Page 61 of Fight For Her
In all the chaos, I’d forgotten to check in with her. With only a few minutes to spare before the interview, I clicked her name on my screen. My chest tightened with each ring until finally, as it was about to go to voicemail, she answered.
“You had me worried sick,” she said in place of a greeting. Her raspy voice was a whole octave higher than usual. That was laughable.
“Mom, I’m okay. There was a storm and the power got knocked out. It’s back on and everything’s fine.”
She puffed her cigarette, and I heard her murmur something under her breath.
“What did you say?”
“Nothing, I was just telling Richard that you’re alright. He knows I was worried sick. I barely even ate last night.” Richard’s deep timbre came through from the background.
“Did you make it to your meetings all weekend?” I needed to get down to the nitty gritty. The clock was ticking, and I couldn’t be late to this interview.
“Yeah, don’t worry. Richard brought me. They served us stale cookies last night. Can you believe that?” She sounded as if stale cookies were the absolute worst thing she had going for her.
“The audacity. Anyway, Mom, I gotta go. Glad you’re doing good.” I bit my lip, hesitating. “And uh, tell Richard I said hello.”
“Richard, my doll face says hi, and she can’t wait to meet you,” she hollered far too loudly for my pre-coffee ears. “Thanks for calling, Doll.”
I cleared my throat. “Of course. Love you, Mom.”
“You too. Now get home safe.”
I clicked end and sat back in the lounge chair. Since when did my mother worry about me or thank me for calling? There’s no way forty-eight hours of me not checking in on her made that much of an impact. It was almost as if she was acting,motherly. I chewed my lip again, silently cursing my nervous habit when I realized I was smearing my lipstick.
After checking myself in the mirror and smoothing out my hair for the tenth time, I went back to the chair by the window and opened up my messages to the email from Victor’s assistant.
It’s now or never.
I clicked the connect call button and inhaled deeply.
“Oh my God,” Mia squealed, wrapping me in a hug. “My best friend is going to LA to meet with Victor Moss in a week!”
A big grin spread across my face. I had Mia on one side of me and Coby on the other as we waited in the lobby for the rest of our group to come downstairs.
“She was amazing.” Coby beamed. “I have to say the way you did that thing to your voice. It um,” he laughed. “It really did it for me.”
I hip bumped him. “What thing?”
“I know what you’re talking about,” Mia added. “She does her ‘PR voice.’”
I shook my head and sipped some water with a shaky hand. My adrenaline was still on high alert from the interview.
“Fine, I know I do a voice. But to be fair, everyone does. It’s a thing.”
Shawn joined us, lugging two suitcases that looked stuffed to the brim. “What are we laughing about?”
“How Kendahl does her PR voice.” Mia kissed Shawn on the cheek and nuzzled close to him.
“You mean the voice that sounds exactly likeyouraccountant voice?” Shawn smirked.
“See! We all do it!” I said.
Mia laughed it off, and Coby shrugged in defeat. “So tell us how it went. What did they ask you?”
Coby had walked into the room halfway through the conversation, so he knew some of the answers to Mia’s question. A muscle ticked in his jaw. I knew he was happy for me, but I didn’t think he was crazy about the questions that had been asked. Mr. Moss’s assistant didn’t come across as a particularly warm person, but this was business. And, on the plus side, there was no mention of the video.
“Oh, you know, the normal job interview stuff. Where I saw myself in five years. Why was I thinking about relocating. That sort of thing.” I shrugged, feigning a casual posture.
