1
MIA
I’M POURING A MUG OF STALE coffee when the door jangles and in strolls my Aunt Rita as if she’s some kind of regular. She takes a seat by the window, elbowing away a plate of half-eaten food that I haven’t had time to clear away yet. Her stare is directed out the grimy window, warding off interest from fellow patrons. That’s a smart move. We’re not her usual Michelin-starred haunt.
“Annie? Take these over to ten. Pretty please?” I slide the cups across the counter to my co-worker and best friend. “Don’t make eye contact with the big guy; focus on his weedy pal.”
Annie nods. I wouldn’t ask for her help if I didn’t need it. Her ability to spot danger is as well-honed as mine—for example, the guy at number ten with snake tattoos all over his neck. He beat another guy’s face to a pulp in the parking lot last week. I hate sending Annie to do my dirty work, but Aunt Rita counts as an emergency.
Wiping grease off my hands onto my apron, I make a beeline to her table.
My aunt looks up, a frown etching deeper grooves between her eyes. She’s grayer since I saw her at Dad’s funeral eighteen months ago, but the steely determination in her eyes hasn’t faded one jot. “I swear to God, Mia.” She shakes her head. “This place.”
“Can I—?” I ask.
“I’m not staying.”
“OK. Um, I…do you have news?” There’s got to be a reason she’s here and it’s sure as hell not the food.
“No beating about the bush with you.” Her mouth twitches into an efficient smile. “As it happens, there is an opening on Aliens in Distress, yes.”
Inside my apron pocket I squeeze my fist. That’s a big upcoming movie. “Whoa. You have no idea,” I reach over to pick up a ketchup-soaked napkin, “what this means to me.”
I gather up the dirty plates, mount side plates on top of those, balance them in one hand and wipe down the plastic table surface with a cloth I pull from my other pocket. Quite a feat given that my hands are trembling.
She eyes my acrobatics warily. “This is the first and last time. One joker card. Understood?”
“Understood, yes, totally. Thank you so much!” As these things go—and believe me these things haven’t gone so much in my life to date—this is an amazing joker card. With Hollywood’s darling, Scarlett Keane, starring in this movie, if I get accepted as a minor role, hell, even as an extra with more than a second’s screen time, this may change my life.
I can’t stop the images flooding my imagination. I’m wearing a sparkling ball gown, being interviewed by the paparazzi on a movie premiere red carpet. “Oh yes, I worked with Scarlett on Aliens in Distress.” Here, I would let a dramatic pause drag out and search the ether for adequate words to do her Scarlettship justice. “She’s just sooo professional and sooo fantastic to work with.” That’s the kind of stuff you have to say, whether true or not.
“Oy,” a voice grinds out from somewhere behind. My fantasy Hollywood carpet scene vaporizes, replaced by the glare of the diner lights. Brutus at number ten is shaking his beefy head at Annie, shouting, “Where’s the blond one?”
Guess he doesn’t like stale coffee.
“I better get over there,” I tell my aunt, dumping the plates back onto her table. “Wait here.”
But she’s maneuvering herself out of her seat, gaze firmly on the door.
“Thank you, thank you so much,” I call after her, helpless, wishing for dear life I could just whip off my apron and join her. Like, forever. But I have to stay here another five hours if I’m going to get my weekly paycheck from Al tonight.
My gaze yo-yos between my aunt exiting through the door and Annie standing by table ten, struggling to negotiate. Crap, this is all my fault. I knew the coffee wasn’t good. I just didn’t think that bozo’s taste buds were developed enough to detect it. He’s going to explode, and it’ll be on my head if he harms Annie.
“I’m texting you,” Aunt Rita mimics through the window now that she’s safely on the other side. Her fingers pretend-tap her phone.
I sag, give her the joined hands sign for gratitude, and dash across to Annie.
“Gentlemen,” I say in dulcet tones, careful to keep my distance. Weedy guy is definitely the type to cop a feel and consider it part of the service.
Annie’s eyelids flicker and she slides past me to deal with her own tables, one of which is getting restless.
“You call this coffee, Blondie?” He’s addressing my boobs, and I actually prefer it that way. I hate looking stupidity directly in the eyes.
I frown at the offending liquid and adopt an expression of horror. “I see what you mean, sir. I swear, Billy’s fired if he doesn’t watch the machine better. Tell you what, I’m gonna personally see to it that he gets fired. Right now. Little creep. He had one job, one job.”
I’m channeling sheer, compressed fury now, and it’s enough to make him look further north and engage in the lost art of eye contact. He actually looks a little worried. Guess my acting skills aren’t too rusty after all.
“I’ll get you two fresh ones.” I gather up both cups and scurry away before he can argue anything, including the fact that Billy is someone I just made up so we could have a common enemy.
Inside the kitchen, Annie’s face is pale, her hands fingering dark strands away from her high forehead. Tears shine in her blue eyes. “God, Mia, I hate this job. I don’t feel secure anymore.”
“End of month, Annie, just keep your thoughts on that. Look…I wasn’t going to say this till we got home, but Aunt Rita said I have a chance to audition for Aliens in Distress.”
Her eyes widen. “What? That was her?” She swings around to look through the porthole window of the kitchen door.
“She’s gone.”
“Come on, what else did she say?” Annie jostles my arm. “Tell me exactly.”
“Let’s find out.” I fish out my phone from my jeans pocket and press to display Aunt Rita’s message. “Three p.m. tomorrow at Palmer Studios. Holy crapola.”
My heart quickens—it all feels real now. After years of nagging my aunt for a chance to audition in one of her movies, or indeed any movie she may have influence on, she’s come through. She managed to fob me off each previous time, saying the commute would be prohibitive, but now she’s run out of excuses. This studio’s in LA, not too far from our apartment. Whether that was a factor in giving in to my pleas I don’t know and I don’t care.
“Palmer Productions? Even I’ve heard of them,” Annie says. “Local...”
“Award winning…” I add.
“Gorgeous CEO!” Annie finishes.
I flash her a grim smile. Jack Palmer’s success and relative youth in a sea of gray means he’s on the corny Entrepreneurs Under Forty lists in trade journals for people who read that sort of thing. His tall, dark, brooding looks and ripped physique also place him high on Movie Glitz’s 100 Sexiest Men list. Let’s just say he’s not hard on the eyes.
If the rags are to be believed, he’s a playboy who’s slept with half the actresses in Hollywood while the other half lines up to meet him, yadda, yadda, yadda. All I care is that he grants my aunt the creative freedom she needs to do her directing magic. By creative freedom. I mean money. She’s always complaining about overbearing producers taking the wind out of her sails. And by that she means money. Last thing I need is for my aunt to get pissed off, so let’s hope he’s not one of these guys with a tight fist on the purse strings.
“I don’t pay you to stand around gossiping.” Al stomps toward us, his overalls streaked with dried blood and what I think (hope) is chocolate sauce. He’s wielding a meat cleaver like he’s looking for any excuse to use it.
“Sorry, Al.” I smile, but it fails to soften him. “OK, OK, we’re going, we’re going.”
I grab the coffees while Annie pulls up plates of tired-looking schnitzel and fries from the service area. Her face has turned mask-like again. This may be the last chance we get to talk until closing.
I’m twenty-one but feel thirty-five as I take orders and slap out substandard food on autopilot to ungrateful people. I guess being a child actress at thirteen accelerated my growing up. When I listen to the bunny rabbit conversations of students who wander into the diner most afternoons I don’t know whether to laugh at their innocence or cry over their preppy enthusiasm.
I ditched school at seventeen because I reckoned the best way to land a job in Hollywood was through experience, even if it just meant running around a set and handing out cups of Joe to famous directors and actors. Turns out, half the acting community had the same idea and were only too happy to offer their services as unpaid slaves, so those jobs were impossible to come by without connections.
Aunt Rita would have been an extremely useful connection, but she didn’t want to acknowledge me. I can only guess that she was horrified at my ditching school. I tried contacting her, of course, but nothing came of that. Then she gave in when Dad died two Christmases ago, saying she’d “be on the lookout” for something for me. Maybe it was just funeral talk. Or maybe she felt a belated responsibility toward her brother’s offspring. Either way, my mom is mad at her for ignoring us for so long. Me, I don’t care as long as this one works out.
***
FOUR HOURS LATER, my chest feels like something, or someone, heavy is sitting on it.
“I can’t do this,” I say, slamming the dishwasher shut. Annie’s resting on a barstool watching me. We’ve swept the diner and wiped all surfaces clean-ish. We’re alone, and in no hurry to get back to the apartment because once this place is emptied of staff and clientele, it’s actually a decent hangout, quiet and well-ventilated, and, best of all, the drinks are free. Al would kill us if he knew we know where the keys to the drinks storage are hidden.
We’re roommates. Annie’s a philosophy student. I’m an aspiring actress. So far, so typical. We live in a loft apartment, which sounds better than the roach-infested dump it actually is—hot in summer, drafty in winter, with genuine ’70s décor and mold patches on the slanted ceilings. Al’s Diner is one of the few restaurants within walking distance of both our apartment and Annie’s university, so we were grateful to get jobs here a year ago. The novelty has worn off big time though.
“What if I screw up? I haven’t acted for ages.”
Annie peers over her nightcap—a tall glass of watermelon and vodka. “Get out of here. You act every day.”
“With customers, sure. But in a movie with a big name? Sci-fi?”
“Not exactly your usual family drama,” she says. “But it’ll stretch you. That’s good.”
My acting “break” came at age thirteen when I was selected out of thirty actresses in East LA Junior Drama acting school for the part of Lola the teenage rebel who adopts a pet monkey that wins over everybody’s hearts, including her estranged father’s. Classic family drama. Even at the time, the storyline made me puke, but I was apparently perfect for the role. It gave me a taste of fame. And it tasted good while it lasted.
“I’m not sure how best to play an alien. Like, do I adopt a weird accent?”
“Or just a British one?”
“Jeez, I wish I had more time to prepare and binge sci-fi on Netflix. Another day would be nice. Not saying I’m not grateful to my aunt, but she sure could have given me more upfront notice.”
“Where’s your confidence? You’ll be fine.” Then Annie lets out a heavy sigh. “Because you have to be, Mia. It’s been too long for you, and without formal qualifications, it can only get harder.”
I flap the dish rag at her. “Don’t you start.”
“Just saying. Either this gig works out or it doesn’t. You need to plan for either eventuality. Now that we’re leaving Al’s, it’s your chance to think ahead, right? Wouldn’t acting school—?”
“Nope,” I cut in over whatever she was about to say. “It wouldn’t. I’m not sitting in school and graduating at twenty-five, sister. I’ll have crow’s feet by then. It’s genetic, on my mother’s side. I can pick up all the experience I need in a job. This here’s my lucky break. I can feel it!”