Perspiration trickled between Gina’s breasts. Her damp hair was matted to her head, and she could feel a heat rash rising on the back of her neck. The Honda’s air-conditioning was usually fairly adequate. But this was not a usual day. The announcer on all-news WGST was predicting the temperature would rise to 102, and there was a brown alert for smog. Since leaving the farmers market she’d managed to inch her way toward the studio at an average speed of twenty miles an hour.
When her cell phone rang, she bit her lip. She knew, without looking, who the caller would be.
“Gina? Where the hell are you?” Scott’s voice held a note of high-pitched panic. “The crew’s sitting around with their thumbs up their asses waiting on you. We should be taping right now.”
“I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “I’ve been stuck in traffic. There was a problem with pumpkins that I won’t get into, and then I had to go to three different Krogers to find turkeys.”
“Just get here, okay?” Scott said, cutting her off. “How much longer?”
She glanced at her watch, then up again, at the endless line of stalled traffic on all sides of her.
“I honestly don’t know,” she said. “I can’t see anything in front of me. If traffic starts moving, I could be there in maybe ten minutes. Or not,” she added lamely.
“Hurry,” Scott urged. “I can’t even get the prep girls started until you get here with the pumpkins and the turkeys.”
She wanted to tell him that wasn’t her fault. She wanted to tell him somebody else should be responsible for doing the shopping and delivering the food to the set. Instead she bit her lip again. If she got The Cooking Channel slot…No. When she got the slot, there would be a designated prep person to do the grocery shopping. But until then…at least the frozen turkeys would be fully thawed by the time she got to the studio.
“I’m doing the best I can,” was what she said finally.
She clicked the phone off and turned up the volume on the radio. The WGST traffic reporter announced that the three-car pileup that was blocking all northbound lanes on I-75 was being cleared. She sighed with relief and started rummaging in her tote bag for a mirror. She dreaded seeing just how bad she must look.
Just then, the traffic miraculously began to move. She jammed the baseball cap back onto her head, and got the Honda up to speed again. Ten minutes later, she was zipping into the parking lot at the studio, backing into the space nearest the door.
It was after three. Scott would be beside himself. She gathered up the clothing for the day’s shoot, and raced for the door. Once inside, she ran to the makeup room.
“I’m here!” she told D’John, who was sitting in the makeup chair, reading a copy of Cosmopolitan magazine. “Just let me get the food unloaded and take a quick shower. Can you let Scott know I’m here?”
“Girl!” D’John said, taking in her melted appearance. “What have you been doin’ to yourself? You look like somethin’ got run over by a MARTA bus.”
“Don’t mess with me, D’John,” she said tersely. “I am not having a good day.”
“I can see that,” he muttered. He put the magazine down and began laying out the brushes and bottles and pots and potions for the task ahead of him. “Gonna take some work to get you looking right.”
There was no time for a snappy answer. In the hallway near the back door to the studio she found the purloined Winn-Dixie shopping cart they used to move props and food and pushed it through the double doors and into the parking lot.
A cherry red vintage pickup truck was wedged tightly into the space beside hers, its rear fender millimeters from the Honda’s. The truck’s owner stood behind it, glaring at her.
“Hi,” she said briefly.
“Hi,” said the stony-faced Tate Moody.
She raised an eyebrow. “Problem?”
“You’re taking up two spaces,” he informed her. “And this one is mine.”
He was, unfortunately, correct. In her haste, she’d parked the Honda at a crazy angle that did, indeed, mean that the rear of her car was protruding a good eight inches into the space next to hers.
“Sorry,” she said, brushing past him. “I’ll have to move it later. I’m in kind of a hurry right now.”
She popped the trunk of her car and began carefully transferring the supplies into the grocery cart. The cartons of produce from Boyette’s nearly filled the cart. She frowned. There was no time for two trips. She managed to wedge the soggy Kroger turkeys on top of the produce boxes, but she had to take all the canned goods out of the bags and fit them in and around the turkeys.
Tate Moody hadn’t moved. He watched as she balanced the beer box holding Rachel Boyette’s painted pumpkin precariously atop the pyramid of cans.
“That ain’t gonna work,” he said.
Before she could respond, two cans of pumpkin spilled out of the cart and rolled, slowly, under her car.
“Told you,” he said, not bothering to suppress his satisfaction.
“Dang,” she muttered. She flopped down to her knees, inching forward on her elbows to try to retrieve the cans.
“Nice ass,” Moody commented.
“Shut up, butthead,” she said, reaching for the first can, which was still rolling. Now another can spilled from the cart.
“Dang,” she repeated, watching it roll under Moody’s pickup. “How ’bout giving me a hand, here?”
She heard, rather than saw, his laconic applause.
“Butthead.”
He sighed dramatically and lunged for the errant can, catching the rear wheel of the grocery cart with the heel of his boat shoe.
Slowly, the cart began rolling away. He grabbed for its handles, but before he could stop it, the cart rammed the rear of a gleaming black Mercedes. From its spot atop the peak of groceries, the painted pumpkin bounced from the cart’s summit and rolled slowly across the asphalt into the path of an oncoming UPS delivery truck.
The loud grind of the truck’s brakes brought Gina crawling, quick-time, out from under the Honda, a can clutched in each hand.
“What happened?” she asked, looking wildly around.
Tate rolled the grocery cart away from the Mercedes, one protective hand atop the turkeys, in the direction of the UPS van. The driver was out now, staring down at the truck’s front tires.
“What the hell is that?” the driver demanded. “Was that a cat?”
“It was a pumpkin,” Tate said.
“My pumpkin?” Gina trotted across the burning asphalt. She looked from Tate to the driver to the pumpkin, or what was left of it. Orange pulp oozed out from under the van’s tires.
“My pumpkin,” she moaned.
“At least it wasn’t a cat,” the driver said, wiping his face with the tail of his brown shirt. “You can’t believe the paperwork when you hit somebody’s cat. Now, a coon, or a possum, you can keep on going, but a cat—”
“Hey!” Gina cried. “That was my pumpkin! The only pumpkin in Atlanta. I was going to make a pie with that pumpkin. It was the centerpiece of my show.”
“Sorry, ma’am,” the driver said. “I tried to stop. I wasn’t even going that fast. It just came out of nowhere.”
“Forget it,” Gina said dully. She snatched the cart away from Tate, sending another can soaring into the air. But she didn’t stop to pick it up. She marched back to the Honda and slammed the trunk down.
Tate scooped up the can and ran after her. “Hey, Reggie,” he called. “You dropped one.”
She ignored him, pausing only to open the studio doors wide enough to allow the cart to pass. Holding the doors with her hand, she gave the loaded cart an ineffective shove with her hip.
“Hang on,” Tate said, as he reached her side. He grabbed for the doors. “Lemme help with that.”
She froze in her tracks. “Just leave me alone,” she said, through clenched teeth.
The knees of her blue jeans were ripped and streaked. Her shirt was grimy, too, and her hair was sweat-soaked, Peter Pan short. She shot Tate a feral look. He took an involuntary step backward, and then stopped short.
“Wait a minute. Why the attitude? It’s not like I ran over your friggin’ pumpkin. I was only trying to help. Hell, if it hadn’t been for me, all your damn groceries would be out there on that pavement.”
She sighed and pushed a sweaty strand of hair off her forehead. “I’m sorry,” she said finally. “You’re right. I’m hot and frustrated, and I forgot my manners for a minute there.” She smiled prettily. “Thank you so much for saving my turkey. Now, could you please get the heck out of my way? I’ve got a show to tape.”