HOLLY
Nat didn’t fall asleep until after five. I stayed up with her, and we combined binging on a block of sitcom reruns on Netflix with binging on Tillamook rocky road ice cream and double-chocolate Milanos. Nat poured her guts out about how much it sucks to date a married man and how she couldn’t face going to work Monday with him in the office right next door.
I didn’t have any advice to give because, let’s face it, every woman dating a married man knows what she should do: Dump the bastard. Delete all of his e-mails. Block his number. Block him from your Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat accounts. Etc. But talking to a mistress about leaving her lover is like telling an overweight person how to diet: She knows what she is supposed to do, and she knows how she got herself into this mess. So don’t insult her with advice. Just listen.
So I listened without judgment (and without a cell phone anywhere nearby—that’s key) and sympathetically repeated various forms of “I’m sorry,” “That sucks,” and “He’s an asshole” all night.
Eventually, I watched Nat drift off to sleep on our three-cushion couch. I put a blanket on her, then made myself comfortable on the smaller two-cushion love seat, staying in the living room so she wouldn’t have to sleep alone.
Or maybe I just didn’t want to sleep alone.
While I cannot imagine being so stupid as to date someone who right off the bat presents himself to be a liar and a cheat, I could totally relate to her “not-face-another-day-of-work” problem.
I know it’s only Friday night (Saturday morning. Eek!), but I’m already dreading Sunday night.
When I have an acting job to go to the next day, my nights before are great. I get to read about another person and can immerse myself completely into a character, forgetting about my own life completely and just flying around fantasyland.
But when I know I have auditions on a Monday, the Sunday night dread borders on pathological. It’s a dread that swims around so deep inside of me that I used to need pills to drown it out.
That dread doesn’t exist the night before my “day job,” which is delightfully mind numbing and a welcome break from my real job. I’m a waitress at a trendy restaurant in Hollywood. When I’m at that job, people are nice to me. I give them food and booze, so in general they’re happy to see me. Rarely does someone take one look at me, say “Thank you for coming in,” then wait for the next server to approach the table. (Notice that I’m saying “rarely” and not “never”? Hollywood people can be weird.)
So I usually don’t mind that job. The one I really can’t face is on Monday morning. My eight o’clock audition is for a two-scene role as a snooty receptionist. Absolutely nothing wrong with the gig—at least it’s not diapers. But I didn’t get into acting just so that I could practice saying, “And you are?” seventeen different ways, then rehearse various reactions for my character to have when the TV show’s protagonist tells me that my boss is wanted for questioning. A reaction that I can get wrong, by the way. Some casting directors will want my receptionist visibly surprised, others cold and stone faced. Trouble is, I never know who wants what. My job is to guess, and I won’t know what the wrong answer is until I drive to Century City Monday morning to find out.
I get myself so worked up some nights trying to guess what they’ll want, and reading the sides so many times, that I end up looking over at the window to see the sun is coming up.
Speaking of sunrise … damn it. This is not the first time I have stayed up all night for no reason. Since getting off my meds, I seem to be making insomnia a habit (or a new addiction, but I can’t think about that right now).
Well, as long as I’m up, might as well watch my favorite show.
A little after six, I hear my new favorite sound coming from outside: the front door gently closing next door. I pull back my curtain ever so slightly to peek through the window and check out my neighbor, who wears jogging shorts to reveal his perfectly toned legs.
He is ridiculously beautiful. He has to be an actor. Probably a former model who won the genetic lottery and spent his late teens and early twenties traveling the world, getting paid a fortune to get his picture taken so girls like me could dream that such men really do exist in nature.
Then, when he decided he was too old for the runways of Paris and getting thousands of dollars per day to have his image snapped on the beaches of Fiji (note that I said he decided—the world did not decide for him), he moved on to auditioning and quickly became a spokesman for a men’s cologne, complementing that day job with roles in TV shows where the female lead gets to date him, even if she’s not nearly as attractive, because his character loves her for her goofy personality and sparkling wit. And sometimes he plays the good cop or secret agent in action movies, since he’s in such great physical shape.
The fact that I’ve never seen my neighbor on TV or in films is beside the point. In my mind, no one who looks like that goes on to be a health insurance administrator. He’s 6’3” (I’m 5’8”, so tall is important to me), with natural blonde hair, clear green eyes, and a body you want to bring to Vegas and hide in a suite with all weekend. What else could he possibly do besides model and …
Ohhhh … Looking at him stretch. Me want.
My mind revs up, and I begin lambasting myself for being too scared to introduce myself. The guy moved in almost three months ago, and I still have not so much as said hi to him. I don’t even know his first name. I checked his last name on the mailbox: Erikson. Wonder if he’s any relation to Erik Erikson, the famous psychologist who coined the term “identity crisis.” He’s the only really famous Erikson I found on Google.
Not that I would Google stalk my neighbor. That would be creepy. I prefer to think of it as Google research. I also discovered that he’s not on IMDb, so maybe he still models full time.
I should go out there right now and say hi.
Or quickly change into my running clothes and be outside before he’s done stretching.
We could jog together! There’s an idea!
I quickly run to my room, throw on my cutest black yoga pants and matching top, lace up my sneakers, and head out.
But by the time I get out there, he’s already gone.
Rats.
I drag myself back into the house, shoulders slumped, and fall onto the love seat. I should get some sleep anyway. My future conquest’s first impression of me should not be half asleep, with unwashed hair and bags under my eyes.
Still … rats.
I pull on some covers, close my eyes, and let the daydream of hugging him wash over me and carry me to sleep.