One To Watch (53 page)

“We love each other. I know we do.”

“Maybe,” she whispered. “But I want more than you can give me.”

The sound guy tugged on Ray’s arm, and he turned to go—watching him leave was awful. Bea took a deep breath, and Alison swooped in for one last touch-up, giving her hair an unnecessary zhuzh.

“You’re doing great,” she whispered. “Keep going.”

Bea nodded, and when the show started back up and Johnny welcomed Sam to the stage, it all felt so much easier.

“Hey, beautiful.” Sam hugged Bea warmly, and seeing him was pure joy, same as always.

“God, I was an idiot to let you go.” She smiled, then turned to the audience. “Wasn’t I? Wasn’t I just the worst to turn him down?”

“YES!” came the resounding cheer from the crowd, and everyone laughed together.

“Why did you, then?” Johnny pressed. “I know for me, and for a lot of the audience, it came as a real shock. You and Sam seemed like a perfect couple.”

“I hope it’s clear to everyone that I think Sam is an absolutely amazing man, and he was nothing but wonderful to me. And in some ways, that’s why I knew we weren’t meant to be together.”

“That sounds a little twisted.” Sam made a face at Bea.

“Ha, I know, my mother would be screaming about my tendency to self-sabotage, but that’s not what I mean. It’s more that—there was something not quite real about our relationship. We had a great rapport, great chemistry, but we never really argued or had any conflict, and I think that’s because we never connected at that serious a level. So for me, at the end of the show, the question was what would happen if we took away the fantasy of
Main Squeeze,
all the travel and limos and hot-air balloons.”

“To be real clear, I could have lived without the hot-air balloons.”

Bea laughed. “See? Dating Sam, that seemed like a perfect fantasy. But in the end, I finally had to be honest with myself that we weren’t right for each other in reality. I couldn’t shake the idea that I was helping Sam on his journey to meet his future wife, but that that person wasn’t me.”

“Sam, do you agree with that assessment?”

“You know, I’m not going to lie, I was hurt when Bea turned me down. She’s the first woman I ever really loved, and that’s going to stick with me a long time. But ultimately, I do think she made the right decision for both of us, and I know we both care for each other and wish each other the best.”

“Do you think you’re ready to search for love again?” Johnny raised an eyebrow.

“You know what?” Sam grinned. “I think I just might be.”

“On that note, I hear you have some news, is that right, Sam?”

“For the first time in history,” he hammed, his voice low and dramatic, “your next Main Squeeze is going to have a mustache.”

The crowd cheered, and Bea hugged Sam—she couldn’t have imagined a better pick for the next Main Squeeze
.

“You know I’m gonna be coming to you for advice,” he said to Bea.

“Anytime!” she effused, praying silently that this didn’t mean she’d have to be on the show again next season.

“And I want to say one thing publicly, while I have the chance,” he went on after the applause had died down. “I think it’s great that Bea broke some new ground on this show, and I know I’m doing the same thing by being the first Black man to be the Main Squeeze. But I don’t want us to go backward on body diversity—I want the women I meet to represent a range of sizes, and I’m going to be really upset if the producers don’t come through for me on that.”

Predictably, the audience lost their minds at this, clapping and cheering. It was a great moment, and Bea was happy to end the night on a high note—but Johnny told her they still had one more segment to film after Sam left the stage.

“Bea,” he said, “I’m sorry if this is tough, but I have to ask: Are you disappointed you didn’t find love on your journey?”

“Definitely.” Bea nodded. “It took me a long time to believe—truly believe—that it was even possible for me to find a lasting relationship on a show like this one, so of course I’m disappointed things didn’t turn out the way I pictured. But you know, in a way, what happened was even better.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“If you had come to me the week before we started filming and told me that Ray was going to leave his fiancée for me, I would have cried for joy. I would have run to him so fast—and it would have been a terrible decision.”

“So your happy ending is getting over your feelings for Ray?”

“That’s part of it.” Bea considered. “But it’s more than that. I’ve told myself for so many years that I’m afraid of men rejecting me for the way I look, of them refusing to look past my size. But I was wrong—I don’t need a man to look past my size. I need someone who’ll see me and love me exactly as I am. For all its flaws, this show made me believe that that’s possible.”

“You’re not the only one who thinks so,” Johnny said. “We talked earlier about the people who weren’t so nice about you being on this show. But I hear you also received a lot of support from the plus-size community?”

“Yes!” Bea chirped. “That’s been one of the best parts of this whole experience. So many women and girls have shared their stories with me, have told me about all these acts of bravery they’ve been inspired to take in their own lives.”

“Any favorites?”

“Oh gosh.” Bea grinned, thinking back on all the terrific letters. “One girl told me that she was nervous to put her name in to be considered for prom court, but then she saw me on TV.”

“And did she become prom queen?”

“No. She decided to run for class president instead.”

The audience broke out in a thunderous ovation, and Bea beamed.

“Well,” Johnny said, “we have a surprise for you, Bea.”

“Uh-oh,” Bea’s response was involuntary, and the audience laughed good-naturedly.

“As you know, a lot of these letters came to us at
Main Squeeze,
and we passed them on to you. We loved the letters as much as you did, and we wanted to celebrate the women who wrote them. Can we get the lights up on the studio audience?”

On Johnny’s cue, the lighting in the studio changed dramatically: The hot lights on the stage dimmed, the house lights came up, and for the first time, Bea was actually able to see the audience.

Every single woman in the crowd was plus-size. And they were rising to their feet to applaud.

“What? What is this?” Bea grabbed Johnny’s hand, and to her great surprise, he held it tightly, keeping her steady as the tears streamed down her face.

“Every member of the audience is a woman who wrote to you, Bea,” Johnny explained. “We thought you deserved a chance to meet, live and in person, some of the many people who see themselves in you.”

“I can’t believe I finally liked a twist on
Main Squeeze,
” Bea blurted, and everyone laughed and cheered some more.

“I hope you won’t mind, but we have just one more.” Johnny guided Bea back to the couch as the studio lights returned to normal. “I’m guessing you noticed that one man from your
Main Squeeze
journey hasn’t made an appearance tonight?”

Bea’s pulse sped up—was he here after all? She looked wildly toward the stage door, thinking of how good it would feel to hold him, to tell him that, after all of this, he was the only one she wanted.

“I’m sorry to tell you that Asher declined our invitation to be here.”

“Oh.” Bea’s voice caught in her throat, and she couldn’t say anything more.

“But we do have a surprise guest—a certain celebrity who’s made it quite public that he’s interested in making your acquaintance. From the new film
Lieutenant Luxembourg: Blast from the Past,
please welcome Chris Evans!”

As a movie star made his way to the stage to give her a friendly hug hello, Bea swallowed her hurt over Asher and tried to stay in the moment, to marvel at the absurdity of her life. To think that less than a year ago, she was lying in bed, counting the days until Ray would be visiting for the Fourth of July, and now here she was, on live television, exchanging niceties with a Hollywood superhero because some publicist or executive had thought it would help sell movie tickets.

Or maybe, Bea stopped to remind herself, he actually was interested in dating her. As she gazed into his dreamy blue eyes, she couldn’t rule it out completely.

Three thousand miles away, in a cozy rental house utterly buried in mess and half-packed moving boxes, Gwen and Linus sat rapt in front of the TV.

“Dad!” Linus screamed. “Will you please come in here for one minute?? It’s IMPORTANT.”

Asher rushed in from the kitchen, packing tape still in hand.

“What is it, buddy? Is everything okay?”

“We need you to see something,” Gwen said matter-of-factly, but when Asher saw whose face was on the TV, he turned quickly on his heel.

“Come on, guys, we’ve been through this. No
Main Squeeze
stuff, okay?”

“But Dad, they ASKED her about you,” Linus emphasized. “She was so, so sad you weren’t there.”

“I’m sure you’re exaggerating,” Asher clipped. But looking at the screen, he noted that Bea did seem upset, even as she chatted with a handsome man Asher vaguely recognized as a popular film actor.

“Linus isn’t exaggerating,” Gwen responded. “No one in history has been that disappointed to see Chris Evans.”

“I don’t know,” Asher mumbled, but Linus broke in.

“Dad, it’s not even debatable. She
loves
you!” He leapt off the couch, wearing a bright-red T-shirt he’d fastidiously bedazzled with fringe and sparkles.

“Guys, give me a break,” Asher pleaded. “It’s complicated.”

Gwen turned off the television and gave her father a knowing stare. “You’re the one who told us to be open-minded about how much Bea could change our lives for the better, even if it felt scary. Did that advice only apply when it felt scary to us? Are you too afraid to take a risk in order to be happy?”

“Why are you so invested in this?” Asher asked, sinking onto the couch. “Aren’t we happy already, just the three of us?”

Linus climbed onto the couch and curled up beside his father.

“But Dad, you’re not happy. You haven’t been happy since you came home.”

“That’s not true,” Asher protested, his voice breaking ever so slightly. “Being with you two makes me happy every day.”

Gwen sat down on Asher’s other side. “Dad, come on. It’s obvious how much you miss her.”

Asher appraised his daughter. “You’re a little terrifying, you know that?”

“Just promise us you’ll think about it, okay?” Gwen pressed.

“I promise,” Asher said. “But for now, I’m tired of thinking—and packing. You guys want to watch a movie?”

“It’s my turn to pick!” Linus jumped up. “Can we watch
Bringing Up Baby
?”

“Dad said we can’t watch that anymore,” Gwen chided.

Asher paused for a moment. “I think it might be okay tonight.”

Gwen opened her mouth to say more—but then thought better of it and grabbed the remote instead.

“Can we make microwave popcorn?” she asked.

“I’m on it.” Asher got up to grab a bag. Once he was out of earshot, Gwen grabbed Linus to whisper in his ear.

“It’s gonna happen,” she said.

Linus’s eyes got wide. “What is?”

Just like her father, Gwen’s lips twitched into a barely perceptible grin.

“Everything we wanted.”

Once the reunion show was done, Bea was really and truly finished with her responsibilities for
Main Squeeze
—sure, there were a couple of interviews left to give, and she’d have to appear on a red carpet from time to time, but for all intents and purposes, it was time to go back to her real life, and she was absolutely thrilled. A few days after the reunion show, Bea realized she had an entire day with nothing on her calendar, so she decided to treat herself to an L.A. day of fun. She put on a breezy Mary Katrantzou sundress in a Technicolor mess of floral patterns and drove around aimlessly in Kermit the Car—top down, breeze in her hair, Taylor Swift turned all the way up.

Before she really realized where she was driving, she found herself heading west on Wilshire, and after a few minutes, the rows of LACMA lanterns came into view.