Fanfare

  I shoved him away as the scent of painful remembrance washed over me. I was too close to the man responsible for a great deal of my suffering. Tears welled as my phone vibrated in my pocket.

  “I don’t have to listen to this. He’s not a moron! You don’t know anything about him, so shut up!”

  “I know enough. The types of people who want that kind of lifestyle are crazy ones. They infect craziness onto those around them, and they’re unfailingly selfish. Their marriages become statistics. I know why he wants you. You’re selfless to a fault. When you love, you give everything,” he stated with the rushed pace of desperation.

  “Because that’s what love is! This is the biggest problem with you, Ryan Sullivan! Love is not supposed to be convenient or easy all the time. Love is all-consuming and irrational.”

  “Only a fool believes that. I don’t want to lose myself to love,” he shot back.

  “Why does it have to be that way? No one’s asking you to lose yourself. This is what’s fucked up about people who intellectualize love and try to repackage it as some new opiate of the masses.”

  “Look, I didn’t come here to fight with you about the perils of co-dependence. In fact, I came to do the exact opposite. Maybe I think love is damaging just as much as it has its merits . . . but it doesn’t matter. I love you. I want you back. Tell me it’s not too late.” He pulled me to him to stare down at my face openly. I tried to wriggle out of his grasp, but he held tightly onto my shoulders.

  “Too late for what? I’m engaged. I love him even if you think he’s crazy and selfish. Incidentally, you couldn’t be more wrong. Before you point the finger at someone you don’t even know, maybe you should take a good long look in the mirror.” I twisted sideways and marched back towards the office building. He shouted after me.

  “You’re lost, Cristina! What are you going to do with your life? Are you going to take Mami with you? You know I’m not being harsh when I say that all those Beverly Hills snobs will think she’s the hired help. Do you want to be responsible for that? I don’t want you to change anything about yourself. Stay here. Be with your family. Be near your friends. Just be with me! I’ll fix everything I broke if it takes me the rest of my life. We can be happy again!”

  I stopped short as the tears cascaded down my face. Spinning around to glare at my first love, I froze at the sight of him rushing towards me to pull me into an embrace.

  “Don’t do this,” he pleaded.

  Even through the bittersweet sensation of hearing him say everything I had dreamed he would say each night I was forced to deal with my pain, I held tightly onto my pride.

  “I didn’t do this. You did.” I shoved him aside and ran as fast as I could into the building.

  My sobs were became audible, so I tore my way into the ladies room and slammed the stall door shut. Tears flowed down my face. All I wanted at that moment was to talk to Tom. I wanted to tell him everything. I wanted him to laugh at the things Ryan said. I wanted him to tell me I wouldn’t be an Orange County housewife. I wanted him to say that my mother would be happy even though her only child lived three thousand miles away from her. Most of all, I wanted him to tell me I would be happy—away from my friends, away from my family . . . away from everything I knew.

  But . . . I couldn’t tell him. I couldn’t bear to hear the pain in his voice when he realized Ryan was back in my life. He would feel betrayed. I pulled out my phone as a moment of weakness washed over me. A voicemail message blinked on the screen. I pressed the keys to listen.

  “Cristina, this is Melissa Nash. I’ve just spoken to Thomas. I want to release a press statement at the end of the news cycle on Friday so we can control the flow of information. Thomas’s publicist will be in touch. ‘No comment’ is about to become the most important phrase in your vocabulary. Against my better inclinations, congratulations are in order. Do yourself a favor and either disconnect your home phone or get an unlisted number. Good luck. You’re going to need it. Hollywood is not for the fainthearted.”

  The phone clattered to the floor as a fresh stream of tears trailed down my cheeks.

  Cartier’s cookie shimmered tauntingly on my hand.

  I was so alone.

  Chapter Twenty

  Last weekend in Paris, British actor Thomas Abramson proposed to his girlfriend Cristina Pereira with a three-carat, emerald cut stone from Cartier. The two have been dating for approximately one year. London born Abramson is twenty-four years old and best known for his starring role in the film Apparition. Pereira is twenty-five years old and originally from Puerto Rico. She is employed by the state of North Carolina as a social worker. No wedding details have been solidified yet, but both the actor and his fiancée respectfully request that any inquiries be directed to Abramson’s publicist, Alan Goefriller.

  For the umpteenth time that evening, my phone screamed for attention from its location of exile under the coffee table. Groaning, I reached for it with wary apprehension, as if it were a clawing cat afflicted with rabies. Please, don’t let it be another “Unknown” number. Sure enough, my caller ID failed to register any digits. I chucked Napoleon back to the Isle of Elba and prayed this anonymous individual gave up more easily than the others had.

  No such luck. The Treo wailed again within mere moments.

  “Hello?” I barked.

  “May I please speak to Cristina . . . Pay-REE-rah?”

  “Peh-ray-rah,” I responded testily. Idiot.

  “Yes, of course. That’s what I meant.”

  “May I ask what this is in regards to?”

  “My name is Candace Porter, and I work for the magazine Box Nine. I just wanted to speak to her for a moment regarding Thomas Abramson.”

  “Speaking,” I sighed.

  “Oh! Great! I don’t mean to bother you.”

  “Right,” I muttered sarcastically. Too late.

  “Haha! First off, congratulations. I was just hoping to interview you for our ‘Honorable Mentions’ section of the next issue—just a quick blurb about where you want to get married or something about your wedding dress. Maybe a tidbit about the proposal? It’s just for our readers.”

  “I’m sorry, but I think you meant to contact Mr. Goefriller. I have nothing to say at this time,” I responded as patiently as possible.

  “Can you just answer one question for us? Our subscribers love Tom, and they would be so excited to learn more about you.”

  “Again, I’m sorry, but . . . no comment.” Give up, please!

  The line disconnected. I pursed my lips together and slid Napoleon under a cushion from the couch.

  “Just turn it off!” Mami exclaimed with frustration.

  “Tom might call,” I responded. “Hana or Gita might need something.”

  “Mira, they’ll understand.”

  “Mami, I need to keep my life as normal as possible. We already had to get rid of our house phone! I don’t know how these people found my cell number, but I swear I will find the individual responsible and glue a phone to their head while I sadistically hit redial for two days straight.”

  “Your life is not going to be normal, mi amor. Do what Thomas said and get another cell phone,” she suggested.

  I huffed through my nose with an expression of obstinacy. “Eventually they’ll stop calling when they realize how boring I am.”

  She shook her head as she exhaled. “It’s been three weeks since the announcement. They haven’t stopped.”

  I didn’t bother responding. She was right.

  After disconnecting the home phone on Melissa’s advice, I held my breath for the entire weekend following her Friday afternoon press release. Since no one bothered me for forty-eight hours straight, I assumed that meant we had successfully eluded the media spotlight. I wasn’t that interesting after all, and I was incredibly grateful for that fact. Unfortunately, the subsequent Monday proved me horribly wrong on both accounts.

  I was forced to leave my cell phone in the car for the afternoon portion of the workday
after dealing with its insolence all morning long. When I retrieved it on my way home from the office, I had missed thirty-seven calls, and the voicemail box was full.

  Tom was not happy about the leak of my personal cell phone number. Honestly, it could have been any number of people, but I did have my suspicions. After the obsessive behavior I exhibited months ago when the grainy pictures of us in the hospital made the blog rounds, I wisely chose to use the internet strictly for email. I really didn’t want to know if Amy in Boise, Idaho thought my hair was fugly at that movie premiere or if my ass was too big to be engaged to a movie star.

  Unfortunately, I couldn’t force my friends to do the same. Hana had placed several indignant phone calls to me when she came across articles depicting Tom Abramson’s fiancée in an unfavorable light. Apparently, some anonymous individuals claiming to possess intimate knowledge were only more than happy to shed “light” onto the fortuitous turn of events that had led me into the arms of one of the most desirable males in the western world. Sure enough, the goldigging famewhore nonsense reared its ugly head . . . again. I had to talk Hana down from her burning soapbox several times, and eventually Gita demanded that Hana stop informing me of all this blogsip crap immediately. Mind pollution at its best.

  Why does anyone even care? I tried hard not to dwell too much on my internal lamentations, but this task had become increasingly more difficult with each passing day.

  It grew late, and after I retrieved the wailing banshee, I went upstairs with the intention of packing for my trip to L.A. the following day. Inexplicably, a shade loomed over this sojourn, and I couldn’t stop this foreboding from overshadowing my excitement. Some shit was about to go down, and I wasn’t sure what caused me to feel this way. I hoped there wasn’t too much truth to the phenomenon of self-fulfilling prophecies.

  My phone rang again as I closed my overstuffed suitcase half an hour later.

  “Hey!” I said with a tired smile.

  “Hey! Are you all set for tomorrow?” Hana replied.

  “More or less.”

  “Are you guys planning on doing anything wedding related this weekend?” she asked over-brightly.

  “No. I don’t think there’s a pressing sense of urgency on either side, and the more I think about it, the more I’d like to do something small in a foreign country.”

  “Destination wedding! Awesome!” There was a note of false enthusiasm to her tone that definitely piqued my curiosity. She was hedging.

  “Okay, what’s going on?” I asked wearily.

  “It’s nothing . . .”

  “Babe, I really don’t have the time or the energy to pry it out of you. Just say it.” I sighed.

  “Well . . . look . . . Gita and I know that something is really bothering you, and I don’t know why you haven’t tried to talk about it with anyone. I keep waiting for you to mention it, and I don’t have any more patience for this crap.”

  I paused thoughtfully. She wasn’t my best friend by mere coincidence. “What are you talking about?”

  “If I knew, I wouldn’t be calling you. I can just tell that you’re troubled, and it’s gotten worse over the last week. Did something happen to you?” she demanded.

  The burden of hiding my internal turmoil from the altercation with Ryan had taken its toll. Here was the proof.

  “Cris, please talk to me. If something is bothering you, then let’s deal with it. Don’t dump it on Tom. You guys don’t get to spend enough time with one another as it is. If I can tell you’re hiding something, he will know as soon as he sees your face.”

  Her words were painfully true. Mendacity was incredibly unbecoming on me. “Please, don’t be mad at me,” I began tentatively.

  “I can’t promise that, but I will promise to hear you out.”

  I exhaled protractedly. “You’re going to be pissed because . . . it’s about Ryan.”

  “Fuck! I knew it!” She groaned. “Go on.”

  “He started . . . emailing me a couple of months ago.”

  “Please tell me you didn’t respond!” she gasped.

  “Well, not at first.”

  “Cristina Pereira! You idiot! Why did you respond to him?” she scolded.

  “I couldn’t help it! He was baiting me, and the shit he said just got under my skin!” I sniffed.

  “If you knew he was baiting you, you should have controlled yourself better!”

  “Are you going to keep yelling at me, or what?” I demanded.

  “Sorry.” She didn’t sound sorry at all.

  “Anyway, he kept begging me to talk to him. He said he had something important to tell me.”

  “I have something important to tell him too. It starts with an F and ends with a U.”

  “I refused to hear him out . . . and . . . he showed up at work a few weeks ago,” I mumbled with chagrin.

  “WHAT? That interfering, backstabbing, mother—”

  “Hana! Just let me finish.” I waited for her to cease her ranting.

  “He . . . told me he never cheated on me. He lied about it so that I would let him go.”

  She was momentarily shocked into silence, so I rushed onward in an attempt to tell her everything that had eaten away at me for the last few weeks.

  “He . . . wants me back.”

  She cleared her throat. “No.”

  “Huh?”

  “Never. Please, Cris. Please tell me you aren’t even thinking about this.” Her voice was deathly quiet.

  “Of course not! I’m engaged!”

  “But that’s not the only reason, right?” she continued.

  “What do you mean?”

  “If you weren’t engaged, you still wouldn’t take him back, right?” she pressed.

  “No. I don’t . . . think so.”

  “No! Don’t even think about it! Maybe you can forget what he did after he feeds you a couple of angst-ridden lines about fear and commitment, but I most certainly can not!” she shouted. “It doesn’t matter if he didn’t cheat! He’s weak. He’s not your equal!”

  “He’s not a bad person, Hana. He just made bad decisions.”

  “Fine! It doesn’t matter if he’s not a bad person. He doesn’t deserve you. He lied to you, and he broke your heart!” she cried.

  “Heartbreak happens every day . . . anyone can break your heart if you let them.” Fear tinged my tone, and my perceptive best friend picked up on it immediately.

  “I will never break your heart, Cris . . . and Tom won’t break your heart either,” she championed.

  “I love you too, but . . . you don’t know that. I never thought Ryan would break my heart, and you can’t make promises on behalf of another person.”

  “Please, don’t be like Ryan. Don’t let your fear ruin something wonderful,” she pleaded.

  “I’m nothing like Ryan,” I said angrily.

  “I know. I just . . . I know you’re afraid of trusting Tom, but he’s earned your trust, chica. You always tell me—love fully or not at all. He deserves your love. Don’t lose sight of that.”

  “I know you’re right. I’m just so . . . scared of everything. All of this change is really getting to me, and sometimes I feel overwhelmed,” I admitted in a hushed tone.

  “I completely understand, but don’t punish the people who really love you for a man who wasn’t sure.”

  When I didn’t answer right away, she rushed through her next pearl of wisdom. “Tom’s a good man, and you need to tell him about this. He deserves to know, and tell him to give me a call if he needs to hire some muscle for a much-deserved beat-down. I’m really cheap. In fact, for our purposes, I’m free,” she joked tongue-in-cheek.

  “He’s going to be furious.”

  “Grow some nerve and deal with it. Ryan’s ruined a good chunk of your life already; how about we place a moratorium on any further ruination?”

  I smiled. “Thank you.”

  “Be a big girl. Don’t screw this up. Even if your life isn’t on a path you expected, it’s the right one.
I can feel it.”

  “Okay, Robert Frost. Goodnight,” I teased.

  “Love you. Call me later.”

  “Love you too. Will do.”

  Unfortunately, I didn’t feel better.

  I felt as though everyone thought my concerns were trivial and unfounded: fear-ridden angst that had no place in the world of a woman recently engaged to a wonderful man. Little did they know, a poison-laced virus had infiltrated its way into my mind, and the only person who could understand my anguish was the individual responsible for it.

  A chauffeured Town Car waited for me by the curb at LAX when I arrived the next day. The driver stood by the passenger door holding a sign with the name “Chip” emblazoned on it.

  With a half-smile, I ran to the automobile and slid into the backseat. Before I even had a chance to look around, I was yanked into a shameless embrace.

  “You’re mauling me!” I giggled as I playfully shoved Tom away.

  “I can’t help it. I’m starving, and you’re delicious,” he teased as he held tightly onto my body and pressed kisses against my neck.

  “What’s with the Town Car?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “Melissa.”

  “Every so often, I start to hope that she hates me a bit less. This is one of those moments,” I mused.

  “She doesn’t hate you. She’s just a control freak, and she can’t control you, so it rankles her a bit.”

  As he spoke, he studied my face carefully. My soul groaned as it braced for impact. Damn the perceptiveness! Wordlessly, he reached up with his right hand and rubbed my forehead with his thumb.

  “These lines weren’t here the last time I saw you,” he began.

  “I’m just tired. This week was tough. Managing work in Raleigh and helping with the master classes in Charlotte is a lot more demanding than I thought it was going to be,” I replied lamely as I sped through my rehearsed explanation with a pace that clearly indicated nervousness.

  He narrowed his eyes at me and ran his hand through my hair to brush it away. “We’re getting you a new cell phone this weekend. End of discussion.”