“I’m not going to lie. I was hurt that you didn’t pick me for the first date.” Alix held their hand over their heart in mock pain.
I put my hand on theirs and lowered my voice, even though I knew the cameras and microphones would pick up every single word I whispered. “I thought the dinner date would be better for us.”
Their eyebrows rose in surprise. “So, I’m not going on the dolphin tour?”
“Unless you want to.”
They held my hands and squeezed. “No. The dinner date sounds fantastic.” They playfully zipped their lips just before another contestant swooped in for some alone time. I got a kiss on the cheek before they left, which made me smile.
Frankie, a professional soccer coach from Kansas City, handed me a flute of champagne. I thanked her and took a sip. I had at least five glasses of it in the backyard that someone had handed me that I sipped and never touched again. I didn’t want to get drunk and wasn’t a fan of champagne.
“How are you tonight?” Frankie asked.
Even though it was a cocktail party, a lot of participants dressed down. I wasn’t the only one suffering from too much sun today. Judging by the tired, disheveled looks from a few of the contestants, getting dressed up with sunburnt skin and a hangover was too much. Frankie was one. Her body heat made me sit back on the love seat. She looked miserable and smelled like vodka. “I feel like I’m doing better than you are.”
She dropped her face into her hands and groaned. “I’m probably the oldest one here, and I know better. I’m around young twenty-somethings every day. I don’t know why I let them get to me.”
It was easy to forgive Frankie because she was so open and real. She didn’t try to feed me a lie or exaggerate today’s events. She was also strong, in shape, and had a crooked smile I knew made women everywhere melt. “What’s your job like? Is the Midwest really into soccer?”
“Kansas City just acquired the team two years ago. We aren’t filling the stands yet, but we’re hopeful.”
“Did you play professionally?” I didn’t know a lot about women’s soccer other than it boomed after the US Women’s team won the World Cup years ago.
“I did, but now I coach.”
It was going to take a lot to pull info out of Frankie. “What do you do for fun when you aren’t coaching?”
“Hang out with my friends. We have bonfires or play games. Sometimes we hang out at the lake.”
“Sounds nice. I do that with my friends, too. My best friend has a boat.”
“How have you enjoyed being on this side of the show?”
Apparently, we were done learning about one another’s likes and dislikes. I took a deep breath and blew it out audibly. “It’s so different. I can’t believe everything that goes into a production.” I reminded myself not to give too much away. I’d signed a nondisclosure agreement, so the information I shared about the show had to be vague. “Everyone has been so supportive and amazing to work with.” Fuck. I’d just said amazing again. The one word I vowed I wouldn’t say on television.
“It has to be hard, too.”
“The hours are different, but I’m not afraid of hard work,” I said.
“You own your own business, right?”
Frankie relaxed in the love seat and rested her head on the cushion. Her eyelids started to droop, and rather than go through the embarrassment of having her fall asleep on me, I excused myself. “I’m being summoned, so we can pick this conversation up tomorrow. Do you think you’d be up for a swim with the dolphins?”
Her eyelids rose for a moment, and a small smile slipped into place. “That sounds like so much fun, but I’ve already had too much sun. I’ll pass.”
I wasn’t sure if she fell asleep right when I turned around, or before. Either way, I wasn’t happy. I pasted on a smile and walked inside, where most of the sparkettes were drinking and having a good time in the ginormous kitchen. “What’s going on in here?”
“Savannah, hi. Come on over here. Alix was just showing us how to make the perfect Manhattan,” Lyanna said.
Alix winked. “Mixology is my true gift to the world. Would you like one?”
I didn’t need more carbs from alcohol. I needed them from bread or pastries, and a tray of cheese and crackers sat on the table. “No, thank you. Keep doing your magic. Pretend I’m not here.”
“Impossible. You’re the prettiest woman in the room.”
All the women agreed, but I felt a current of ruffled feathers at Alix’s assertion. I blushed, but my faint sunburn hopefully hid my color. Nibbling on a cracker, I watched as Alix explained why the brand of vermouth was essential to the perfect drink.
Kaisley sidled up to me. “Looks like you got some sun today.” I knew the least about her. She didn’t race up and drag me away the moment I walked into a room, but I remembered her after our initial meeting. I appreciated her standoffishness, even though the show really pushed for the contestants to fight for time with me or just to be in front of the camera. I wasn’t sure where everyone stood yet except for Madison. She was clearly here for fame, a relationship a distant second. I refocused on Kaisley.
“I did. I’m used to the heat but didn’t use enough sunscreen. Does it look bad?”
She crinkled her nose. “Not bad, but like maybe it hurts. If you need aloe, let me know. I have a tube of it.”
“That’s so sweet. Thank you so much. I’m sure the show has it for everyone.”
Alix interrupted our moment. “In spite of what she said, the first drink goes to Savannah.”
I waved them off. This was too much alcohol. I was too old for this shit.
“Come on. Just a sip. I want to know what you think,” they said.
Peer pressure and cameras all around the room made me succumb. I took the lowball glass and sipped. My reaction was genuine. It was delicious. “It’s excellent. You should make enough for the room.”
Applause erupted, and Alix took a bow.
“Want to get out of here?” I asked Kaisley.
She nodded, and we slipped out onto the patio, away from the loud chatter of the kitchen.
“It’s quieter out here, even if it’s still hot,” she said.
“Remind me where you’re from?” I couldn’t pull up Kaisley’s information sheet in my head.
“Aspen, Colorado.”
“Nice place. So you aren’t familiar with this humidity either. Welcome to a different kind of hell,” I said.
“Dry heat and lots of snow where I live,” she said.
“Does that mean you ski? I like to, even though I haven’t been in years.” I went to Vail one Christmas with my mother and turned out to be a natural. I was a full-grown adult but almost threw a childlike tantrum when it was time to leave.
“Oh, you should come this winter, and I’ll show you the best places to ski. I love it so much.”
“What else do you like to do? You’re fit, so you probably hike every weekend,” I said. She covered her mouth with her hand as she giggled at my compliment.
“Thank you. I love anything outdoors. I like to camp, fish, ski, snowboard. Now that I have a son, I’m limited on what I can do, but he’s actually been on skis already, and he just turned three.”
“Oh, my gosh. That’s so adorable. Is he any good?”
“I mean, he still trips just walking because he’s a toddler, but he’s fearless.”
“What’s his name?” I had it memorized, but too many distractions made my mind blank out. She smiled so hard when she was talking about him, her love for him evident.
“Kaden. He’s my everything. It was hard to leave him to do this show, but I felt like you and I had a lot in common, including relationship goals.” Tears gathered in the corners of her eyes.
The urge to kiss her and dry her tears was strong. She seemed like she was more what I was looking for than the others drinking in the kitchen. We talked for twenty more minutes before Lauren interrupted and told us to head inside. The next date was going to be announced.
“Hi, everyone. How’s the night going?” Lauren asked the contestants.
“Alix made us delicious Manhattans. And we got to spend time with Savannah as a small group,” Kaisley said.
“But did everyone get some one-on-one time?”
Some people nodded, including people I hadn’t seen until just now. Madison, the obnoxious lawyer from the first night, and Thea, the English professor from Boston, had only just appeared. I didn’t give it any thought. I’d had a nice time being part of something that didn’t hang on my every word or action.
At everyone’s nods, Lauren continued. “I’m going to have a chat with Savannah, and then we’ll come back and announce the contestants for the first group date and the lucky one who gets the dinner date. Please excuse us.”
We slipped into the secret info room with headshots and more information on each contestant.
“Do you have an idea of who you want on the dinner date and who you want on the group date?” she asked.
I guess I shouldn’t have told Alix I was picking them for the single date. Oops. I looked at the ten photos on the wall and mentally selected my four. “Yes.”
“Good. I think whoever you choose will have a lot of fun on the group date.”
“You should come with us. Maybe when we’re done, you can sneak into the water and play with them. I’m assuming Sparks has rented the place for the day, right?”
She waved me off. “This isn’t about me. This is about you.”
I shrugged. It was her loss. I imagined every single crew member would love to swim with the dolphins if they had the opportunity. I studied the photos one more time and mentally picked Kaisley, Charlotte, Lyanna, and Ava. Charlotte was a blogger with a daughter, so she and Kaisley would have something to talk about, and Lyanna and Ava had the medical field in common. Not that I was trying to play matchmaker with my own contestants, but it was important to make sure everyone had similarities so they would be friendly when I was off with somebody else. That left Alix for the dinner date and Emma, Frankie, Madison, and Thea for the other group date. In three days, I would start eliminating sparkettes. I didn’t care what Denise said. Madison wasn’t getting my flame.
“I’m ready,” I said.
* * *
The knock on the front door didn’t surprise me, but I was startled. It was almost midnight, and I was just about to retire for the night. I was tired of always having to be aware of how I stood, what I said, who I said it to, how I sat, how my hair looked, and keeping my hands away from my face so I didn’t ruin my makeup. All those little details wound me up tight. By the end of the night, I needed a hot shower to relax me. I was wearing an oversized T-shirt and thin pajama shorts when I opened the door. A part of me knew it was Lauren, but another thought it might be somebody from the crew leaving me the itinerary for tomorrow. That happened sometimes.
“Hi.” I stood to the side and invited her in with a sweep of my hand.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t do dinner. I had another engagement,” she said.
She stood just inside the door, waiting for permission or something. “Come in. Don’t worry about it. I forget your job is more demanding than mine. I just need to show up and either show emotion or not, depending on what they tell me.” Our conversation continued as we walked up the stairs to the only private room in the entire mansion.
“Is it worse than you thought?”
“No. I’m just feeling sorry for myself. It’s different for sure. I hate that I don’t really have anybody to talk to. I miss Jane, my best friend. She would have so much fun here discussing the contestants. Not in a bad way, but in a supportive way.” I didn’t want Jane to come off as snobby or mean, because she wasn’t.
“I will try to make more of an effort,” Lauren said.
I touched her arm. “No. I don’t mean it like that. You aren’t responsible for entertaining me. It’s just hard for me to be idle.” I crawled into bed and propped a pillow behind me so I was at least sitting up.
“But I do consider you a friend, and since you are shielded from the rest of the world, it’s important to have somebody to talk to. Let me be that person.”
Tonight, Lauren was dressed more like me, in shorts and a T-shirt. Her sandals were still fancier than my flip-flops, but these little glimpses of the real her were a treat. “Tell me anything going on in the world. Tell me something important that’s happening out there.” I was used to scrolling on my phone, reading the news or on social media, and being away from it was killing me.
“Someone is setting a lot of churches on fire in the South. Most of the news is still bad, but some good things are happening.” At my nod of encouragement, she continued. I needed good news. “A photo of a canine soldier from World War I wearing dog tags is circulating. More people are signed up as organ donors than ever before. Oh, and we got your beeswax candles, which Denise plans to use. She ordered two hundred and fifty.”
I sat up straighter. “What? How?”
“Denise loved the candles you had delivered. She called Jane. Well, somebody from the show called Jane, and she sent them to us.”
That wiped out our inventory. I did some quick math. At twelve dollars a pop with seven gross-margin dollars per stick, we’d made close to eighteen hundred dollars. “That’s great news.” I was beyond excited.
“And I’m sure once people figure out your store, your fans will buy out your stock. Do you make your own product?” Lauren asked.
I nodded. “Most of our inventory is handmade. We buy some items, but I’m such a stickler that I spend most of my weekends making candles.” She looked as though she felt sorry for me because I worked every day. “I love it though. I’m an olfactory-type person, and I’m doing something I love. I have a whole setup in my garage, so I can knock out about a hundred candles a week. I put them in different-sized mason jars and in some of them press herbs and flower petals into the top of the wax.”
“I love that you’re passionate about it. And everybody loves candles. I checked your website, and you have some really nice things for sale.”
I blushed because Lauren took time to learn more about me, whether she was instructed to or not. “Thanks. I’m pretty proud of my shop. I’d like for it to be more successful, but I know it’ll take time.”
“The show will generate business for sure. Trust me,” she said.
“What about you? What do you do for fun?”
She laughed. Immediately I knew she didn’t have time for anything other than When Sparks Fly. She was everywhere. Sometimes I’d see her in the video village and other times with her head down and chatting with Denise. I never saw her sitting still unless it was time for us to chat on camera. “When you’re not filming. I’m sure this job requires twenty-four seven, three hundred and sixty-five days a year.”
“I get Christmas and New Year’s off.”
My jaw dropped. “That’s it?”
“I’m teasing. It’s not that bad. When we’re not in production, I’m home. I like the beach, and I enjoy reading.”
“Let me guess. Nonfiction, most likely political autobiographies,” I said, certain politics was her niche.
“You’re right. It’s hard to walk away from that part of my life,” she said.
“Why did you?”
“Lots of reasons, but mainly I did it for love.” She leaned back in the chair and sighed. “And it was totally not worth it.”