The Girl of Sand & Fog (32 page)

I choke out a laugh. “No, you’re wrong. Bobby is
wonderful. I’m the idiot. But it was really sweet that you said that. In case
you haven’t noticed I
am
feeling really bad tonight.”

He nods and makes a pout that’s sort of sexy on
such a ruggedly handsome man. “I know. You don’t hide it very well. In fact,
you’re pretty awful at hiding what you’re thinking and feeling.”

I laugh more comfortably and give him a push. I
drop my face in my hands, clutch my hair, and groan. “God, I have the sorriest
life ever.”

His hands close on my cheeks.

He turns me to look at him.

His thumbs lightly brush my jaw. “You don’t have
a sorry life. You know what you want and you can have it. You know who you love
and you can have them. Don’t you know how fortunate that is? And you are one
amazing girl, Kaley Stanton. You’re going to do great things in life. I know
it.”

He places a light kiss on my lips. It’s friendly
and nothing more. It makes my emotions twirl faster. I feel like a jerk for
always being a pain in the ass to him and even for my
oh so obvious
flirting.

God, what’s wrong with me? By now I should have
figured out a way to stop doing one dumb thing after another.

I cry harder.

He folds me against his chest. “Kaley, I’m never
wrong. Trust me. It’s going to be OK.”

But it’s not. No matter how true Graham Carson
can make that feel by holding me in his powerful arms.

God, I wish I could go back in time.

I wish it were as easy to rewind your life as it
is to rewind a video.

I would never have ruined my mother’s happiness.

I would never have made that hideous, shocking
website and streaming video.

I never would have hurt and humiliated my father.

I never would have been foolish enough to lose
Bobby Rowan—
oh crap, the room is spinning
—and I wouldn’t have drunk so
much tonight. My stomach convulses.

Fuck.

I’m going to be sick.

I try to move.

Too late.

That’s vomit on Graham Carson’s lap.

He scrambles for a wastebasket and holds it
beneath me, keeping the hair off my face. Over and over again my stomach
contents shoot into the can. I can’t stop it. It’s draining. I’m panting.
Tense. Waiting for the next round. Nothing. Is it done? How long have I been
throwing up with Graham holding me? Oh God, how am I ever going to face this
guy again?

He sets the trash aside.

I collapse to lie in a ball with my face against
his thigh.

My breathing is ragged.

His fingers in my hair are gentle.

My lids grow heavy.

“I should go back to my room,” I choke out,
finding it hard to say the words.

He adjusts my body from its fetal position into
something more comfortable for me.

“Sleep, Kaley. Just sleep,” he murmurs. “That’s
what you need now. I’ll figure out in the morning how to smooth this over with
your dad. Don’t worry. I’ll take care of everything. Right now you just rest.”

Graham Carson is such a good guy.

He’d be a wonderful boyfriend, if I wasn’t in
love with Bobby.

Bobby—I close my eyes and drift away…

Part Two

Kaley’s Dream

“Rewind”

CHAPTER 28

It
started as a joke. Just something I worked on one night after learning the last
girl from my sorority clique was getting married. I really didn’t do it out of
spite or resentment. I didn’t even do it because I polished off a full bottle
of Zinfandel that night. It’s just how I fill my evenings when there is nothing
better to do: design a blog page, give it a name—
How to Train Your Fembot
—and
start to post.

Who would have ever thought this page would take
off the way it has in the past six months and who would have thought there were
so many vain guys out there looking to bag a Fembot?

I don’t
really
think of my sorority
sisters as
fembots
, any more than I think of myself as
the token
brunette.
Sure, I was the only brunette in the clique inside my sorority of
rich hotties at USC, but that was totally random and had nothing to do with
this being California.

I don’t really resent them all landing their
super-duper great guys, marching down the aisle into their oh-so-perfect lives.
I had a super-duper great guy. I just didn’t marry him. Oh well, that’s another
story for another day and a different blog. Tonight, I haven’t finished
teaching overachieving men how to achieve their fembot-perfect wife.

Rule #477:
If you want to make the Fembot
crawl to you, figure out who her best friend is, and then flirt her up. As much
as they pride themselves on ‘the sisterhood’ the second the BFF’s back is
turned, she’ll make her move.

My fingers pause and I stare at the screen.

You ought to know rule #477 in spades, Kaley
Stanton.

It’s what got me into my current mess. I’m so
stupid to have fallen for that one, and definitely over a player like Graham
Carson. Graham could write this blog probably better than I do. He made his way
through my sorority sisters with a slick-talking, velvet-encased machete.

Damn. It was a mistake, misplaced female
competitiveness, and it cost me Bobby Rowan. I wonder where Bobby is these
days. Two years. I never expected not to hear from him for two years, despite
the fact that he was very emphatic, in an
oh-so-not Bobby
way, that we
were over after I foolishly confessed to a pointless, drunken one night stand
with Graham, thinking that truth would make it all something I could fix.

I take a hearty sip of my wine. I called that one
wrong. I definitely have no one to blame but myself. And I definitely deserve
to be home alone on a Saturday night writing my pitiful blog post.

I open the drawer in the bedside table and pull
out my secret scrapbook. God, I’ve become like one of those lonely cat-ladies,
one of those girls with secret scrapbooks, bitchy blogs, and dateless weekend
nights.

I start flipping through the pages. As sad as I
feel, the pictures make me smile. There is just something so right about how
Bobby and I look together. I felt it the first day I met him. We were meant to
be, a perfectly imperfect forever kind of couple.

I’ve never been able to imagine myself with
someone else. I’ve loved Bobby Rowan since I was seventeen and, up until two
years ago, he was also my best friend.

I refill my wineglass, put away the scrapbook and
turn on the TV. I’m restless tonight. I should sleep, but there is something
frantic and twitchy running through me. A feeling of lack of completion, of
loss, and of need.

How long does it take to get over a guy? Maybe it
would happen faster if I could find someone interesting and occasionally enjoy
that sex thing again. How long has it been since I’ve gotten laid? I try to
remember. I can’t. That’s how long it’s been.

God, I always miss Bobby the most on nights like
these: alone, blogging, thinking, and drinking.

Ding. I look at my laptop screen. S
hit
. I
forgot to log off, but then again, I never get any chats or comments on this
blog except from my one virtual fan who randomly has been dropping in the last
six weeks. A lot of people read it, the traffic numbers are very good, but no
one wants to admit it by commenting that they visit the site. It’s that kind of
thing.

I click open the chat box. OK, what does my cyber
groupie have to say to me tonight?

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.

I stop tapping the pen. “I would prefer just to
view the latest cut and go straight into the postmortem.”

A flash of irritation shows in Justin’s eyes, but
he doesn’t argue and the lights are quickly turned off and the latest version
of our documentary begins to play. I lean forward in my chair, elbows on the
table, chin in my hands, carefully dissecting it frame by frame almost as if I
can slow it down to edit speed and view it piece by piece. It still doesn’t
feel right. Not even after the latest cut. It’s close, but not quite there.
Damn, this should be finished by now. We need finished projects to start
pulling in dollars.