Page 19 of Hollywood Humbug

“What the hell was that about, with you barging out of my house like your hair was on fire?” I ask her.

“We’re not doing this,” she says.

“Yes, we are. We’re so doing this.”

One of the cameramen steps forward to take her plate.

“Thank you,” she says.

“You spend one amazing night in my arms, in my bed, then you just rush out like it meant nothing,” I say. “That is not how this is gonna work, sweet thing.”

She pops her fists on her hips. “No, evidently the way this is gonna work is you’re going to call me horrible names to your family when I’m not in the room.”

“Andrew,” Scarlett scolds.

“Oh no,” Laura says.

And I just laugh.

“Oh, so you just think this is all hilarious?” Max asks.

“Go ahead, tell them what you overheard,” I say. “What’s this horrible name you heard?”

“You called me a whale,” she says.

“Nope. Be more specific.”

“A narwhal!” She tosses her hands up. “He called me a fucking narwhal. Like it’s any better to refer to me as a specific kind of whale?”

Scarlett gasps, looking from me to Max and back again, her eyes widening. “Is she really, Andrew?”

“Oh yeah.”

Then Scarlett and Laura are both wiping their eyes and side hugging. “You’ve waited so long.”

The cameraman who took Max’s plate and has since been snacking off of it, comes and claps me on the shoulder. “Congrats, man.”

“Hold up!” Max yells. “You are all crazy people! Why is everyone so excited that he’s calling me a fancy unicorn whale?”

I close the distance between us and cup her face. “You’re beautiful when you’re angry,” I say.

“You’re a lunatic.”

“Shall I explain?”

“By all means. Not going to deny that I’m curious about this. Especially since everyone seems to know about it but me.”

“I already told you how I ended up in Hollywood and this line of work, but why I stayed, well, that’s a bit of a different story. The truth is, I just felt like my narwhal was here and that someday this was where I’d find her.”

Her brow furrows.

“You know how people talk about their perfect someone? They’ll have a list of attributes, characteristics, traits, features, etc. But to put them all together in one person seems to be asking too much of the world. So, they refer to this perfect someone as ‘the unicorn.’ Why? Because unicorns are mythical creatures. They actually don’t exist. In essence they’re saying before they even start, I’ll never find what I’m looking for so why even try.”

I grab her hands and squeeze them, then run my thumb across her knuckles. “But in my family, we’re raised to believe that our perfect someone isn’t mythical, but also might not be right next door. You might have to actually go look. Narwhals are hard to find. They’re magical and cool and majestic. But they’re totally fucking real.”

She opens her mouth, then closes it. “So, you weren’t calling me fat?”

“What? God, no. I love your body. I thought I made that abundantly clear last night.”

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