JULIAN STOOD IN FRONT OF HIS BEDROOM MIRROR AND loosened the knot in his tie. For some reason it felt too tight. It kept pressing on his Adam’s apple. He would’ve left the tie off, but he didn’t like to go into studio meetings without one. Everyone took him more seriously with it on.
He drove to Coffee Plus Food to get a drink before his trip down to Fox. While in line, he caught a girl’s eye. It pleased him to catch it. He was glad he’d worn his good tie. She was in front of him, long-haired and slim, though not too slim. The Timberland boots made her appear taller than she actually was. She wore a denim mini skirt and a sheer blue blouse. He liked the backs of her slender legs and the roundness of her hips. Her waist was tiny. She turned around, glanced at him. He affected a neutral face and stared intently at the specials board.
“So what’s good,” she said.
“The buns are pretty good,” he said. “The morning buns, I mean.”
She faced front. A few moments later, she turned around again.
She had a soft voice and a large shy smile. She wore feather earrings, thick black mascara, red lip gloss. She was a glowing bohemian rhapsody.
“So, what else is good?” she said, looking up at him.
* * *
@survivalchick21 1:32 p.m.
What a difference a day makes. I am watching a completely mismatched man and woman fall in love before my very eyes at a coffee joint on Melrose and Gower. When my day began, it sucked. And now it doesn’t.
#CoffeePlusFood
#love
@survivalchick21 1:33 p.m.
He is an immaculately groomed Mr. Arms with deep-set eyes and designer stubble in a custom-made suit. She is a hippie chick in a tiny skirt. The only hippie thing about him is his wavy hair, down to his neck, slicked back behind his ears and partly tied in a hot little bun.
@survivalchick21 1:35 p.m.
He is prim and she is improper. He is tightly wound and she is all flowy.
@survivalchick21 1:36 p.m.
I don’t know how they started talking. I wasn’t paying attention. I think she started it. He doesn’t seem like the forward type. He doesn’t need to be, does he.
@survivalchick21 1:38 p.m.
Suddenly she’s telling him she’s an actress and used to work at some joint on Coney Island, and on and on. I don’t know what he does. She won’t let him get a word in.
@survivalchick21 1:41 p.m.
Next thing I know they’re off about boxing, and he’s staring at her like he can’t believe the words pouring out of her.
#dying
@survivalchick21 1:44 p.m.
Every syllable out of her mouth he receives as a gift. She doesn’t even see it, she’s so worried as soon as she stops talking, he’ll lose interest. She talks, and he grunts mostly yes. When she smiles, he instantly smiles back like they’re the same star reflecting in one mirror.
@survivalchick21 1:47 p.m.
I thought they just met, but I heard her say O my God I know you! They gape at each other like Meredith and Christina on #GreysAnatomy. You’re my person!
#prayingforlinetogoslower
@survivalchick21 1:49 p.m.
He took off his tie and stuffed it in his pocket. Like he couldn’t breathe!
@survivalchick21 1:50 p.m.
She tells him 49 is her magic number. He says he never cared for it himself, plus it’s rather high. His is 7. She smiles and says that’s rather low. She asks if 7 has any special significance and he TURNS RED! But recovers in time to smile and say no.
#!!!!!!!!!!
#RIPme
@survivalchick21 1:54 p.m.
I can’t. She just asked him to give her a ride, and they left together. Am I allowed to follow them to find out how it turns out?
#restrainingorderanyone?
@survivalchick21 11:30 p.m.
I can’t stop thinking about them. It’s a cynical world out there, I know, but I’m telling you, it happened in front of me. This morning I was flatlining, and this afternoon everything had changed.
* * *
She kept turning around and staring at him. He kept smiling politely.
“Sorry, but didn’t you come to my play a few weeks ago?” she asked.
“I don’t think so.”
“New York? Cherry Lane Theatre?” Theatrically she spread out her arms and said in a British accent, “I’m dead then. Good.”
“Definitely not. Sorry.” The British accent stirred him up a bit.
“Huh. I could’ve sworn it was you.”
“Wasn’t me.” She had a breathy soprano that sounded oddly familiar. Yet he had never heard such a combination of sexy and innocent in a woman’s voice.
“You sat in the third row between your date and your friend. You were all pretty wrecked by the end. I don’t blame you. I was excellent, if I do say so myself.”
“I’m sure. But it wasn’t me.”
“The Invention of Love? I played A.E. Housman. I was Nicole Kidman’s understudy. Love is ice in the hands of children.”
“Sounds good, but I haven’t been to New York in years.”
“Incredible.”
It sure was. A squinting Julian studied the specials board again. He had that specials board memorized.
She faced front for barely a second. “I just had an audition for a Mountain Dew commercial,” she said, turning around.
“Oh, yeah?”
“I was also in Six Characters in Search of an Author. I was one of the six characters. And I was in Top Girls.”
“Were you one of the top girls?”
“How did you know? Actually, I wasn’t, so—ha. I was one of the second-tier girls. You’re not a producer by any chance, are you?” She appraised his suit. “Maybe I could audition for you.”
He demurred. “The kind of producer I am you don’t want to audition for.”
“Why?” She batted her eyes. “Are you in . . . naughty films?”
“No.” He lowered his gaze, took a step back. “I sponsor and train some fighters at a gym near here.”
“Oh my God, really? I love boxing!”
“You do?” He tried to remain impassive.
“Oh, sure.” She put up her fists. “Hey, can you train me, too?”
It was hard to stay impassive. “I don’t train girls, sorry.”
“Why not? That’s sexist. Girls can fight.”
“They sure can. I just can’t train them. I’d be like, don’t get hit, duck, move away, run.”
“So maybe somebody should train you to be a trainer of girls.”
“Yeah. Maybe.”
She kept looking him up and down, reviewing the shine on his shoes, the cut of his jacket. She roamed his face, from his forehead to his chin, peered into his eyes, studied his full mouth, his twice-busted nose, stared at his Adam’s apple above the open top button of his shirt. He had taken the tie off. He had to. “This is how you dress for fight training?”
“No, suit is for a meeting,” he said. “The boxing’s usually first thing.”
“What kind of meeting? I didn’t know there was a gym around here.”
“Freddie Roach’s place, just up on Vine.”
“Yeah, I know it. The Chiquis Taco food truck in the parking lot is pretty good.”
“I prefer the Han Tai Vietnamese truck next to it.”
“Oh yeah? I’ve never had Vietnamese food.” She waited.
“Oh yeah?” Was she expecting him to say something else, like invite her out? “You should try it. It’s very good.”
“I bet. Did you know I used to run the Gotham Girls Roller Derby rink?”
“I don’t think I knew that, no. But it doesn’t surprise me.”
“I did. On Coney Island. That’s me, I’m a Gotham Girl. I bet I roller blade better than you box.” She smiled.
“I bet I roller blade better than you box, too.” He smiled.
She laughed and edged half a foot closer. “Have you ever been to Coney Island?”
He stayed put. “I haven’t, no.” There was nowhere for him to go; the small place was packed.
“It’s awesome. We have a boxing gym there, too. Plus a Ferris wheel and amusements. We have fortune-tellers and a kiss me quick promenade”—she grinned—“and we had Sideshows by the Seashore where I used to work with my dad. I was the emcee, an amazing emcee, by the way, I was a carnival performer, did a little of everything, including juggling knives while riding a unicycle.”
“That sounds pretty great.”
“Oh, it was incredible. But we closed unfortunately. Coney Island still has a world-famous roller coaster, the Cyclone, and a boardwalk, and the best pizza joint in the entire world.”
“Thank you.” He couldn’t help smiling. “I know what Coney Island is.”
“Oh!” She almost blushed, but quickly regrouped. “So what do you do, Mr. Boxing Guy? Do you just train others, or do you box yourself? Oh, you box, too, really? Maybe I can come to one of your fights. What do you mean, not professionally? But you used to? Wow. Were you any good? You were? Why’d you quit? Oh no!—that sounds terrible. Head injuries are the worst. No, I never had one myself, knock wood”—she rapped on her own head—“but I knew a guy who dived into the shallow end of the pool, and he was never the same after. Mind you, he probably wasn’t all there to begin with, to dive into the shallow end. I really do like boxing, you know. I’m not just saying that.”
“Why would I think you were just saying that?”
“Like to try to impress you or something.”
“Why would I think you were trying to impress me?” He twinkled at her.
She twinkled back at him. “I used to follow this blog online,” she said. “Then I got busy, I don’t know if I mentioned it, but I’m in both film and theatre . . .”
“Yes, you mentioned it.”
“Well, I have no spare time is what I’m saying. But I found time to follow this dude’s blog. He was a former boxer, like you, but he was also a Mr. Know-it-All, and he ran an awesome boxing-slash-survival-slash-life hacks-slash-lonely hearts website.”
There was a pause. “The lonely hearts part wasn’t intentional,” he said. “Everyone kept asking all kinds of personal questions, even though it was supposed to be just life hacks.”
“Oh, you know the blog, too?”
“I do,” said Julian. “It’s mine.”
“No, the guy was an actual boxer, plus he also knew a ton of survival stuff. Not that I needed it, but it was so much fun to read.”
“I’m that guy.”
There was a second or two of processing silence. “Shut up—you’re not Julian Cruz!”
“Um . . .”
Her smile, wide before, became Hawaii-wide. She stuck out her hand. “Well, well, Mr. Julian Cruz, we meet at last. I’m Mia. Actually, Mirabelle, but most of my friends call me Mia. But you can call me Mirabelle or Mia, or whatever you want.”
Her soft slender hand remained in his. Julian let go first. That didn’t happen. The girl was usually the one to pull away.
“What’s your stage name?” he said. “I’ll look you up on IMDb.”
“You’re going to look me up, are you?” Irrepressibly grinning.
Now he was at a loss for words.
“I’m kidding. It’s Mirabelle McKenzie.”
“That’s a good name.”
“I like it. For a while I wanted to change it to Josephine Collins. I saw it written out in an old diary and liked the ring of it, and how it looked on the page. It sounded so historical and posh, like British aristocracy, Josephine Collins, a Shakespearean star of film and stage! But my mother said she would kill me.”
“Mirabelle McKenzie is better.”
“I told my mom if she kept making me mad I’d change it to Mystique McKenzie. Moms was not amused. She doesn’t even know who Mystique is.”
“Do you?”
“Oh, yeah, baby.” She clicked her tongue. “I know everything. I’m like Miss Know-it-All. You said the morning bun?” It was her turn at the counter. “What else?”
“The sausage rolls are good. Australians run this place. They know their coffee and sausage rolls.”
“So you come here a lot?”
“Yes, semi-regularly.”
“Like around lunchtime?”
“Uh, no, different times. Depending on the day.”
She ordered, paid, and barely waited for him to order his own coffee before resuming. “I have an audition coming up for a London play,” she said. As if London and Australia were interchangeable. “The director is flying in all the way from London, casting for a revival of Medea at the Riverside Theatre. It’s right on the banks of the Thames. My life’s dream is to live in London and be on stage there, ideally at the Palace Theatre, which is my favorite. Have you heard of it—the play, I mean? Medea, the woman who kills her children to avenge her betrayal. Dress up murder in handsome words, why don’t you.”
“Well, kids can be such a handful,” Julian said dryly. “I hope you get the part. London sounds fun. Though I hear the weather’s not great. Five months of drizzle followed by a day of sun.”
She laughed. “Clearly you’ve been to London.”
“No. Always wanted to go, though.”
“Me, too. Did you know that if you laid all the streets of London end to end, they would reach from New York to L.A.?”
“Yeah, but who’d want to?”
“Well, there’s that. I really hope I get the part. It’d be like a year commitment, though.” She blinked at him, as if inviting him to follow up with . . .
“But what an opportunity,” he said. “And you’ll get used to the rain.”
“How do you know?”
“Because people can get used to anything,” he said.
They waited for their food and drinks in the mobbed place. She got hers first, but wouldn’t leave, kept talking to him.
“Well, best of luck to you,” Julian said, when he got his coffee. “Break a leg.”
She was chewing her lip, her eyes darting up and down.
He turned to walk out.
“Jules, wait!”