Take Two (29 page)

“Do I really have to do this today?”

“Yes. You’ve rescheduled
twice
and we’re
already
here so get out
. Now.”

I stepped outside the car and a multitude of people
screamed
: “I love you!” “Kiss me!” “Sign mine!” “Marry me!”

I signed a couple of book
s
and posters, and made my way inside Barnes and Noble.

A man dressed in a pinstriped suit met me at the door and led me upstairs. As we walked, fans scre
amed and pointed, camera flashes
went off continuously.

“You can go ahead and have a seat, Mr. Sterling,” he said. “What we’re going to do first is the Q&A session with the
fans.
We have the pre-approved question bowl so—”

“There’s no need for that today,” I sat down. “Just let them ask whatever they want.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.”

The fans always came up with the best questions. They were the ones who read all my magazine intervi
ews, watched and re-watched
my movies, so it seemed unfair to always restrict them to the same questions over and over. Of course, sometime
s
I regretted the unrestricted format: A woman once asked me
, on live TV,
how big my dick was and if I’d be interested in letting her “give [me] the best pleasure of [my] life
.”

“Mr. Sterling,” Joan handed me a bottle of water. “After the Q&A session, you’ll move to the book signing downstairs for three hours.”

“Three hours, Joan? What happened to just one?”

“You canceled two
weeks in a row to hang out with your girlfriend,” she smirked. “You have to make it up to your fans somehow.”

“I hate you, Joan.”

“I love you too,” she gave the thumbs up to a woman dressed in white.

“Ladies and gentlemen! Ladies and gentlemen!” the woman spoke loudly into the microphone. “We need everyone to adjust their voices back down to bookstore level so we can begin our special event for the day.”

Within minutes, the fans became quiet. Only the shuttering of cameras could be heard.

“Thank you very much,” she
smiled. “My name is Natalie Williams and I am the general manager of Barnes and Noble. My staff and I are very happy to welcome Hollywood actor, Matt Sterling—”

The fans screamed.

She yelled over them. “To our store! We are going to do a short Q&A session first and then Mr. Sterling will be signing copies of his first book,
Destined for the Screen
! We have five mi
cs
throughout our space so if he calls on you, wait for one of my s
taff members to bring you a mic
so we can all hear the question! Let’s get started!”

The fans screamed again and the manager handed me her microphone. I waited for her go ahead signal and picked out a woman in the front row.

“Before I ask my question,” she was shaking. “I want you to know that I am your number one fan. I’ve seen all your movies and I tape everything you do on TV. I just wanted to ask you…Can I have a hug?”

I laughed and stood up. “Of course.”

She jumped up and screamed. She
ran
past security
, up on
to
the small stage
,
and leapt
into my arms. I hugged her and gave her a kiss on the cheek.
I picked
a fan
in the rear
next.

“Hi Matt!” she waved.

“Hel
lo sweet
heart,” I waved back.

“I hope I’m not getting too personal, but do you think that Selena
Ross
is the love of your life?”

Fuck
no!

I went into safe mode. “
I’m marrying her, so I hope so.”

The fans laughed. None of their remaining questions were that bad. Only two of them were about Selena. The others were about my thoughts on current movies, my habits, and my body.

I signed books for the next five hours. My
conscience
wouldn’t let me get up after three—at le
ast a hundred fans told me
th
ey were upset about my past
cancellations.

I slumped
across the back seat. “
I am s
o tired, Joan.”

“Would you like an energy bar?”

“Why would I need an energy bar?”

“
You have a two hour dance lesson in thirty minutes. That’s the only reason I stopped the signing.”

“The
store was closing
.”

She shrugged and handed me a Nutri-Grain bar. “I had y
our change of clothes sent over
.”

“I know how to dance already. Is this a school promo or something?”

Joan shook her head and sighed. “You and your fiancé are taking dance lessons together for your reception. We went over this last month, last week, and this morning. The OWN network will be there to tape it.”

I sat on the floor and
tried not to roll
my eyes when
Selena entered the studio. Her baby bump was significantly bigger and all the OWN producers were taking turns touching it.

She stooped down next to me and kissed me on the lips. She was kissing me passionately, like we were actually in love. I bit her tongue.

She jumped back. “Good to see you too.”

“Okay love birds,” the studio manager snapped her fingers. “Let’s get started with something different! Today we will be fine tuning the fox trot!”

I pulled Selena up and positioned her arms in place. The
manager
gave a brief demonstration and turned on the music. Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York” began to play.

All of a sudden, I was happy. I was gentle with
Selena, helping her with every misstep, praising her whenever she did a sequence correctly.

The dance instructor played the song again and again, interrupting every now and then to perfect our spacing.

“Okay now this time,” she clapped as the
song came to an end, “
I won’t interrupt. I’ll just let you two go at it and I’ll comment at the end. Okay?”

“We’re ready,” Selena looked into my eyes.

Frank
Sinatra’s voice filled the room and she followed my lead. I pretended she was Melody as I added extra steps—lifting her up, dipping her, and twirling her around. As the song approached the bridge, I clos
ed my eyes and pulled her close
. The next thing I felt were her lips on mine.

The song came to an end and the producers clapped
. I opened my eyes and
drew back from the kiss.

“My fiancé and I
need to talk privately everyone,” Selena said.
“
Could we get five minutes?”

The
OWN staff
left their cameras on the floor and followed the dance instructor out of
the room
. Selena
pulled me into an adjacent studio
.

“
I
need to talk to you
about something important
,”
she
looked down at the floor.

“Why
?”

“Could you for once be civil with me?
You were just
kissing
me for Christ’s sake.
”

“
I didn’t mean to.
What do you want?”

“
OWN wants to capture the birth of our child.”

“
Seeing as we don’t have a child, just tell them no. Is that all?”

“Do you really hate me, Matt?”

“No.
I don’t hate you Selena,
I just—I’m not very happy about your threats to ruin my career.”

“
It wa
s the only way I could get you
to go through with the wedding.”

“So that makes it okay? Right.”

“No, it’s not alright,” she grabbed my hands. “I’m sorry.”

“I mean, it’s bad enough I signed that stupid TV contract, but I can’t believe you went and attached everything else to this. When were you going to tell me that you got a book deal to write about our relationship?”

“I was going to text you that later
. How’d you find out?”

“Are you serious? How did I find out? The woman who will stop at nothing to get her name in the news is asking me how I found out? How ironic!”

“Calm down, Matt,” she pleaded. “
I said I was sorry and I had every intention of telling you this week.”

“Is that all you have to say to me? I need to get some sleep.”

“Can we start over?”

“What?”

“Can we start over? I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately, a lot of reminiscing and…I want us to be like we used to be.”

I couldn’t move. I was speechless. Utterly speechless.

She hesitantly reached up and touched my face
.
“I miss the days when you used to show up to my shoots with flowers because you wanted to—back when we weren’t caught up in the fame…After the wedding, we can both just disappear and start over and go back to whatever we used to be…Can we do that?”

She stood on her toes and kissed me on the cheek. Memories of our past flashed through my mind: We were kayaking on the Hudson River
. We
were struggling to paddle properly, flipping our kayak over. We were having a picnic on a rooftop, throwing bread crumbs for the pigeons. W
e were biking across the city, smiling behind our shades as the paparazzi gave chase. But then we were just existing—talking about ways to remain in the press, scheduling our lives around their cameras. We weren’t having fun anymore, all the
excitement
was gone. It
was staged and pre-meditated
, never natural or spontaneous.

I felt her kissing me and broke away. “No. We can’t do that.
We don’t belong together
.”

“Will you at least help me come up with a way to get rid of the baby? Will you confirm I miscarried on our honeymoon?”

“Goodbye
Selena.”

I didn’t call Melody beforehand. I just showed up to her apartment.
I banged on her door, not caring if it
scared
the neighbors
.

“Hey! Stop that!” a
n
unfamiliar voice cried. I stepped back to make sure I was knocking on the right apartment.

The door swung open and a Melody look-alike—only with blond
e
hair, stared back at me.

“Mel!” she ushered me into the
apartment. “It’s your
boyfriend
!”

I laughed. “I take it you’re her sister, Jen? It’s nice to finally meet you in person.”

“Nice to meet you too,
Matt Sterling
. I was just leaving so—”

“You and your sister are both bad liars. Am I interrupting something?”

“Not really. I was just stopping by to catch up. We were making margaritas. You want one?”

“Sure,” I followed her into the kitchen. “Did you use a juice mixer or did you make the juice yourself?”

“Ha!” she handed me a drink. “I used a juice mixer.
We Carter sisters don’t do the cooking thing. Besides, I’m sure they taste the same.”

“I’
ll have to make them
one day to prove you wrong.”

“Who was that at the—” Melody stepped into the kitchen
wearing a
stunning
white wedding dress. Her eyes met mine.

I need to randomly show up more often…

“I um…” she turned away from me. “I um…”

“I can
so
feel the tension in here,” Jen tossed back her drink. “Call me tomorrow Mel. Matt, I’m holding you to what you said. I n
ever forget a free drink
.”

She gave Melody a hug and left the kitchen. I could hear the front door close as she walked out.

Melody didn’t look up again. She nervously bit her lip and tottered back and forth. I put down my drink and walked over.

I
held
her
face
and forced her to look at me. “Are you okay?”

She shook her head and began to cry. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were coming over today.”