Page 46 of All That Glitters

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Eli strode in through the glass doors of the Starving Artists Agency like a Category 5 hurricane, a whirlwind of energy and overpriced espresso. He was halfway across the lobby, his mind racing through a to-do list of calls he needed to make and deals he needed to close, when he came to a screeching halt.

There, sitting on a couch in the waiting area and casually flipping through a gossip rag as if she owned the place, was Carrie Thompson. His number one client. His number one problem. His number one career-ending, ulcer-inducing migraine.

Eli immediately backpedaled into the hallway by the elevators. He definitely wasn’t in the mood to face her, not after yesterday’s call about a zombie that had ‘inappropriately sniffed her’ on the set of Teenage Zombie Cheerleader Summer. It had taken him three hours and a promised guest spot on a daytime talk show to keep her from walking off the set. He peeked around the corner,but she was still there, a beautiful, blonde ticking time bomb of demands and entitlement.

He was pondering his next move, maybe faking a sudden, debilitating illness or simply sprinting for the fire escape, when the elevator dinged. A pizza boy stepped out, balancing a stack of four large pizzas. He was a college-aged kid with the determined look of someone trying to get his foot in the door of Hollywood.

An idea born of pure desperation lit up Eli’s face. He pulled a wad of cash from his pocket.

“I’ll give you twenty dollars for your outfit,” he said, his voice a low, urgent whisper.

The pizza boy just looked at him. “No way, man. Go find your own costume.”

“Thirty dollars,” Eli countered, upping the ante. “And I’ll read the script inside the top box.” It was a safe assumption, given how many other desperate writers were using this approach.

The pizza boy’s eyes lit up, like he’d just hit the jackpot. Without another word, he dropped the entire stack of pizzas onto the floor, ignoring the cheese and marinara sauce that probably just drenched his script. The kid quickly stripped out of his uniform and swapped clothes with Eli, not sure what to do with the expensive Armani suit he now held in his hands.

A minute later, Eli hurried back across the reception area, now dressed in the slightly too-tight pizza uniform. He held the stack of squashed pizzas high enough to cover his face from Carrie’s view. Thankfully, she didn’t even look up from her magazine as he slipped past her and made a beeline down the hallway.

Eli found Neil Bergman in his paper-choked cave of an office, flipping idly through a script. Eli poked his head in.

“Tell me some good news, Neil,” he pleaded. “You found Carrie a script? Anything? A commercial for adult diapers? A voiceover for a talking dog movie? I’m desperate.”

Neil looked up, unfazed by the absurd sight of his hyper-caffeinated colleague dressed as a pizza delivery driver. “New job, Eli?” he asked dryly.

“She’s staking out the lobby,” Eli explained, closing the door behind him. “It’s the only way I could get past. It’s like Escape from New York out there.”

Just then, Neil’s intercom buzzed.

“Neil, there’s a Craig Caldwell on line one,” Amy’s voice crackled through the speaker. “He wants to talk to you about a vampire script called ‘The Frat.’”

Neil frowned; the name clearly meant nothing to him. “Never heard of it. Tell him we’re not accepting submissions.”

“He said he’s a producer, and the script has a Starving Artists cover sheet on it,” Amy said.

Neil’s eyes scanned the mountains of paper around his office as if the script might magically appear. “You said it’s called The Frat?”

“Yeah. I have a copy up here at my desk. One of the pizza boys dropped it off a couple weeks ago. It has pepperoni stains on it.”

“Tell Craig I’m sorry, but there’s been a mistake,” Neil said.

Before Neil could say another word, Eli bolted across the room and slammed his hand down on the intercom button.

“Amy, it’s Eli,” he barked. “Forget what Neil said. Does this guy sound like he has any money?”

There was a brief pause. “He said they’re ready to make the movie,” Amy’s voice replied.

Eli’s eyes lit up. He straightened his crooked pizza hat, all traces of panic and desperation gone. This was it. A go picture. It didn’t matter who this Craig guy was; this was a lifeline.

“Put him through.”

The bluff at La Jolla Shores spread out like a vast green carpet, beyond which the Pacific’s deep blue waters spanned to the horizon. The late afternoon sun painted everything in shades of gold and amber, and a gentle breeze carried the smell of ocean air. Tony and Debbie sat on their favorite weathered picnic table, sharing a large pepperoni pizza from a cardboard box and drinking from a beer bottle wrapped discreetly in a brown paper bag.

“You know,” Tony said, washing a bite of pizza down with a swig of beer, “maybe this is the universe’s way of telling me I’m supposed to be a cell phone.”

Debbie nearly choked on her pizza. “Are you kidding me? You’re giving up?”

“I prefer to think of it as cutting my losses.”