He sounds sincere, but I’m not sure if that’s a good idea. People are staring. I can feel the weight of their gazes without even turning around, and that means they’re looking blatantly. It has to be the dress, I decide. The fire-engine red is just begging to be noticed.
And all the attention is making me slightly dizzy. Or maybe it’s the alcohol. I haven’t had dinner yet because I was planning to eat after I finished video number six. David wraps an arm around my waist. I almost pull away in surprise, then catch myself. We’re role-playing here.
“Relax,” he whispers into my ear.
“Okay.”
His hold tightens. Maybe he can sense that I might do something embarrassing. Like puke.
Or maybe he’s trying to play the proper boyfriend? I’m supposed to be the love of his life, remember?
True. But how would such a woman behave around David? Is he supposed to be the love of my life for the evening, too? He never told me what his role is. I’m not sure if it’s a good idea to just assume.
He really should’ve just hired an actress. I would’ve screened some for him, no problem. Or maybe Charlotte was supposed to be the one for him, but got busy in the meantime.
I turn to ask how exactly he expects us to play our roles, but we’re accosted by some people who want to chat with David. Given that we’ve only been in L.A. for a year, I’m shocked at how many people he seems to know. They ask how he’s doing, then chat about his parents and his grandmother. David makes introductions each time. I have no trouble remembering all the names. It’s a skill I had to master growing up as a mayor’s daughter. Dad would take me to social functions and have me mingle when Mom wasn’t feeling well. And it was up to me to remember everyone I met and charm them. And by “charm them,” Dad meant make them feel sorry for me because Mom was struggling with her challenges and Dad was doing double duty to raise me right. He said voter sympathy mattered—the difference between a win and loss.
I just wish it didn’t have to come at the price of me being displayed like some pathetic loser.
The memory brings me down, and I forcibly shake myself out of the funk. David isn’t bring me here to score pity points. He doesn’t need that in his dealings.
“You’re good at this,” David says, surprise in his eyes.
“I’m a quick learner,” I joke, not wanting him to know the truth of my childhood. It’s too humiliating.
I take a small breath when it looks like we’ve said hello to everyone. But maybe I relaxed too fast. A black-haired woman is approaching us with the intensity of a starving hyena. It makes me clench with a kind of dreadful anticipation.
Unlike me, she is in a tight black dress that shows off a long, voluptuous body with the kind of breasts even the most discerning Hollywood plastic surgeon would admire. She stops in front of me and gives me a squinting, head-to-toe once-over with the thoroughness of a bargain-hunting penny pincher examining merchandise at a yard sale. I wonder again if there’s something on my face. But maybe she just lost her contacts.
“This is your date?” she demands.
“Yes,” David says in a saccharine tone. “Erin, this is Shelly. Shelly, Erin.”
Understanding finally dawns on me. This woman must be the reason I’m here instead of watching the training videos. There’s just too much meanness in his voice for it to be anything else.
Normally I’d hate being used to hurt somebody, but I don’t like the way she studied me or her tone of voice. Not to mention, given how generally nice David’s been over the last two years, he must have a very good reason for doing this.
“Hi, pleased to meet you,” I say, just to be polite.
I might as well have said nothing. Her cheeks turn red as she continues to glare at David. “Are you serious?”
Still not a glance in my direction despite the blood-red sequins on my dress glittering under the chandeliers. She’s probably color-blind.
She adds, “Blondes aren’t your type.”
Rude people aren’t his type, either.
“People change,” David says easily. “I changed.”
“She’s too short and…and skinny!” She finally gives me another look, but it’s full of nauseated revulsion, like she’s in the presence of a farting cow.
I look at David, not sure how he wants me to play this. “I could dye my hair…”
“Don’t,” David says with the sweetest, most adoring smile I’ve ever seen on a man’s face. “I love your hair. Now cut it out, Shelly.” David pulls me closer in a gesture designed to comfort and shield me. I know it’s fake, but I like it. A lot.
Get a grip, Erin. This is just a scene in a play.
“She’s perfect just the way she is,” he adds. “You can’t see it because you’re too shallow.”