InHap*pily Ever After (Incidental Happenstance) (15 page)

            Tia smiled
huge, remembering. “Yup, that was me alright.”

            “I understand
there was a big to-do in the British tabloids about that,” he said.

            “There was,
but they got my name wrong, and the pictures were too fuzzy to identify me, so
I was still in the clear.”

            “So I have to
ask, how did the two of you meet? You have to admit, a school teacher and a
rock star are a pretty unlikely match.”

            Dylan looked
at his watch and smiled. “I don’t think there’s enough time left to tell that
story; it could fill a whole show.”

            Tony looked at
his own watch. “You’re right—I’m afraid we are running out of time, which is
too bad, because I’ve got so many more questions!”

            Dylan pulled
Tia close. “I’ll tell you this, Tony. We have a lot of future plans to discuss
because I plan a future with this woman.” The crowd broke into applause. “Right
now, though, I’m just so happy to have her back in my life, and we’re taking it
one day at a time. I’ll keep you posted though.”

            “I’m counting
on it, and expect to see you back here again soon. But on that note, we are out
of time, so until then, I wish you both a little luck and a lot of happiness!”

            He closed the
show, and then the three of them walked down into the audience, shaking hands
and receiving well-wishes from the crowd.

*****

            Ryan and Jace
sat at a table in
Smitty’s Sports Bar
, nursing Fat Tires and glancing
occasionally at the Packers /Vikings game that dominated the huge televisions
spread around the pub. It wasn’t one of their usual hang-outs by any means, but
they were sick of driving and parking only to walk into a place and see a sign
that advertised that they’d be showing the
After Dark
special airing at
8:00. Although Tia’s name wasn’t yet public knowledge, it seemed that enough
folks in town either knew that it would be Tia on the program or that the
mystery woman was a local and had convinced their usual hangouts to air the
show.

            He’d begged
off Lexi’s numerous requests to attend the viewing party at the pub, much to
her chagrin. “It’s a once in a lifetime event, Ryan. How could you not watch
Tia’s television debut?” she’d asked.

            Ryan had
gotten more than his fill of Tia’s “debut” the night before, spending several
hours sitting alone and watching Lexi bask in the limelight cast by her best
friend. He’d spent the whole damn day on the fringes of it all, actually, first
at the club and then at
Paddy’s
. He watched all the country club people
fawning all over Tia, acting like she was suddenly everyone’s best friend even
though most of them had barely spared her a polite hello prior to her
attachment to Dylan Miller.  The last thing he wanted to do was to spend his
Sunday night there, too.

            He and Jace
had met first at the club, but it didn’t take long to determine that they were
setting up for an event. Turned out that they were hosting a viewing party for
the show too, complete with a buffet and full bar. They took one look at each
other and without saying a word, walked out to find a different venue at which
to spend their evening.

            The game was
tied at 10 and the Packers were on the 30 yard line with three minutes to go in
the half when they heard the announcement. “Ladies and Gentleman, if I can have
your attention, please!” one of the servers bellowed. “We’ve just found out
that there’s going to be a special edition of
After Dark
starting in a
few minutes, and that they’re going to announce on the show that Dylan Miller’s
mystery girl is from right here in Chicago! A number of you have asked if we
can tune in, and since some of it’ll be during half time, we’re going to show
it on the televisions in the bar section. We’ll keep the game on in the dining
area, so if you want to move, you should settle up with your server and make
your way—it starts in ten minutes.”

            “Seriously?”
Jace asked incredulously as Ryan just shook his head. He glanced around the
room and saw the African-American woman who’d been at the pub last night—the
school secretary, if he remembered correctly—followed by a little entourage of
teachers from Tia’s school. He and Jace simultaneously picked up their mugs and
drained their beers, grabbing their coats and wordlessly heading for the exit.

*****

            “Hey Fancy
Pants,” the guard said to the woman in the cell. “Got somethin’ here you ought
to see. My cousin in America sent it to me.”

            “Fuck off,”
Penelope said unenthusiastically.

            Madeline
ignored her and set her laptop outside of Penelope’s cell, turned up the
volume, and struck a key. And as much as Penelope didn’t want to look, didn’t
want to know, Dylan was on the screen, and she couldn’t turn away.

            Madeline
watched with interest as Penelope’s facial expressions went from elation to
devastation when the host, a good looking guy named Tony Granger, asked Dylan
Miller; who was absolutely smokin’ hot in Madeline’s opinion; if he had found
the girl he was looking for.

            ““Well…I’m
very happy to say that there is a happy ending in all of this mess, Tony,” the
beautiful man said. “Turns out she never stopped loving me either.”

            For a moment,
silent tears streamed down the prisoner’s face. Then, he said that his woman
was there with him and introduced her, slipping her a juicy kiss right there in
front of the whole world. That’s when the prisoner went off the edge.

            Penelope had
remained stoic during her detention; refusing to speak to anyone unless
absolutely necessary, eating only enough of the absolute shit they tried to
pass off as food to keep her alive, and trying to maintain her dignity in her
less than dignified situation. Once again, she pulled from her Oscar nominated
acting skills to show the peons who ran this place that they couldn’t touch
her—couldn’t break her. Surely, she thought, Dylan would come to his senses at
some point and realize that what she’d done, she’d done for love. They’d shared
too much over the past few months for him to just walk away and leave her. Damn
it, it only took a couple
days
for him to fall for that
bitch
,
and she had so much more to offer than that Tia chick could ever give him.

            But now she
watched them on the screen, unable to turn her head away even though it crushed
something inside her to see them together; her eyes locked on Dylan’s smiling
face as he pulled Tia into his arms…

            “AAARRRUGGGG!”
she screamed, the strangled cry exploding from somewhere deep inside her and
bouncing back and forth off the bare walls of the tiny cell, echoing and
mocking her. Her features contorted and she lost her hold on self-control. She
started flinging things at the wall—magazines, her smelly, flat pillow, the
blanket off the bed. There was precious little in the room to hurl, however,
and none of it crashed, broke, or made her feel even the slightest bit better.
What she wanted to do was to smash the laptop—to watch Tia’s smug and smiling
fucking face disappear in a spider web of broken glass; shattered just like
Penelope was shattered. But the guard had it just maddeningly out of her grasp,
and the fat cunt laughed when she tried desperately to reach it. Instead, she
flashed Penelope an evil grin and leaned over to hit the replay button; Dylan’s
mellow voice now echoing with her own moans. She howled in sadness and broke
into huge racking sobs, pushed her palms against her ears to block it all out
and slid to the floor, defeated.

            She’d kept
hoping that she would wake up from this nightmare, but apparently what she’d
done—little things really—intercepting a few letters, fiddling with a computer
and a phone, selling some slightly doctored  photos—was being blown way out of
proportion. And because she’d been in this godforsaken country there were
charges stacking up on two continents, and they couldn’t even tell her when
she’d be able to go home. Not that she had anything to go back to.

            She’d thought
that if she could explain things to Dylan; just talk to him, he’d understand,
and maybe even forgive her eventually. She kept waiting for him to show up
here, but obviously he’d left at the first opportunity and run straight to
her
and he wasn’t coming back. He’d actually said, on national television,
that he had nothing to say to her. Not ever.

            The
hopelessness of her situation drowned her—if Dylan and that damn teacher were
on national television, it was only a matter of time before her fucking mother
and sister would see how she’d screwed up her life. Again. She could just
picture the bitches and their smug faces with their ‘I told you so’s and their
‘she deserves it’s.’   All hope gone, she curled into fetal position in the
corner of the room, tucked her head in the crook of her elbow, and let the
tears come.

Tia
felt like she’d been tossed around in a tornado by the time they got to the
studio on Tuesday morning; not a good place to be right before a photo shoot
for an international magazine; the name of which she didn’t know and didn’t
really care. She’d been moving so much the past couple days that she was
actually looking forward to sitting in the make-up chair and closing her eyes
for a few minutes.

“Mr.
Miller, Miss Hastings, we’re so happy to be working with you this morning!”
said a heavy-set woman wearing too much eye makeup. A small troupe of others
rushed up to shake their hands as they were swept into the room. There were
several different areas set up with a variety of themes; a garden, a street
scene, a park, and a cozy room with a stone fireplace and a red velvet chaise
lounge.

A
young girl with hoops in her ears, lower lip, and right nostril rushed up to
greet Dylan. “I don’t know if you remember me,” she said, batting her lashes,
“but I worked with you about a year ago on the shoot for ‘Remember Yesterday.’
I did your hair and makeup…”

“Of
course,” Dylan said, flashing his celebrity smile. “You did a great job.”

“Oh,
well, you’re so easy,” she breathed, “not much work needed at all. I’m so
excited to work with you again.”

Tia
rolled her eyes as the woman flirted with her man. Dylan caught her look and
rolled his back.

 “You’re
so lucky,” Sarah, the makeup artist told her as she smeared creams into Tia’s
skin. “He’s just so dreamy…”

“Don’t
I know it,” she answered as Sarah swirled a large makeup brush over her face.
“On both counts.”

“You’ve
got great cheekbones. And I just love the color of your eyes. We can pretty
much go in any direction you want—this is your chance to reinvent yourself. Or,
invent yourself, I guess, since you’re kind of new to the whole celebrity
scene. We can go completely glamorous or…oh! How about 50’s starlet? We can do
an updo, add some lashes…”

“I
don’t think so,” Tia smiled. “That just isn’t me. And if I have to be thrust
into all of this, I at least want to stay true to myself. I’m not really the
glamorous type.”

Sarah
sat in the swivel chair next to her and turned Tia’s to face her. “I totally
respect that, really. So why don’t you tell me a bit about yourself so I can
get it just right. Describe yourself in three words.”

Tia
raised her eyebrows. “Three words?”

“Yup.
The first ones that come to mind that describe you best.”

“Hmmm.
I guess the first one would be “Earthy.” I’m pretty down to earth, and I love
nature…you know, hiking, bird watching, that kind of thing.”

“OK,
what’s next?”

“Honest.
And then…” words bounced around in her head; it was so hard to narrow yourself
down to three adjectives. Finally, she settled on the one that had and would
see her and Dylan through any situation. “Loyal.”

“I
can do that.” Sarah opened a drawer and pulled out some pallets of color.
“Close your eyes and trust me. We can always wash it off and start over if you
hate it, but I’m pretty sure I’ve got you down.”

It
was some time before Sara spun Tia’s chair around to face the mirror. When she
got a look at herself, she sucked in a short gasp. Never in her life had she
had so much product on her face—not even the makeup people for the TV shows
they’d already done spent so much time, but somehow, she still looked natural.
A soft gold shimmered under her eyebrows, and her lids were covered in shades
of green that got progressively darker as they reached her temples. The colors
made her eyes pop, and her newly-shaped brows looked full and natural under a
variety of pencils and powders. Her lashes swept high and dark, and there was
just the slightest emerald green line curving below each eye. Sarah had somehow
managed to make her skin look flawless, and her lips appeared plump and pouty,
with just a touch of color and sparkle. “Wow, you mean I could look like this
every day?” she asked. “I absolutely love it!”

“You
could if you hired me as your personal makeup artist,” Sarah smiled. “It’s
hardly an everyday application process, but if I do say so myself, you look
earthy, honest, and loyal. You two make an adorable couple, by the way.”