L. A. Candy (5 page)

At 6:05 on Tuesday night, Jane pulled out of the parking lot, away from Fiona Chen events. She had survived another day…barely.

She had accidentally hung up on three more people (she couldn’t quite get the handle of the Call Waiting and Hold and Forward buttons), ordered the wrong kind of sandwich for Fiona, and almost spilled iced tea on a $100,000 wedding dress. (A hundred grand? For a dress that would only be worn once?) The bride—a famous Danish lingerie model named Petra—had been so upset that her therapist, acupuncturist,
and
psychic all had to be called in for emergency sessions.

Jane made a right onto Sunset and adjusted her shades. She drove past a row of trendy-looking sidewalk cafés, where pretty people were drinking pretty cocktails, laughing, and having fun. She wished she was one of those people right now.

She reminded herself that it would get better—it
had
to. She’d figure out the phones, she’d figure out Fiona…. By next week she’d think it was hilarious that she kept calling Fiona’s favorite color specialist Max instead of Mav (she’d assumed Mav was a typo on the call sheet). Well, if Fiona didn’t fire her before next week.

Up ahead, the early-evening sky was thick with smog; it was murky and gray, and it reflected Jane’s mood perfectly. For the first time since moving to L.A., Jane felt troubled, uncertain. She had put off college and left the comforts of her home and family back in Santa Barbara to work for Fiona Chen. If Fiona fired her, what would she do?

Jane drove a few more blocks, wondering if she was going in the right direction. Wasn’t the apartment this way? Or was it the other way? She reminded herself yet again to ask her parents for a GPS for Christmas (although that would leave a lot of months to still get lost). She slowed down at a stop sign and reached into her bag for her cell phone, to call Scarlett for directions. Despite living in L.A. for just over a week, Scarlett could direct a city tour.

As Jane waited for Scarlett to pick up, a guy crossed in front of her. He looked familiar. Jane took off her shades so she could see him better. It couldn’t be…

“Braden?” Jane said loudly.

“Janie, are you lost again?” Scarlett’s voice demanded. Jane forgot that she had her phone pressed to her ear.

“Call you back, Scar,” she said quickly as she dropped the phone into her lap, thinking about luck or fate or
whatever had brought her to this random intersection.

The guy kept going. Jane stuck her head out the window. “Braden!” she yelled at him.

He stopped in the middle of the street and turned around. It was definitely Braden. He looked at her for a second before he recognized her. “Hey! Jane!” he called out. He looked pleasantly surprised to see her.

“What are you doing?” Jane shouted.

“Just had my audition!” Braden shouted back. “I think I totally sucked!”

The car behind Jane honked. “You hungry?” she blurted out, before she’d had a chance to think.

Braden smiled and nodded. “Go left! I’ll meet you around the corner!”

Jane smiled back. But even as she was smiling, her mind was spinning and racing.
Jane, what are you doing? He has a girlfriend. Don’t be that kind of girl!

“So I had to read this scene where my character mind-melds with an alien species that’s part cyborg, part poodle. I thought I’d play it funny, you know? Because really, there’s something pretty funny about a human mind-melding with a poodle from outer space,” Braden said.

“Definitely,” Jane said, nodding. She noticed that Braden’s eyes looked more green than hazel today. Or was it the lighting?

After she had parked her car and given Braden a super-casual hug (she hadn’t noticed the other night that he
smelled really yummy, like the beach), he had taken her across the street to Cabo Cantina, which he said was one of his favorite hangouts in L.A. It was a really loud, colorful place with brightly painted chipped walls. (It was basically Fiona Chen’s version of hell.) It reminded Jane of actual restaurants she’d gone to in Cabo during spring break. It also struck her as the exact opposite of the Hollywood glamour scene. To her surprise, she liked it. Or was it because she was there with Braden?

“But I guess funny wasn’t what they were looking for, because the director just stared at me like I was completely out of my mind,” Braden went on. “I don’t think I’ll be getting a callback.”

“No, no. You have to think that you
will
get a callback,” Jane told him, suddenly animated. “It’s called positive visualization. It’s like in that book
The Secret.
Scar and I do it all the time. Actually, I do it, and Scar just pretends to do it while silently mocking me.” She grinned.

Braden grinned too. “It’s cool how close you guys are. How long have you known each other?”

“We’ve been friends forever. We grew up together,” Jane replied. “We’re total opposites, which is why we’re so close, I guess. I know that probably doesn’t make any sense,” she added apologetically.

“No, no, it does!” Braden said. “I grew up with my best friend, too. Jesse. It’s that same thing. He and I are totally different. He’s really into the whole Hollywood
scene and that’s never been my thing. We went to school together, at Crossroads.”

“Where’s that?”

“Santa Monica. When we were growing up he practically lived at my house. He loved it there because my family’s so…I don’t know, loud. Really close. Normal, most of the time. His parents weren’t around that much.”

“I know what you mean. Scar says she likes hanging out at my house because my parents aren’t freaks, like hers.”

“What are your not-freak parents like?”

“My parents are great,” Jane said affectionately. “They’ve always been supportive of me and my two sisters. They’ve been married for almost twenty-five years, and they still love each other, which is amazing. We still catch them making out and stuff.” She blushed. “I’m sorry…TMI.”

Braden smiled. “Not at all. That’s sweet. That’s what I want someday. You know, to be married forever to someone I’m madly in love with.”

“Yeah. It’s just so rare these days,” Jane said softly, wondering how the conversation had turned to marriage.

She took a long sip of her frozen margarita, keeping her eyes focused on the glass so she wouldn’t do something dumb, like lean over and start making out with Braden right then and there. He was such a great guy. She hadn’t met anyone she felt a connection with since…well, since Caleb, and in a way not even him, because although he
was insanely hot and awesome, she had always sensed a distance with him. True, he was the first (and so far, only) guy who told her that he loved her. And true, they had lost their virginity to each other—something she had held out on doing for exactly six months, one week, and three days from when they first met. But despite their emotional and physical connection—their
passion
—Jane felt deep down that there was something ultimately aloof and untouchable about Caleb. The fact that, when it came time for him to decide on a college, he had chosen Yale over Stanford kind of proved her theory. With Stanford, they could have continued seeing each other, every weekend. But with Yale…Jane had hoped they could stay together and visit each other during vacations and holidays, and he had agreed initially. She was just always so happy to see him when he came home. It wasn’t perfect, but they loved each other, and Jane was willing to deal with the distance. Sadly, Caleb wasn’t. During his last visit he had told her that it would be better if they didn’t “tie each other down like that,” as though being in love was some sort of noose or trap. Or had he found someone else at Yale? Jane had always wondered.

“Jane? You still there?” Braden’s voice broke into her thoughts.

Jane glanced up from her drink. Braden’s hazel-green eyes were staring into hers.

“Still here,” Jane said quickly. “I, um, just remembered
that I forgot to eat breakfast. And lunch. It was kind of a hectic day.”

“What? You’re kidding. Hey, Sarah!” Braden raised his voice and signaled to the waitress. “Can you bring us some chips and salsa? And a couple of menus?”

“I’m fine,” Jane insisted, although her stomach
did
feel funny, and the tequila was making her head kind of spinny.

“No, you’re not fine, crazy. You have to eat something now, before you wither away into one of those celery-sticks-and-bottled-water girls, which you’re totally not,” Braden said firmly. “And I mean that as a compliment. What do you feel like having?”

“Hmm. I dunno. What’s good? I’ll try anything!” Jane said.
God, that sounded slutty,
she thought.

She remembered that her hair was a total mess, and she must have looked so tired. She reached up and began trying to smooth down the loose strands that had escaped her hair clip. She licked her lips and glanced around, wondering where the ladies’ room might be.

Braden watched her in amusement. “You look fine,” he said, as if knowing exactly what was going through her mind.

“Thanks,” Jane said, blushing again. Why did Braden make her feel like this? What was she? Ten?

“So. What kept you so busy today? You start your new job?”

“Day two,” she said, and then regaled him with tales
from her first days at her first real job.

Braden smiled sympathetically. “Listen,” he said when she had finished. “Don’t stress. It’s early days. I’m sure you’ll be awesome at this job. And if for some reason it doesn’t work out, then it wasn’t meant to be, and you’ll just have to be awesome at something else.”

“Well, I don’t know about that…but thanks,” Jane said.

Braden reached across the table and grabbed her hands. “No, no. You have to
think
that you’re going to have a really happy, successful career doing whatever. It’s called positive visualization.” He grinned.

Jane laughed and pulled her hands away. She didn’t want him to feel how hot they were from her being nervous. “You’re mocking me right after I tell you I had a bad day. Braden, you’re not a very nice person.”

“I’m most definitely not mocking you,” Braden reassured her.

A moment passed, and Jane realized that she was still smiling and staring at him. She looked down at her phone and pretended to check a message. It was funny. She felt so anxious around him and he just seemed so comfortable with himself, like nothing fazed him. The waitress brought a red woven basket of chips and two dog-eared menus. Braden thanked her and handed one to Jane. She was about to tell him about meeting Trevor Lord the night before when someone’s phone beeped. It beeped again.

“Jane? I think that’s you,” Braden said.

“What? Oh!”

Jane glanced at the screen. It was a text from Scarlett.

HELLO? DID U 4GET ABOUT ME? It said.

“It’s Scar,” Jane told Braden. She typed: NO. IM @ SOME RESTRAUNT W/BRADEN.

WHAT!!?? Scarlett’s reply read.

“How is she?” Braden asked her.

Probably freaking out and wondering what the hell I’m doing with you,
Jane thought. “She’s fine.”

WILLOW THERE? Scarlett asked.

Oh, right. Willow. Jane had forgotten about her for a few minutes. On the other hand, Braden hadn’t brought up her name. Not once. What did that mean? That Willow wasn’t his girlfriend after all?

NO, she typed.

B CAREFUL, WOMAN, Scarlett responded a few seconds later.

“What’s she saying?” he asked, leaning forward and playfully pretending to sneak a peek at her phone. Jane glanced up and smiled uncertainly at Braden, pulling her phone closer to her. She knew Scarlett was right. She wished she could ask him about Willow—girlfriend or not? He wouldn’t have taken her to one of his favorite places if he had a girlfriend, right? He’d have said, “Nice running into you,” and kept walking. Then again, maybe she was being presumptuous and he really had no interest in her at all, aside from being “just friends.” Or maybe he was just hungry. She had no idea.

“Not much.” And then, because what did she have to lose really, she added, “Did I tell you she’s got this weird theory about actors? She says actors are professional liars.” Maybe she’d subtly get him to fess up about Willow.

“Well, it’s a good thing I’m an awful actor then,” Braden joked. Then his expression turned somber. “Seriously, though. I really am an awful liar. In fact, I can’t stand liars. That’s why I can’t stand Hollywood. I wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for…” He paused.

Jane leaned forward, waiting for him to finish. Her phone beeped with another text from Scarlett, but she ignored it. “What? If it wasn’t for what?” Willow?

Braden shook his head and drank some beer. “Ya know, my acting and stuff. Come on, let’s order. I’m hungry.”

Jane took another sip of her margarita and studied him. She could tell that wasn’t his original response. Guess he wasn’t lying about being a bad actor.

Scarlett held out the U.S.C. campus map. Where the hell was she, anyway? Day three and she still couldn’t find anything. She looked around. Rows of trees. A fountain. A building called Olin Hall. A lot of geeky-looking guys with pocket protectors. Some of them—actually,
most
of them—were staring at her with undisguised lust, as though the closest they’d ever come to a girl like her was on the Internet, alone in their rooms, late at night.

Ah, this must be the engineering quad. How did she end up here?

Scarlett saw from the map that this area was called Archimedes Plaza—named after the ancient Greek mathematician. She remembered from some book that Archimedes had invented elaborate war machines, like the “heat ray,” which supposedly reflected sunlight off a bunch of mirrors and burned enemy ships. That was kind of awesome, in Scarlett’s opinion.

In another life, she could have imagined herself as a brilliant, bad-ass mathematician like Archimedes. But in this life…

Scarlett glanced down at her schedule, peeking out from behind the map. She knew that her parents really, really wanted her to be pre-med. Her mother, who thought she was such a clever shrink, liked to do that “reverse psychology” crap and would say things like, “Scarlett, sweetheart, it’s probably best if you do something
other
than medicine, so you can have your own identity,” which loosely translated as: “Your father and I both went into medicine, so you should, too” (if you could call charging $400 an hour for telling patients not to be so hard on themselves, or vacuuming fat out of people’s stomachs because they’d been brainwashed into thinking they weren’t thin enough, “medicine”). Scarlett knew that they were secretly waiting and hoping for her to sign up for courses like neurobiology and general physiology. Well, no, thank you.

She was perfectly happy with her English and philosophy classes. It had been hard to pick just a few from the catalog. Modern Philosophy and the Meaning of Life. Introduction to Contemporary East Asian Film and Culture. Women Writers in Europe and America. Sex Similarities and Differences: A Multidisciplinary Approach. (That would be an easy class—most men are assholes, and most women are assholes, too, except with makeup?) She had to take some freshmen intro classes though, so
while she couldn’t have all these courses now, she was determined to sign up for them at some point over the next four years. Or however long she lasted at U.S.C.

Not that she would flunk out or anything. On the contrary, she wondered if she had done the right thing, coming here. Maybe she should have aimed higher, like an Ivy? Transferring was always on option. But then she and Jane wouldn’t be able to live together. Scarlett knew that she wasn’t an easy person to be close to. Jane was the only one who’d put up with her bullshit over the years and stuck around—no, not just stuck around, but been the most loyal friend imaginable. She didn’t trust anyone else like she trusted Jane.

Just then, a voice interrupted her.

“Hi, there! Are you new here?”

Scarlett glanced up. A girl flashing two rows of perfect white teeth stood in front of her. She was tall and thin, with bleached blond hair and a pair of large, spray-tanned breasts practically popping out of her maroon U.S.C. tank. (Daddy issues, Scarlett concluded. Girls like her didn’t get enough love from their daddies growing up, so they end up desperate for male attention. Girls like her would’ve fallen all over someone like Trevor Lord. Oops, was she starting to sound like Mom the shrink?) “Guilty as charged,” Scarlett said.

“Hey, I’m Cammy! Welcome to U.S.C.!”

“Hi, Cammy! I’m Scarlett! Thanks for the welcome!” Scarlett’s super-fake smile faded quickly, and she turned to go. Cammy would get the hint.

“Wait! I was just wondering, Charlotte—are you planning to rush?”

Scarlett frowned. “Scarlett. Umm, should I? I don’t think Introduction to Contemporary East Asian Film and Culture is going to fill up before I get there.”

Cammy giggled. “Ha-ha, good one! Next week is rush week! You should totally think about joining Pi Delta! Not to bid promise or anything.”

Pi Delta?
Scarlett thought.
A sorority? Seriously?

“Pi Delt is awesome!” Cammy went on. “Rush week rocks, too! There’s Unity Day, and there’s Spirit Day, and there’s Pride Day! We totally don’t dirty rush but all the hottest girls join ours and you’re really pretty.”

Scarlett was well versed in sororities. She had seen
Animal House
about twenty-nine times on cable. She had also heard the “hazing” horror stories, in which new sorority sisters—“pledges”—were allegedly subjected to humiliating and sometimes dangerous rituals.

Cammy was going on and on about something called the “Greek Gala.”

“I don’t think sororities are my thing, Cammy,” Scarlett interrupted her. “Didn’t I read about you guys in the papers? Don’t you make pledges stand in a cold room buck-naked, while you circle their cellulite with Magic Markers?”

Cammy gasped. Her mouth dropped open. “That is
so
not true!” she exclaimed. “Those are just horrible
lies spread by jealous people who want to destroy us and everything we stand for!”

“If you say so. Thanks for inviting me, though! See you around campus!”

Scarlett suppressed a laugh as she hoisted her backpack on her shoulders and took off in the opposite direction. “Bitch!” she heard Cammy muttering after her. Whatever.

Scarlett turned left and headed toward what she thought might be the center of campus. As she walked, she passed racks of art posters for sale (Picasso’s
The Lovers
, Van Gogh’s
Starry Night
, and all the rest of the usual museum clichés to warm up those depressing little dorm rooms); a bronze statue of a Trojan warrior, nicknamed “Tommy Trojan,” that reminded her of the mascot for the condom ads (maybe she
would
fit in here); maroon and gold U.S.C. banners; handpainted signs inviting her to join the Dancing Club, the SoCalVoCals, the Turkish Students’ Association, or the Student Senate. She also passed people who were presumably her new classmates. A frightening number of them looked just like Cammy. What was the appeal, anyway? Why did they all want to be the same cookie-cutter, dyed-blond, plump-lipped, big-boobed, spray-tanned Barbie doll? Wasn’t variety supposed to be the spice of life? To be fair, not everyone looked like that. Still, the Cammy clones were definitely not hard to spot.

Scarlett wondered once again if she had made the right choice in coming to U.S.C. Would she really fit in here?

On the other hand, would she really fit in anywhere?