.”

They both yelled at once.

“You
what?”

I held up my arms again. “I ran away, all right? Why do you think I'm still dressed like this? I'm afraid to go home. I've been riding Muni all afternoon waiting for you guys to get off work.” I registered their staring faces. “What?”

Max looked away. “I think we can all agree that the key word in that explanation was
afraid
.”

Vida nodded. “You think Josh will be waiting for you at your place?”

I squirmed a little. “Maybe.”

“And you don't want to see him?”

“Of course not!”

“Why not?” Max asked. “Because he's nuts about you and he's perfect for you? Or because you're nuts about him and you don't want to admit it?”

“I am
not
nuts about him!”

“Oh, Becks,” Vida said. “You are
so
nuts about him.”

I ignored her. “And why,” I turned on Max, “why is it that right before the kiss, Josh said something about you having warned him that I'd be oblivious? What the hell have you been conspiring about?”

I thought he'd crumble like the killer in the last reel of a Bogart movie, but no. “I haven't been conspiring about anything. I just had one little chat with him a while ago.”

“How long ago?”

“After you showed me that storyboard for Vladima and her new partner.”

“Did you really?” Vida asked him.

“Why?” I wailed.

“Because it was obvious that Josh has a huge thing for you, and I wanted to know if it was some sort of twisted fixation or if he really cares about you.”

“Max, why on earth—”

“Because
I
care about you, you idiot!” He was angry now and didn't want to hear what I thought about his behind-the-scenes manipulations. “And I know you're clueless about guys who fall for you, and I wanted to make sure Josh wasn't some sort of creep who was going to haul you off to some cave and put you in a black leather bustier to act out his sick fantasies!”

That shut me up, but not Vida. “Max, you're not serious! Josh?”

He sat down and ran a hand across his face. “No. Not Josh. When I talked to him, he was…” Max sighed and met my eyes. “He's a normal guy who's crazy about you but smart enough to see the barbed wire and ‘keep out' signs you've got posted everywhere.”

“I do not,” I said icily, “have barbed wire.”

But Vida looked doubtful. “Maybe…”

“Not you too?”

“Just listen, Becks.” She drew her legs up onto the sofa so she could face me. “You remember the date-laziness theory?”

Across the room, Max snorted. I held my empty martini glass out to him. “I'm going to need another of these.”

Vida went on. “Well, I think Connie and I may have been a little off base about that.”

“You think?” Max was as heavy with the sarcasm as he was light with the vermouth.

“Quiet, Max,” Vida answered him. She focused again. “I think maybe you aren't just lazy about who you go out with. I think maybe part of you only wants to go out with guys who are…”

“Losers?” Max handed me the replenished glass.

She turned to him. “You're not helping.” Back to me. “Look, if you only go out with men who are impossibly wrong for you, then it's impossible for you to risk actually getting into a real relationship with one of them, right? And as long as there's no risk, you're comfortable. But if all of a sudden you started going out with a guy who was right for you, things might get…
real
or something, and that's totally scary.”

I rejected the theory immediately. With proof. “No. What about the LOTM? He wasn't a loser and I wanted a real relationship with him—”

“Oh, please,” Max said. “There was nothing real about him. You picked the phoniest guy in the British Isles. There was no way that was going to work out.”

I looked at Vida. “He was pretty impossible, Becks,” she said. “I mean, he was a liar and a cheat, in addition to the gorgeous-jet-setting-aristocratic-playboy thing.” She winced. “He was just a different flavor of impossible than what you were used to.”

Great. I leaned back into the cushions and closed my eyes. “So let me get this straight. I ran away from Josh not because it was a wildly inappropriate and unprofessional thing for him to have pounced on me after a business meeting. I ran away from Josh because he's…right for me? And I'm…what? Afraid of commitment?”

Vida turned to Max. “Do you think it's fear of commitment? Because I'm thinking it's more a fear-of-intimacy thing.”

I stood. “That's it. I'm out of here.”

“Running away again?” Max asked sweetly.

“This is bullshit psychobabble and I'm going home.” I grabbed my purse and headed for the door.

“Becks—” Vida called after me.

But I was in no mood to listen to any more.

 

I SPENT THE NEXT DAY
and a half reading a stack of books on the state of the wireless communications industry. My future was with WorldWired, not with some cartoon vampire or her sexually frustrated creator, and I had to catch up on the last year and a half of technology breakthroughs if I was going to slay them at Wednesday's interview.

I screened all my calls. The last thing I needed was to break my concentration with some stupid conversation about relationships and feelings with Josh. But he didn't call. There weren't even any suspicious hang-ups I could assume were his.

Good. Now if only I could stop jumping two feet into the air every time some damn telemarketer called, I'd be fine.

Tuesday night I took two Tylenol PMs and washed them down with two large swigs of Johnny Walker Black straight from the bottle. That had always been my secret recipe for a good night's sleep when I'd been stressed out at work. In fact, back in the boom times, it had been my bedtime ritual more often than not. With one chewable antacid chaser to prevent whiskey-induced nighttime heartburn, I was ready for bed.

Where I did
not
think about Josh.

 

WEDNESDAY MORNING.
Interview day. I walked into the San Francisco headquarters of WorldWired Incorporated at ten-thirty on Wednesday morning looking and feeling like their latest corporate star.

Joe Elliot was boyishly cute, blond, and British. When he was introducing himself, I was struck with the random piece of trivia that the lead singer of the eighties metal group Def Leppard had been named Joe Elliot. My college roommate had had a major crush on him. For one delirious moment I wondered if the man chatting amiably and leading me to a conference room could be the former headbanger. Then I came to my senses, and said, “Oh yes, thank you. Water would be lovely.”

When he stepped out to get it, I had a moment to pull my head out of VH1 Classics and back to business. I'd wasted the opportunity to get a feel for the corporate climate on the walk to the conference room, but if the room itself was any indication, WorldWired didn't scrimp on the finer things.

The lighting was soft but clear. The wood paneling was actually wood, as was the richly polished long table. The chairs were comfortable, and the control for the videoconferencing monitor looked like something Tom Cruise would fool around with in one of his spy movies.

The view of Telegraph Hill and the bay was glorious. I had to tear myself away from it to do a quick check of the corporate portraits lining the long wall opposite the window. Self-satisfied-looking white men. Big surprise.

Joe Elliot returned, followed by a lackey carrying a crystal water pitcher and two crystal glasses. God forbid bottled Evian should cheapen the ambiance.

Now where did that thought come from? What was the matter with me? And what's wrong with having plush office space? I was supposed to be presenting myself as a finely tuned corporate asset, and I was having serious problems with both my focus and my attitude. Not good.

The lackey withdrew, and Elliot relaxed into the chair opposite me. “So, Becks Mansfield. We meet at last.”

How to respond, given that I'd just heard of him five days ago? “You've got a nice place here.” Accompanied by an easy smile.

“We like it.” He may have winked. Or I may have hallucinated it. “I can't tell you what tremendous things I've been hearing about you.”

I'm the first to admit that I'm very, very good at what I do. But, seriously, it's not like I'm famous. “Really?” I took a sip from the heavy glass and was careful to replace it on its coaster. “Hearing things from whom?” Phillip Hastings, surely. But I still didn't actually know that for sure.

Elliot laughed and gestured to the line of portraits. “Only our chairman, you clever girl.”

What? I searched the line of jowly capitalists again. Who the hell did I know? Nobody…

And then I saw him. Almost unrecognizable in a gray pinstripe. Only the slightest of twinkles linking him to the man I'd last seen hauling a sizable white swan out of Sir I-Can't-Believe-This-Is-Happening's lake.

“George?”

Elliot laughed. “Yes,
George
.” He emphasized the name in a knowing way. “The old earl doesn't often leave his estate at Lakewood to interest himself in the business anymore, but he gets the whole place buzzing when he does.”

I had gripped the underside of the table to keep from falling over. George wasn't a gardener. George, according to the discreet silver plaque under this portrait, was the ninth Earl of Windercestershire. And the chairman of the board of WorldWired.

Elliot was still nattering on pleasantly, so I had time to reel mentally while maintaining a politely interested expression. Of course I'd known from my research that the chairman was a semi-retired earl. But I'd never seen a picture, or if I had, I hadn't looked at it hard enough to realize it was…
George
? And…wait a minute…if I'd just heard correctly, George—not Sir Charles—was the Lord of Lakewood Manor. Dear God, did that make him Charles's
father
?

“So, anyway.” Elliot was obliviously winding up the exchanging-pleasantries portion of the day. “Shall we get down to business?”

I gave up trying to remember exactly how many sordid details I'd given WorldWired's chairman about his son's sexual proclivities while sobbing on a swan boat, and concentrated on applying a properly confident, competent, and professional expression to my face.

“Please.”

 

THINGS WENT AS WELL
as could be expected. I spoke to five people, and I got myself into gear about halfway through the second interview. After that, Joe Elliot took me to lunch upstairs in the executive dining room. I hadn't realized there were still companies that had executive dining rooms, and the kind of clearly defined social strata they implied. But apparently at WorldWired these anachronisms were still accepted as a matter of course.

I fully redeemed myself with Elliot over lunch. He may have been wondering what the hell George had seen in me when he'd turned me over to the first interviewer, but by the time we'd finished our excellent biscotti and espresso, I recog
nized the gleam in his eye as that of a man who had to have me.

Professionally speaking, of course.

And I wasn't wrong. After the last of the three afternoon interviews, Joe Elliot entered the conference room with a slim leather portfolio in his hands and a let's-make-a-deal smile on his face.

We handled the preliminaries fairly quickly. He asked me what I wanted, and I knew full well he'd already figured out what he'd give me. The only trick was to not ask for less. I'd played this game before. Finally, with a resigned grin, he slid the portfolio across the table toward me.

“I don't want you to evaluate this offer now, Becks,” he explained. “I want you to take it home and study it. Give me a call in the next day or so and let me know if it works for you. I think you'll find it's very generous.”

I ran a fingertip lightly over the supple leather that encased my future career. “Thank you, Joe. I will.”

He gave me one last conspiratorial smile. “I don't mind telling you we usually don't act this quickly. But we're all in agreement that you've got just what we've been looking for. We need a shark in this position, Becks. A no-holds-barred, take-no-prisoners winner who's bottom-line all the way and doesn't care if she puts a few backs up as long as she gets the job done. You seem to have all of that. You're a perfect…” He flailed at the last word, but I suspected it might have been “bitch.”

“Fit,” I supplied

He laughed. “See? We're finishing each other's sentences already.”

It couldn't have gone better in my wildest imagination.
And my imagination can get pretty wild. So five minutes later I stepped onto the street with the expectation of a fantastic surge of energy and satisfaction.

And why not? I deserved it. This was everything I'd worked and planned for.