Summary: Things aren’t always black and white. Relationships, situations, people - they're complicated and messy, and often heartbreaking, even when they make you happy. Sometimes they’re gray, sometimes they’re blue, and when Justin meets Zooey, everything suddenly turns… yellow.
Categories: Completed Het Stories
Characters: Justin Timberlake
Awards: None
Genres: Celebrity/Celebrity, Drama, Humor, Romance
Challenges: None
Series: None
Chapters: 20
Completed: Yes
Word count: 83648
Read: 60441
Published: Jul 04, 2010
Updated: Jul 24, 2011
Story Notes:
I said I wouldn't post this story until it was complete, but I don't know... there's something wrong with me. I get halfway through a concept and say I HAVE TO POST IT NOW! So here it is, the beginning of something that I will (hopefully) eventually end lol. I hope you guys like. - Ash
If you're interested, the cast!: (Copy & Paste the Link) http://i28.tinypic.com/33uxv6p.jpg
1. Fifty-Five Cents by Ashley
2. I Got A Feeling by Ashley
3. Back At Your Door by Ashley
4. Bon Temps, Trés Innocent by Ashley
5. Fireworks by Ashley
6. Eleven-Ten-Nine by Ashley
7. Full Disclosure by Ashley
8. Up In The Air by Ashley
9. Oh Friend, You've Left Me Speechless by Ashley
10. The Two Sides of My Brain Need to Have a Meeting by Ashley
11. Not All Surprises Are Bad by Ashley
12. Wake Up Calls by Ashley
13. All... Right? by Ashley
14. Puzzling Pieces by Ashley
15. Boston In April by Ashley
16. Elephant In The Room by Ashley
17. Just Gonna Stand There And Watch Me Burn by Ashley
18. You Lost You by Ashley
19. The Last Day of Our Acquaintance by Ashley
20. Fade To Black by Ashley
Fifty-Five Cents by Ashley
1: Fifty-Five Cents
“Okay, daddy, I have to go.”
“All right, Zo, but call me as soon as you’re done.”
“I have to head to work right after, but I’ll call you tonight?”
“No, call me as soon as you’re done. Okay?”
Zooey sighed heavily but smiled at her dear father’s relentlessness. “Okay.”
“Good luck, sweetheart.”
“Thanks. I love you,” she stated factually, pulling into one of several open parking spots on El Camino Drive. “Bye.”
She hung up her phone just before turning off her car and pulling her iPod out of its dock. She gave herself a look in her rearview mirror, making sure she didn’t have any cheese in her hair or lip gloss smeared across her teeth. With everything seemingly in tact, she grabbed her purse and got out of her still-new car, her happy spirits falling when she realized that she needed change for the parking meter. Knowing she had spent her last available cents on a Coke, she started to look around for help.
Just then, just behind her, a young, attractive guy stepped out of a charcoal grey Audi, change already jingling in his hand. He looked over to her, a pair of blue sunglasses covering most of his chiseled face, and greeted her, “Hello.”
“Hi,” she grinned at him, knowing that this was her best shot at a fast and simple resolution. “Umm, kind of awkward, but… could I ask you a huge favor?”
Deeming her harmless enough, he replied, “Okay…”
“Do you have any extra change, by any chance? Like a quarter or two?”
“Umm.” He stopped feeding his meter long enough to look through the coins in his well-manicured but masculine hand. “Yeah. Sure.”
“You’re a lifesaver. Thank you so much,” she replied genuinely. “I spent my last dimes in the vending machines at work. I should’ve known that was a bad idea.”
“Well hey, I’m glad to help a stranger in need,” he answered, offering her a total of 55 cents. “I hope that helps.”
“Thank you so much,” she repeated. “I’ll pay you back next time I see you.”
“I hope so. I’m pretty strapped for cash these days.”
“Well, you’re driving an Audi, so I figure you can wait a couple… years?”
“Works for me.” He finally smiled at her as he parted from the scene, headed for the swanky building across the street.
She filled her meter, which allotted her a whopping 27 minutes, and headed for her final destination, also across the street, at William Morris Endeavor Entertainment. Making her way to the elevators and up to the seventh floor, she was pleasantly surprised to find that the charitable stranger was there, too, meaning he was either pretty talented, pretty rich, or an even more delightful mixture of both.
“Good morning, Justin,” the sickeningly pretty receptionist eventually greeted her stranger. “How are you today?”
“I’m good, Ricki. Is Patrick here?” he asked.
“Actually, you’re meeting with Ari today, if that’s all right with you.”
“Uh oh. Am I in trouble?”
“Not at all,” Ricki smiled. “Have a seat and I’ll let him know you’re here.”
“Wow, Ari Emanuel,” Zooey commented, impressed, as he passed by. “You are clearly hot shit.” The moment he took off his sunglasses, she felt like an idiot, because she realized that he most definitely was hot shit and then some. He looked every bit as cool as he should, but at the same time, there was something surprisingly unflashy about him, even understated. Such a contrast to so many of the other A-listers she’d met in her short time in Hollywood
“No, I’m just me,” he smirked, taking a seat behind her.
She approached the desk, waiting for Ricki to return, but suddenly, she didn’t know how to act, knowing that Justin Timberlake was sitting directly behind her, possibly watching all her nervousness materialize.
“Are you in anything I should know of?”
She turned to make sure that he wasn’t on a phone call and was, in fact, talking to her. “Excuse me?”
“Are you on TV?”
“Me? Oh god no, I’m not an actress,” she sputtered uneasily.
“Hi,” Ricki smiled to her as she returned. “Can I help you?”
“Umm, yes. I’m here to see Sharon Sheinwold?”
“Zooey Levin?” Ricki confirmed.
“That would be me,” she grinned happily at the confirmation that this wasn’t all a fluke. “I was supposed to meet her at nine; I’m sorry I’m late.”
“No, it’s fine. You can come on in,” she offered to escort her to Sharon’s office, while Justin watched the beautiful stranger fade out of sight.
If she wasn’t an actress, then what was she, he wondered. She was very pretty, but in a plain sort of way that didn’t scream “movie star,” and she seemed too pleasant to be a reality television type of girl.
“Hey Ricki,” he requested when the receptionist returned, “who was that girl?”
“Zooey Levin?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m not sure,” she shook her blonde hair out of her face. “I think she works for NBC.”
“She’s on TV?”
“I’m really not sure,” she answered regretfully. “I’m sorry.”
“Ricki, stop harassing people,” the famous Ari Emanuel announced, entering his reception area to greet his client. “Justin, how are you, sir?”
“I’m good,” he nodded, rising from his seat.
“Come, come in. We have a lot to discuss.”
“I hope a good movie is in there. I just heard I’m supposed to be playing Boo-Boo in a Yogi Bear biopic... Do I actually need to tell you No?”
Ari chuckled happily as he welcomed Justin into his swanky office and made sure to inform his assistant, “Hold my calls.”
____________________
“So Zooey, now that you’ve gotten two of your scripts on air, it’s pretty safe to say that your spot on The Office is solidified. Now you need to start thinking of big picture stuff,” Sharon Sheinwold was telling her potential star. “Where do you want to go with this?”
“Well. As a writer, I do think I’m on an upward trajectory, and I really just want to keep getting better at this. I actually just got another script that’ll most likely be airing in February, so… I feel like I’m doing well. Ultimately, I would like a producer credit. Eventually, create my own show. I mean, the sky is the limit, obviously, but at the moment, I’m just trying to sharpen my craft.”
“Okay,” Sharon nodded enthusiastically. “That’s great. Now we briefly discussed this before, have you given any more consideration to doing anything onscreen?”
“Well,” Zooey grinned tightly, “like I said before, that’s really not my forte at all. I would be terrible as an actor.”
“But the thing is, you’re a comedienne. You guys have that innate knack for acting.”
“I don’t,” she shook her head vehemently. “I write because I can’t act.”
“Okay, I won’t push you. You’ve been in Hollywood for, what, two years?”
“Almost,” she nodded. “I actually just got my first place last month, so…”
“Trust me, you are on the cusp of something spectacular here. But I understand your want to keep it low key for now.”
“Probably for quite a while,” she offered straightly. “I don’t want to sign with you guys and then have you trying to push me into acting for the next five years.”
“It’s just that you have this face!” Sharon marveled. “Those green eyes were made for a big screen. It’s hard.”
Zooey pulled out her dorky pair of red eyeglasses and perched them on her small face. “Concentrate, Sharon! I’m not an actress!”
“Fine!” she laughed, sitting back in her seat. “Have it your way, Zooey. Do we have a deal?
Grinning wildly at the idea, and her sun-kissed skin turning bright pink, she nodded. “We have a deal.”
“Wonderful,” she smiled back, finding Zooey’s file on her cluttered desk. “And I promise I will not try to turn you into an actress every three months.”
“Every six?” she guessed.
“I have to.”
“Fair enough.”
Sharon began pulling out several papers for her newest client to sign, both of them ecstatic about their new relationship. “Did you enjoy the Emmys last night?”
“It was interesting,” Zooey noted with a diplomatic grin. “I was starving throughout the entire show, though. “
“I hate award shows.”
“That was my first one, and hopefully, my last. By the way, that’s another reason I have no desire to be an actor.”
“Now that is understandable,” she chuckled, passing her a pen. “Just sign at all the sticky things on these. And then,” she handed over a folder, “take these to your lawyer, have him look over everything, and bring them back to me by Friday?”
“Sounds good,” she nodded “Oh hey, Justin Timberlake was out there. Do you guys already represent him, or is he shopping agencies?”
“Ari represents him,” Sharon confirmed. “As an actor.”
“Not for music?”
“Not for music. But… you saw him last night, just won another Emmy.”
“He did, didn’t he.”
“Stick with us, kid. I promise, we’ll take you places.”
“On that horribly corny note, I’m gonna get out of here. But thanks, Sharon. For all your help.”
“Put me on your speed dial,” she instructed, walking her client to the door. “We’re about to be best friends.”
“Crap, that means I have to start inviting you places and buying you Hannukkah presents?”
“Pretty much.”
“Looking forward to it,” Zooey offered her a hug. “I’ll see you later.”
As she happily headed down the halls of WME, she pulled her phone from her purse and fulfilled her father’s wish of calling him when she was done.
“Paul Levin,” he answered his phone after what felt like a million rings to her.
“Daddy?”
“Zo?”
“Yes, it’s me. It happened!”
“It’s done?”
“Yes! I have an agent!”
“I’m proud of you, sweetheart.”
“Ahhh, I’m so psyched,” she replied giddily. “What the hell, how do I have an agent?”
“Because you’re talented. And talent in Hollywood means having people take your money in order to convince other people to give you money.”
“I love this city,” she laughed.
“Listen, don’t tell your mom about this yet. You know how she feels about your… career choice.”
“Dad, you really have to stop caring what she thinks. You’ve been divorced for like fifteen years now.”
“I still know your mother better than anyone. Just… hold off a bit.”
“Will do,” she relented, too happy to do otherwise. “Listen, I have to get to work, but I just wanted to let you know.”
“All right, love, you have a good day. And I can’t wait to see your episode this week.”
“Nope, next week.”
“Next week? Really?”
“Yes. It’s called ‘The Promotion.’ October first.”
“Well okay.”
“Okay, daddy, I gotta go.”
“Zo, I’m proud of you, you know.”
“I know.”
After a long pause, full of happiness for his daughter, he let her go. “Bye.”
It seemed that hanging up her phone was the magical move to get Justin Timberlake to walk into her life, because no sooner than she was stuffing her phone into a pocket of her bag, did he escape his meeting with the illustrious Ari Emanuel.
“Long time, no see, stranger.”
“In which case, you owe me that fifty-five cents,” he reminded her with raised eyebrows.
“Crap. Can you bill me? I wasn’t prepared to see you again so soon.”
“So soon? It’s been nearly twenty minutes!”
“I’m sorry!” she rebutted dramatically. “If only I didn’t have this destructive addiction to Coke. And Sprite.” She put her hand over forehead, feigning dismay for just a second too long, and then looked up to him with a happy smile. “If you wanna walk me to my car, I can probably rustle it up in pennies.”
“That won’t be necessary,” he waved off. “I’ll bill you.”
“Should I give you my address?”
“That would be ideal.”
“Or you could just bill my agent!” she realized excitedly, starting to walk with him towards the elevators. “They do shit like that, right?”
“All the time.”
“Yes. Sharon Sheinwold. I’ll let her know.”
“Thank you,” he accepted, holding the elevator door for her as they entered together. “That reminds me, I never did find out what you do.”
“Are you that interested?”
“Well, you said you’re not an actor, but William Morris clearly has a keen interest in you, so…”
She waited until they reached the lobby and had exited the building before stopping to answer him. “I’m a writer.”
“Really?” he was visibly surprised. It was his experience that attractive women in Hollywood had been told more than enough times that that they were, in fact, attractive. To the point where he hated to even meet pretty girls anymore, figuring they’d have enough ego for both of them. Not that it really mattered anymore anyway, but… that was how he felt.
“Why is that surprising?” she wondered as they resumed their walk to their closely parked cars.
“Well, it’s mostly been my experience that they don’t put people who look like you behind the camera.”
“I think that was a compliment, so thank you?” she blushed. “But honestly… I have absolutely no desire to be an actor.”
He nodded at the notion and accepted it at face value. “That’s refreshing.”
“And what do you do?”
He hadn’t heard that question in ages. It was actually a bit awkward for him to meet a girl that didn’t already know who he was and at least ten things about him. “Umm… I’m-I’m a m-musician,” he stuttered slowly. “And an--.”
“I’m-I’m f-fucking with you,” she chuckled. “I know who you are.”
“Well, you never know.”
“You seemed a bit flabbergasted at the idea.”
“Not flabbergasted. Just, you know… taken aback.”
“Well, I’m glad that I could take you aback,” She grinned. “Sometimes, we need to get knocked down to size.”
“But then you knocked me back up to a non-size, because you do actually know who I am, so…”
“That’s true,” she acknowledged with him. “I take it back. Who are you?”
He smiled at her warmly, enchanted by everything about her. Her brown hair, highlighted with small amounts of blonde, perfectly accented her warm olive complexion. Her bangs came to just the right point above her mesmerizing green eyes, and her playful smile brought her entire face to life. He couldn’t not stare at her. “I’m sorry... I have to go.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah… I really shouldn’t have done this.”
Confused, her smile faded away. “Done what?”
“Spoken to you.”
“What? Why?”
“I’m sorry. I have to go,” he repeated, flustered. “But it was nice to meet you.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah. I’m… sorry.”
“Wait.” She couldn’t help but stare at him for a moment either. She could’ve gotten lost in his happy blue eyes if she wanted to. “If this is about what I said, I was just kidding. I know who you are.”
“That’s shocking,” he laughed genuinely.
She smiled again, her green eyes dancing in place. “This feels so ridiculous to ask, but could I have your number maybe?” She winced, waiting for him to respond, quietly chanting, “Don’t say no, don’t say no.”
“I really wish… I can’t.”
“Are you all right?”
“I really, really need to go.”
“Okay. Well… have fun…?”
“It was nice to meet you…”
“Zooey.”
“Justin,” he offered a handshake.
“Yeah… I got that,” she laughed, returning with her hand. “Nice to meet you, too.”
Feeling a bit dejected, Zooey watched as Justin Timberlake disappeared to his Audi, replaying their conversation in her head as she wondered what she could have done in a matter of two minutes to make him scurry away that way. But… she had gotten herself an agent, and that was her big news of the day, so she decided not to care about the rest.
____________________
About an hour later, Justin was waltzing into his Hollywood Hills mansion, pleased with his meeting with Ari, and quite smitten for the beautiful stranger he met in the process. Of course, he would have much preferred to have not given her a second thought, but truthfully, he enjoyed the prospect of running into her again when he went to meet with his agent. Just for small talk. It was all very innocent, he swore to himself.
And with that, he entered his home in a happier mood than he’d left it in, smiling at the sound of his dogs barking at his return. “I’m here, I’m here,” he greeted his boxers, Buckley and Brennan, as he made his way inside.
“Hey, babe,” a female voice announced when she heard the sound of the back door open.
Justin entered his home to find his fiancée, Scarlett, sitting at the kitchen table, devouring a bowlful of fruit among a table full of paperwork and a huge book. He immediately went over to her, placing a kiss on her cheek before saying, “Mornin’.”
“How was your meeting?” she wondered, devouring a strawberry.
“It was very good,” he nodded, making his way to the refrigerator. He grabbed a bottle of water and joined her at the table. “I met with Ari.”
“Whoa,” she looked at him with an impressed expression. “Hot shit coming through.”
He forced himself to push the thought of Zooey from his mind, as those were her words, as well. “Right?”
“What was that like?”
“Not as intimidating as I thought it would be. He’s a super nice dude.”
“Well yeah, he’s trying to please you; not the other way around.”
“True.” He grabbed one of her cherries and went to town on it. “But he got me out of that whole Yogi Bear nonsense. And found me two projects that I already really wanna do.”
“Elaborate.”
“The first one is called ‘The Social Network,’ and it’s directed by David Fincher…”
“Seriously?!”
“Right?” he shared in her excitement. “And that’s about the founding of Facebook. It was written by Aaron Sorkin, all kinds of crazy shit.”
“That sounds terrible. And by terrible, I mean fantastic.”
“I think it will be.”
“And the other one?”
“That one is a comedy--.”
“Which I’ve always said you should do,” she inserted knowingly.
“Right. It’s written by Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg, who write for The Office, so that’s exciting. And Jason Segel is already signed on to do it.”
“I heard about this one,” she recalled. “My agent wanted me to look into it, John Krasinski is up for that.”
“Seriously? Ari didn’t mention that part.”
“They never tell you the things you need to know, just the things they want you to know.”
Justin rolled his eyes and sat back in his chair. “I have the script in the car, so… I’ll have to read through it and see if it’s something I wanna fight for.”
“I have a meeting with my agent tomorrow,” she sighed, resting her foot at the bottom of Justin’s chair. “He wants me to do Broadway.”
“Well what’s it all about?”
She winced, flashing her blue-green eyes to the other side of the kitchen so as not to catch his gaze. “It’s for this sh--”
“I think you should do it,” he cut her off with an encouraging smile.
She grinned back, and looked down at the messy table. “I want to, I think. But… rehearsals start almost immediately, then we run from December until early May. And then I have to promote Iron Man, and I just really don’t want the first six months of our marriage to be spent apart.”
“I don’t either, but you know I’m not going anywhere, Tess. And I’ll be shooting movies too, so it may work out perfectly. We’ve been apart much longer without issue.”
She smiled at his encouragement, as well as his private nickname for her “ the middle name that no one knew besides him, her parents, and her twin brother. “I know.” She rested her head on the table, her wavy blonde hair falling over all of her papers.
“What’s all this stuff?” he suddenly switched subjects.
“Seating chart crap. Trying to rationalize my family is a lost cause, but I’m doing it anyway.”
“Who doesn’t get along again?”
“Oh, just everybody with everyone.”
“We should just un-invite them, don’t you think?”
“That would be so awesome.” She picked her head up from the table and gave her future husband a tired smile. “Planning a secret wedding is exhausting.”
“Can I help with anything?”
“You can just make sure you show up.”
“That, I will do,” he smiled happily. “But anything else?”
“I can’t even make half the calls without someone recognizing my voice, so I’m pretty sure you can’t.”
“But I could do, like, the seating chart or something.”
“Absolutely not,” she chuckled. “You can write your vows--.”
“Already done,” he returned proudly.
“Seriously?”
“Yep.”
“Wow, I need to fuckin’ step it up.”
“Yeah, you do.”
“Shut up,” she smirked, hiding the smile behind her full lips. “Also, we have a menu tasting on Thursday “ they’re shipping in food straight from Mexico “ so you can come to that if you want.”
“I get to eat? I’ll be there.”
“Awesome.” She closed her big book of wedding plans and got up from the table to take her empty bowl to the sink. “By the way, your mom called, she told me to tell you that she’s coming in Friday.”
“Why didn’t she call me?”
“Well, she called to talk to me; she just wanted me to mention that to you.”
“Oh.”
“Don’t worry, she’s staying with my mom.”
“Why would I be worried?” he wondered, watching her wash her bowl thoroughly.
“You know how weird you get when your mom’s coming to stay with us.”
“I get weird?”
“If you’re gonna deny it, we won’t discuss it,” she chuckled hoarsely. “But you do, you turn into that whole mama’s boy thing that you warned me about when we first started dating.
“But that was like five years ago. I’m pretty sure I’m not a mama’s boy anymore.”
She let out a loud cackle as she turned off the water and returned to the table. “Okay, babe.”
“What? I’m not!”
“I said Okay!”
“Yeah, but it wasn’t a real Okay. It was a sarcastic Okay, like ‘Yeah, I’m saying Okay, but actually, you’re kind of crazy.’”
Scarlett smiled at him warmly, loving that this was their relationship. So simple, so connected to one another. They had been together six years, and they were still nothing short of happy together. She couldn’t wait to marry him. “You are a little crazy, babe. But… you’re not a mama’s boy. You’re just a son that needs to have everything exactly the way his mother might want it…”
“Thank you.”
“God, you’re weird,” she grinned.
“In a really adorable way, though, right?”
“Obviously.”
He smiled back at his girlfriend, no longer thinking of the beautiful stranger that he left on El Camino Drive an hour earlier. Scarlett had consumed his thoughts, as she had been doing for over six years, and there wasn’t room for anyone else. Except maybe his mom.
I Got A Feeling by Ashley
2: I Got A Feeling
After a long day of brainstorming and rewriting at work, Zooey returned to her modest Los Feliz home, exhausted by the day she’d had. She couldn’t wait to get inside, gorge on some Doritos, and watch the premiere of Dancing With the Stars. As a television writer, she thoroughly enjoyed that it was part of her job to watch TV, and with it being the third week of September, she was elated that she finally had more than enough to watch again.
Unfortunate for her, when she entered her house, she was met with a mess that only her sister, Emile, could be responsible for. Clothes and shoes scattered all over her living room, Zooey waded through it all to yell at her.
“Em, what the hell?!”
Her older sister, a taller and slightly less exotic but equally gorgeous version of Zooey “ with brown eyes and fairer skin “ appeared in the threshold of the room, looking at her innocently. “What’s wrong?”
“Uhh, is there a reason my house looks like your closet exploded?”
“Well, yeah.”
“…What is it?”
“I’m looking for something to wear.”
“Why were you doing it in here?”
She shrugged and strutted through the mess in only her thong, showing off one of her twelve tattoos “ this one, located on her right butt cheek “ and a pair of stilettos, where another tat on her ankle was just visible enough. “My suitcase was in here.”
“Yeah, if you could take that to your room, by the way, that would be awesome.”
Emile rolled her dark hazel eyes at her younger sister and plopped down on her new couch. “How was your day, Zo?”
“Awesome,” she returned happily, her minor New England accent bolstering through the first syllable. “Best day ever.”
“Yeah?”
“I got an agent! I got a huge segment added to the Jim and Pam baby episode! And most importantly, I got a free sandwich from Jack in the Box.”
“Oh my god, we have to celebrate!” Emile shrieked, so proud of her little sis.
“We do?”
“Of course we do!” She quickly glanced at the clock on the DVR and then down to the mess she’d made. “Come on, it’s only eight. We can go grab some dinner and then you come with me to Guys and Dolls.”
“But I wanted to watch Dancing With the Stars!”
“Zooey, no. Find something fab to wear and we’ll go get drunk.”
“I can’t get drunk, I have to work at ten tomorrow.”
“Fine, I’ll get drunk,” Em relented. “But we’re gonna have fun.”
Zooey was a fun-loving type of girl, for the most part, so it didn’t take long for her to accept her sister’s proposition. “Okay. But as a punishment for this mess, you have to wear a leotard out tonight. With a top hat.”
Emile Levin had recently become somewhat of a celebrity-blog mainstay, due to her tumultuous relationship with the one and only Kanye West. Added to that, she was always in public wearing something kind of outrageous, so Zooey’s little dare was not at all a problem for her. She enjoyed that her sister often inspired her costumes. “Like Lady GaGa?” she asked excitedly.
“Like Lady GaGa,” Zooey grinned. “By the by, have you talked to Kanye yet?”
Rolling her eyes again, she kneeled to the floor to search for an appropriate leotard for their outing. “I told you, I’m disassociating myself with him until this Taylor Smith thing blows over.”
“Taylor Swift,” she corrected with a roll of her eyes. “And you didn’t tell me that.”
“Oh. Well, I meant to.”
“So that means you’ll be staying with me for… how long?”
“Probably another week or so. We’re goin’ to Italy in October.”
“Right,” Zooey nodded, not really having a clue as to what her sister was talking about, which was the norm. “Well I’m gonna get ready, you get your Single Ladies swag on, and we’ll meet back here in twenty minutes?”
Emile agreed just as she located a yellow bodysuit. “Coo’.”
____________________
It was close to 11:00 p.m. when Justin and his eclectic group of friends decided to stop by Guys & Dolls, a hot spot for Hollywood’s most beautiful people. He was still celebrating his Emmy win and it had been decided that a Boys’ Night Out was in order, so his fiancée was at home, happy to have the house to herself.
With his good friend Rob leading the pack, Justin followed his friends into the upscale club, excited that he would be able to just chill for a few hours. They weren’t worried about work or wives, just playing the night away.
“Yo, are we gettin’ bottles or what?” his best friend, Trace, wondered once they got settled in the area that had been cleared for them. He was almost surprised that nobody had taken their order yet.
Just as Justin was about to reply, the manager, Mary, came walking towards them with a bartender in tow carrying a tray full of drinks for the four of them. “How we doin’ tonight, guys?”
Justin stood up to shake her hand, though already bored with the politics of the nightlife in Hollywood. “We’re good,” he nodded. “Thanks.”
“Good. Good to hear. Listen guys, we know you’re not in the habit of accepting drinks from randoms, but this young lady insisted that you would accept if I gave you this first…” Mary pulled several coins from the tray and offered them to Justin with a shrug.
It was fifty-five cents in nickels. He gladly accepted the money while laughing at a joke that no one else was in on. “Yeah, we’ll take the drinks.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah,” he waved the bartender towards him, passing around the red concoctions to his friends. “What is this?”
“Cape Cods, just cranberry juice, lime juice, and Ciroc.”
Justin took a long sip from his drink and then stood up again. “Is she over here?”
“She was right over at the bar, but I can send her over here if you want.”
“I can go,” he waved off the ridiculous notion. “I’ll be back, y’all.”
Taking his drink with him, he made his way through the packed crowd of a rather small room, searching for the beautiful stranger he’d met that morning. He couldn’t help but smile when it appeared that two of them were sitting at the bar together.
“Fancy meeting you here,” Zooey grinned when she saw him approach.
“Why are you stalking me again?” he replied with a chuckle.
“Well, I was actually here first, so…”
“Right. I was tracking you down for my money, so I’m glad you got the hint,” he nodded. “Thank you, by the way.”
“Think nothing of it,” she waved off. “Hey, this is my sister, by the way. Emile. Emile, this is Justin “ I asked him for meter money this morning.”
Emile, who had been mostly concerned with why her boyfriend wasn’t texting her back, finally looked up from her phone to see Justin Timberlake standing in front of her. “Hey, I know you.”
“This is your sister?” he asked Zooey, recognizing her as well.
“I’m her sister, really,” she noted, remembering that Emile Levin was a name and face of her own these days. “But yeah.”
“Very cool. Good to see you,” he nodded. Immediately directing his attention back to Zooey. “So… thanks for the drink?”
“I figured it was the least I could do.”
“It definitely was the least you could do, but… I appreciate it nonetheless.”
Her mouth dropped in fake shock, “Asshole!”
“So are you a cranberry juice fan or… what?”
“Oh, well I’m from Boston, so it was just a bit of an homage to the hometown.”
“That’s so interesting,” he sarcastically noted.
“Fuck you!” she laughed. “Are you this mean to your boyfriends?”
“I am, actually. That’s why I’m standing here with you, they made me leave.”
“Ah, that makes sense,” she accepted, placing her empty glass on the bar. “Are they the reason you had to disappear this morning?”
“They are not,” he admitted as he watched her stand from her seat. “But I promise that was for a valid reason.”
“Uh huh.” She turned to her sister, still completely engaged in her iPhone, and told her, “Em, I’ll be back, okay?”
“Wait a minute, bitch, where are you going? I thought we were celebrating!”
“Well. You’re on your phone and I’m having a conversation with this dude, but if you really want me to stay…”
“Whatever,” she rolled her eyes, flipping her sideswept auburn bangs from her eyes. “Abandon me!”
“I’ll be back!”
“Is there a reason we’re abandoning your sister?” Justin requested as Zooey pulled him away from the bar.
“Trust me,” she instructed, leading him towards what looked like an exit.
“So yeah, where are we going exactly?”
“Just outside.”
He was definitely hesitant to be following some pretty young thing around a club like he had nothing better to do, but he had to admit that he kind of liked her “no holds barred” attitude. She didn’t wait for cues or permission, she just did what she felt. It made it really difficult to say No. Especially since she didn’t ask. “What’s outside?” he finally wondered out loud.
Once they made it to their destination “ the secluded valet lot behind the building, she answered. “Absolutely nothing.”
He smiled in reply, as he was definitely the type of guy that appreciated absolutely nothing sometimes. “Not into clubs, I take it.”
“I am. But I have to be in that mood, ya know? Tonight, I wanted to do nothing, but Em convinced me to come out.”
“You two are like polar opposites?”
“Not really. She’s just like… an extreme version of me. I wear a yellow polka dot dress with red shoes, she wears a yellow leotard with rainbow shoes,” she described their outfits as well as their personalities. “I’m slightly ridiculous, she’s ridiculously ridiculous.”
He nodded in understanding, inadvertently admiring the print of her bright cocktail dress. “A little ridiculous is necessary at times.”
“And a lot is obnoxious, I know. That’s why she’s dating someone equally as insane as she is and not the doctor she was engaged to, as our mom would have wanted.” Zooey innately rolled her eyes at the thought of her mother and then began to look through her banana-colored purse. “You wanna sit?”
“Uhh… sure,” he shrugged, looking around for a seat.
Locating her pack of cigarettes and a lighter, she dropped her bag to the ground and directed him to sit on the steps. “You smoke?”
“Uh, no. Thanks.”
She shrugged offhandedly and lit one up for herself. “I talk about Em a lot, I know. She’s my best friend.”
“That isn’t adorable at all.”
“Shut up.”
“So if you don’t mind me asking, what are you guys?”
“We’re… sisters?” she took a drag of her cigarette and looked at him as she blew the smoke the other way. “What do you mean?”
“No, I mean, like… are you white? Or…”
“Justin, you can’t just ask someone if they’re white.”
“Ha. Ha. But I mean, your sister looks… ethnic, and you don’t, really, so…”
“She looks ‘ethnic?’” Zooey cackled loudly. “What the fuck does that mean?”
“You know what I mean.”
“Nope. Not at all.”
He was blushing, clearly embarrassed by his question. “Nevermind.”
“No, I’m fucking with you,” she softened, placing her hand on his arm. “You’re right, we don’t look that much alike.”
“You have a lot of similarities actually,” he recalled their identically shaped faces, long brown hair, the full lips and same wide, happy smiles. But Emile actually resembled the late Aaliyah from a certain angle, whereas Zooey… didn’t. “There are the obvious differences, but it’s very apparent that you’re sisters.”
“Em is basically she spitting image of our mom, who’s black “ they have the brown eyes, the richer skin, the dimples; and then I got most of my features from our dad, who’s Jewish, so that makes us… Indian, I think.”
“That makes sense,” he nodded seriously.
“Right?”
“It does.”
“I like to identify myself as Pacific Islander, though,” she joked. “Then when people ask where I’m from, I get to say some cool shit like Tahiti or Samoa.”
“I think that’s where most ethnic people originate,” he deduced.
“I think you’re right.” She took another inhale and then stared at him. “So that’s my story. Or at least, the first page of it. What’s yours?”
“My story,” he chuckled, thinking of how it could possibly begin. “My story is pretty boring, honestly.”
“Oh, like mine was so riveting. Tell me something good.”
“My name is Justin. I’m from Memphis, Tennessee. I’ve been in show business, essentially, since I was eleven. I’ve lived here since I was twenty-two. And now, here I am, sitting next to you.”
“Motherfucker, I didn’t ask for the Cliff Notes version!”
“I’m sorry, I thought you probably knew the long version already since you were stalking me and all.”
“See, now I feel bad that I do know,” she giggled.
“Uh huh.”
“What’s Memphis like?”
“It’s an awesome place. It’s small, but I think it’s interesting. It has a certain charm about it, the people are happy and Southern, the girls are sweet,” he realized as he spoke. “And we have a rich history with, not only the music aspect with the blues and Elvis, but there’s all this American history, as well, with the civil rights movement.”
“Oh god, Elvis is terrible.”
His eyes widened in offense at her announcement. “Say what?”
“Yeah, I said it!”
“Oh no, I can’t talk to you anymore.”
“No, no one with legitimate taste in music actually likes Elvis,” she smirked, taking one last puff from her cigarette before putting it out on the ground beneath her. “I refuse to believe that you like him.”
“I do, though! And I’m offended by your statement.”
“I’m offended by yours!”
“Then we’ll just have to agree to disagree.”
“I absolutely will not. I can’t forget this,” she deadpanned. “God, and I thought you were cool.”
“Please, you’re from Boston. What the fuck do you know about interesting music.”
“Well, I went to Berklee, so… a lot.”
“Did you really?” he asked, genuinely interested now.
“No, I went to Harvard.”
He chuckled, but still wondered, “Did you really?” He liked that he couldn’t tell whether she was serious.
“I really did. It’s where I learned to be a snob “ music and otherwise, and also how to be cripplingly self-aware.”
He couldn’t help but smile at her admission. “And how old are you?”
“Well I won’t answer that explicitly, but I’ll ballpark it for you by revealing that I was born in the first half of the eighties.”
“What? Me too! What are the odds!”
“Being that we’re at a club in LA at midnight on a Monday night, the odds are pretty good, I think?”
“Oh god, don’t get all Harvard smart on me. I didn’t go to college. Or high school, actually, so you could become really intimidating really fast.”
“Yet you’re the millionaire,” she noted jokingly. “What a world.”
“You can have your fifty-five cents back if that’ll help,” he offered.
“It won’t.”
____________________
An hour and a half later, Zooey and Justin were sitting in the exact same spot, having run the gamut of “getting to know you” questions, both of them admittedly enjoying every minute of it.
"Greatest TV sitcom of all time?" she found another probing question to unleash on him.
"Of all time?"
"And if you don't say something that's at least in my top five, I'm losing all respect for you."
"That's a tough one."
"It's not easy," she agreed.
Justin appeared to be thinking over an answer for a long time, until finally, he reached a consensus with himself. "Man. I think I gotta go with Seinfeld."
Zooey was pleased with his choice, even though it wasn't what she would have said. "Respectable answer."
"Well wait, what’s yours?"
"Hands down, I Love Lucy."
"I could get with that," he nodded thoughtfully. "Definitely a strong contender."
"I'm just really glad you didn't say Friends."
"Not even top ten," he waved off. "Hell no."
"I like you," she stated factually.
"Tell me your top five."
"In no particular order..."
"Certainly."
"I Love Lucy is absolutely number one, though. But Seinfeld is definitely up there, Golden Girls is up there, the Cosby Show, and I gotta say… Cheers. And honorable mention to the first few seasons of The Fresh Prince."
"How convenient that five of your six picks are NBC shows."
"Well hey, I can't help it if NBC has pioneered some of the greatest sitcoms in television history."
"You definitely left out some good ones, though."
"Like what?"
"Like... All in the Family, The Jeffersons, Dick Van Dyke, Everybody Loves Raymond, Roseanne..."
"I'll give you Dick Van Dyke and Roseanne, but my partisanship is definitely with NBC. Like, if 30 Rock gets a few more years, it'll be right up there with the rest of mine."
"Not The Office?"
"You're not gonna catch me sounding like an asshole," she chuckled. "No, sir."
"Fair enough."
"I honestly believe that 30 Rock is the best show on TV right now, though."
"You mean comedy, right?"
"Well yeah, everyone knows the best drama on right now is ““
"Mad Men," Justin confidently injected, as there was no way he would allow her to say anything else. Zooey just looked at him. "How could you possibly think otherwise?" he argued with her silence.
"Mad Men is really good," she conceded.
"Mad Men is superb," he corrected her. "The writing is genius. The acting is seamless."
"I'm sorry, there is nothing seamless about January Jones' acting. What could be a five-star show is downgraded to a four-point-five solely because of her."
"Bullshit!"
"Hate to break it to you, but yes."
"She's fantastic. She's so deliciously awkward and dissonant. I think she plays that role perfectly."
"Different strokes..."
"So what's your pick?"
"Breaking Bad. No question."
"What's that?"
"What's that?" Zooey exclaimed. "Are you kidding me?"
"I don't watch a whole lot of TV, so..."
"I don't care, you need to watch it. It comes on the same channel as Mad Men!"
"Never seen it. Mad Men is all that's on my TiVo and I fast forward through all the ads."
"Ironic."
"Right?"
"At any rate, you have to buy the first season of Breaking Bad. You'll love it."
"How do you know?"
"Because... you have good taste."
"Well all right. But if I don't like it, I'm gonna hate you."
"You will like it. And you'll probably hate me for introducing it to you when there are only two seasons because you'll definitely want more."
"You are so arrogant about your TV, Zooey Levin."
"Well hey, if there's one thing I know, it's television."
“Asshole.”
She laughed heartily at his assessment, deliriously happy at the fact that they got along so well in all their lighthearted sarcasm. “Why do I feel like I’ve known you forever?” she asked quietly after a comfortable lull in the conversation.
“Probably because I feel the same way,” he replied softly, taking note of how the moonlight illuminated her freckles. “Like… we met this morning and I get along with you better than I do with some of my best friends.”
“You’re probably a shitty best friend then?”
“Well I did leave them to talk to a stranger for two hours, so… yeah.”
“Well that’s disappointing!”
He chuckled about it for a second, but he quickly realized he had something else to reveal. “I’m engaged,” he blurted out finally, after debating with himself for two hours on how to let those words come out of his mouth.
“What?” she snickered.
“I’m getting married.”
“Oh wow, me too! But I really feel like we should call it off, then you and I can marry each other.”
“No, I’m serious, Zooey. In two months.”
“What?”
“We’ve been together six years. We’re happy.”
“…Oh.”
“So…”
“Well congratulations!” she perked up, sensing that an awkwardness was about to take over what had been a great conversation prior to that. “That’s… fantastic.”
“You’re fantastic,” he offered sincerely. “But… I should really go.”
Zooey hung her head a bit sadly, watching him rise from their comfortable little spot outside with absolutely nothing. She already knew it was a long shot that someone like him would be available, but she didn’t fathom that he’d be engaged. That was a whole other plateau in the arena of Unavailable. “Yeah, I should get back to Em before she sets some shit on fire.” She stood as well, wiping any residual dirt from her busy little dress. “So maybe I’ll see you at William Morris sometime.”
“Maybe.”
Reluctantly, Justin watched her head back inside, confused by his not wanting to let her go. He’d met tons of women in the time he’d been with Scarlett, plenty of them better looking than Zooey, but somehow, she seemed to be the only one that turned his head, held his attention for more than a few minutes. He didn’t know why, but he decided to follow her back inside, where she had already found her sister and they were dancing to the Black Eyed Peas.
“Hey,” he called out to her. This time, he was pulling her away.
Confused by who would be grabbing her, she resisted at first, but when she saw it was Justin’s silhouette in front of her, she immediately relented. “Hey, stranger!”
“Hey,” he repeated, loud enough to be heard over the music this time. “Can I have your number?”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea!” she answered teasingly.
“I know it’s not, but I want it anyway!”
She gladly took his phone from him, adding her mobile number to his address book under a special alias. She leaned in close to him so that she could speak into his ear, “I’m ‘Samantha Baker.’”
He laughed at her idea and then offered the same as he waited for her to hand over her phone. “Then I guess I’m Jake Ryan.”
“Nice to meet you, sir.”
“Likewise.”
“Call me sometime.”
“I will,” he promised.
With that, he left to finally return to his friends while she went back to her sister, both of them pleased with their ending. The night had been a good, good night.
Back At Your Door by Ashley
Author's Notes:
Okay, so my laptop battery is dying, it's time for me to be in bed, but I wanted to post this today, so here we are. I went through and did a super quick edit, but I apologize beforehand for any glaring errors that I might've missed. And THANK YOU GUYS for the fantastic reviews. Like, I'm always nervous about a story until I get your feedback, so it really means a lot to hear from you guys. But anywho, I'm gonna keep it rolling. I hope y'all enjoy! - Ash
3: Back At Your Door
It had been a week since Justin had gotten Zooey’s number that fateful night at Guys & Dolls and he had yet to use it “ mostly due to a hectic schedule “ but he had to admit that there was a bit of a tentative pause whenever he scrolled past ‘Samantha Baker’ on his list of contacts. The intent to deceive was clear, because why else would he need to give her an alias? And if he felt that he had to hide her from Scarlett, what else was he subconsciously planning on keeping from the woman he was about to commit his life to?
After he thought about it long enough, he was completely uncomfortable with the idea, so he changed the listing from her pseudonym to that of her real name, but made sure to add ‘NBC’ under the name of her company. And while that was nothing short of the truth, Justin knew that, having so many different affiliations with the network, if Scarlett did happen to see her name (and company), there would be no questions asked.
Pleased with himself and his ingenuity, he decided to go ahead and finally call his new friend after seven long days without communication.
And Zooey, who had been busy in her makeshift garden, was pleasantly surprised when her phone rang and ‘Jake Ryan’ popped up on the screen. She had decided that it would be disrespectful for her to call first, given that he was attached and she wasn’t. Even though this was a platonic thing, she knew the insinuations of a single girl calling an engaged guy and wanted him to be the decision-maker. She was happy that he got the hint. “Hey!” she greeted him cheerfully after running to catch his call.
“Hey,” he grinned at the sound of her voice and her heavy breathing. He liked that she’d clearly made an effort to speak to him. “What are you up to?”
“What are you up to?” she answered his question with a question.
“I’m asking you what you’re up to.”
“Well, I just got done freaking out about my car being stolen, and… now I’m planting tomatoes.”
“Are you serious? Someone stole your Range?”
“Well, no. The reason I stopped freaking out is because I realized it was towed. I was parked in front of a driveway.”
“Wow,” he laughed loudly. “That’s… special.”
“I’m special,” she admitted with a sigh, still happy that he thought to call her. “Besides pestering me, what are you up to?”
“Oh… nothing really.”
“I didn’t think you’d call,” she grinned meekly.
“I didn’t think I would either, but… I found myself dragging my feet this morning and you seemed like a good pick-me-up.”
“I can’t tell whether that’s a compliment or an insult.”
“Just a fact,” he reasoned. “Speaking of which, what are you doing today?”
“How is that speaking of which?”
“What?”
“What do my plans for the afternoon and-or evening have to do with what we were just speaking of?”
“Well I said I was dragging my feet this morning, and then I thought of all I have to do today, so I figured I’d ask what’s on your plate. Is that irrational?”
“Fair enough,” she allowed, pulling herself from the ground to head back inside her house. “But correct me if I’m wrong, didn’t you tell me you were engaged? Was that a nightmare? …Please tell me it was…”
He couldn’t help but smile in reply. “No, I am engaged. But we can be friends, right?”
“I guess,” she coughed uneasily, knowing that would be easier said than done. “I… I mean if you think that’s all right.”
“It’s fine. I have plenty of friends that are girls.”
“Is that so?”
“Well not really. But you wouldn’t be the first.”
“All right,” she sighed again, trying to figure a scenario where this didn’t end disastrously. “And to answer your question, I am… having a party tonight.”
“And you weren’t gonna invite me? Shit, maybe we can’t be friends.”
“Shut up, you can come. It’s just this little thing I do with my friends, one of my episodes is airing.”
“One of your episodes?” he asked in confusion, realizing he never quite got the full scope of her job. “What does that mean?”
“I told you I’m a writer for The Office, didn’t I?”
“You did,” he recalled, “but you said you didn’t act, so... what?”
“Oh right, you disappeared in the middle of our conversation.”
“I didn’t disappear! I told you I was leaving.”
“It was awkward, though, and pretty discourteous, actually. But no, I don’t act,” she confirmed. “When I say one of my episodes is airing, that means that the episode, the script was my idea, I wrote it all.”
“Seriously? No one helps you?”
“Well… no, not at first. The way Greg Daniels “ he’s the creator, executive producer, and head writer--.”
“I know who he is,” Justin assured her.
“Well ‘scuse me, I’m just trying to be informative,” she snapped jokingly. “Well, what he does is if we have an idea, we have to create an entire episode around it. We can get help from the other writing staff if we so choose, but before we submit it to him, it has to be a complete episode. So I usually like to do scripts on my own, get them approved “ because that’s where the real money is--.”
“Of course,” he injected.
“And then once we decide where to put the episode, it comes to the entire staff and we meet and debate over it for two months, we discuss direction and psychology and the broader questions, and eventually, we shoot it.”
“That’s interesting.”
“And then, of course, Steve Carell comes in and improvs everything so our jobs are kind of pointless,” she added with a laugh. “But I like it anyway.”
“That’s a pretty badass job,” he commented, feeling a strange tinge of pride for her. “How did you manage that?”
“Well, my parents are friends with Greg, so that didn’t hurt --.”
“Ah, nepotism rears its wonderfully unfair head.”
“Well fuck you very much, I’m good at my job. I’ve been with the show for two seasons and I’ve already had three episodes green-lit. The very first one that I submitted was aired and subsequently ranked number five out of all twenty-six last season. Trust me, no matter what favor Greg owed my parents, none of that would have happened if I weren’t good. I worked my way up, starting in college, I wrote for the Harvard Lampoon, the Hasty Pudding Theatricals, and I was the president of our improv troupe… so no, it was not nepotism.” She let her words sink into the air before adding, “…They just needed more women on their staff, so it was more like affirmative action rearing its unfair head, actually.”
“I stand corrected,” he chuckled awkwardly, not at all used to people speaking to him so candidly.
“Yes, you do.”
“What episode was yours last season?”
“Do you watch the show regularly?”
“Umm, pretty regularly, yeah.”
“Well, it was called ‘The Duel.’ When Andy found out about Dwight and Angela and tried to run over him in the parking lot.”
“Oh really? That was one of my favorite episodes.”
“Are you saying that just to humor me after you’ve pissed me off?”
“No, it’s one of few that I remember from last season,” he proclaimed sincerely. “Side note, you guys have taken a huge downhill turn from what you were in the first couple of seasons.”
“Do you want me to hate you? Is that it?”
“I’m kidding, I’m kidding,” he laughed happily. “Honestly, it is one of my favorite shows on right now, one of the few that I watch. So I’d be honored to come to your party tonight.”
“Don’t get excited, it’s really low budget shit, we drink cheap wine and eat Chinese food.”
“I’m game,” he smirked. “What time should I be there?”
“We convene at around seven-thirty, but as long as you’re here before nine.”
“Sounds good.”
“So… awesome. You’re gonna meet all my friends, and be nice to them, and it’s gonna be oodles of fun.”
“Why wouldn’t I be nice to them?”
“Well, you just told me I got my job because of my parents and that the show sucks now, so… clearly, you’re not known as the polite guy.”
“I said I was kidding!”
“Uh huh.” She knew he was joking, but she was undeniably pretty sensitive about her work. “I’ll see you tonight, stranger.”
“Later.”
____________________
Later came sooner than Justin expected, and he found himself running late to Zooey’s party. He meant to pick up some wine “ the non-cheap kind “ and stop by his house for one of his The Office DVDs for her to sign, but he wasn’t able to do any of that once he was done with a long day of handling business stuff with Trace.
When he arrived at the address she gave him, still dressed in his ‘work clothes’ “ William Rast jeans, plaid shirt, and blazer “ he wondered exactly what he had gotten himself into. Zooey lived in Los Feliz, an area notoriously known as a dwelling for hipsters, and her small home was a definite contrast to the $80,000 Range Rover she was driving around in. Still, he parked his Audi on a street full of seventies BMWs and hybrid Volkswagens, aside from Zooey’s car, and hiked up her steep driveway.
“Good evening, good evening,” Zooey greeted him before he could even ring the doorbell. She wore a green and white plaid sundress, managing to match Justin’s shirt as if they planned it. “Glad you could make it.”
He eyed her, clearly amused by her choice of clothing. “I told you I would come.”
“That’s what she said,” she giggled at her show’s well-known pun and stepped back to let him inside. “Let me give you a quick tour and then I’ll introduce you to my dudes and dudettes.”
Zooey’s house was pretty nicely decorated, a bit of a contrast to its exterior, where her small lawn was unkempt, her stucco was chipping, and the red paint on her front door was peeling. Inside, however, was much more charming, done up with contemporary square furniture and walls painted in rich yellows and purples. Most endearingly, she had paintings of one of the Beatles on each of the walls of her living room, one of the Rat Pack on each wall of her dining room, and her halls were lined with portraits of some of SNL’s greatest, including Gilda Radner, Phil Hartman, John Belushi, Eddie Murphy, and Tina Fey. Justin definitely liked what he saw, and regretted judging her house by its cover.
“You have an awesome place here,” he noted genuinely once they were back at the front of the one-story home.
“Thanks. I just bought it about a month ago, so there’s still a ton of work to be done, especially exterior-wise, but I likes it.”
“Well if you need help with any of that stuff, you can always give me a call…”
“Really?”
“Yeah. I know a great yard service.”
“Very funny,” she rolled her eyes, taking his hand to bring him back to the living room where her friends had convened to play Wii until the nine o’clock hour. “Guys, I want you to meet Justin.”
Her friends, an eclectic group of twenty-somethings looked up, a bit surprised that the Justin she had previously mentioned was Timberlake. “Hey,” some of them greeted him collectively.
The group read like a Benetton ad, all different colors of the rainbow, all unbelievably thin and uniquely attractive under their veil of tousled hair and clothing designed to make them look like they didn’t necessarily care about their appearances.
“That’s Lacey,” Zooey began to point them out, referring to a gorgeous dark-skinned girl perched on the couch with her mile-long legs crossed. “Besides Em, she’s my best friend.”
“Hi,” she grinned, lighting up the room.
“Hello,” Justin smiled back, admiring her extra large afro before meeting her gaze.
“She’s the first person I met when I moved here,” Zooey explained to him. “We were sitting together on a flight from New York, we became friends instantly.”
“You just make friends wherever you go, don’t you?”
“Pretty much,” she nodded, moving on. “That’s Andrew.” She pointed to a skeletal white dude with lots of facial hair, sitting on the floor at the coffee table, drinking a glass of red wine.
Justin could already tell Andrew was an asshole, just by the way he refused to look up, but Justin greeted him anyway. “What’s up.”
“Hey,” he answered, still avoiding eye contact.
“Tiana is the one playing right now.” She was a cute Hispanic girl with big multicolored hair, several tattoos adorning her wrists and forearms, and an awesome Wii tennis player.
“Nice to meet you,” she called out between shots.
“Nice to meet you, too.”
“And that’s Jon.” Jon was a tall Asian guy, his thick black hair covering his eyes, and lots of cookies sitting in front of him at the end of the table. When he got up to shake Justin’s hand, he realized that Jon was wearing William Rast jeans and immediately liked him.
“Good to meet you,” he returned with the handshake.
“Same here,” Jon answered.
“And Tennille and Adrian will be here soon,” Zooey finished. “But in the meantime, make yourself at home. I’m gonna finish up dinner, but play yourself a round of Wii golf or whatever.”
“I thought we were having Chinese.”
“We had that last week,” Andrew inserted, a bit obnoxiously. “Zo’s making pizza and sliders, if that’s all right with you.”
“That’s fine with me,” Justin retorted.
Zooey smiled to alleviate the mounting tension in the room and gently touched Justin’s arm. “You want something to drink? A beer?”
“A Corona if you have it.”
“Coming right up.”
As she headed towards the back of the room where her kitchen was situated, Justin took a seat on the sofa next to Lacey. He was about to ask her a friendly question or two, but Andrew glanced at him coldly, so he opted not to speak.
“What’s it like?” Andrew eyed him.
“What’s… what like?” Justin wondered with a nervous smile.
“Clueless,” he shook his head.
Rubbing his stubbly cheek, Justin turned to Lacey, who was already rolling her eyes at their friend. “Did I miss something?”
“No,” she assured him. “He’s just a bitter little dude.”
“Lacey, why don’t we play some music?” Jon piped up, wanting to subdue their conversation before it got out of hand.
“But not the soulless bullshit kept alive by people like this dude over here,” Andrew curtly supplied, clearly referring to Justin. “Play some real music.”
“Andy, chill,” Tiana hissed.
“What? Justin can probably tell you firsthand, everything played on the radio is responsible for the downward turn of American music. It’s the birthplace of mediocrity.”
Justin couldn’t help but laugh, as he’d been through this conversation a couple of times before with know-it-alls just like this dude. “Maybe it’s born there, but it’s conceived by hipster assholes who think they’re too disparate to like what’s popular. So we get people like Ke$ha infecting the airwaves for six months before I come in and reclaim my rightful spot at the top of the charts.”
“You’re perpetuating lies to people, you know. What exactly is SexyBack about? How do you sing something you don’t feel?”
“Come on, Andrew. We all compromise for some sake or another,” Zooey inserted in an attempt to simultaneously defend and criticize Justin.
Justin glanced back at her curiously, surprised that she thought him a sellout, considering what she did for a living. She wasn’t exactly some starving talent on a struggling television show.
“How do you sleep at night?” Andrew asked him seriously.
“On a bed made of money,” he shot back with a smirk, not missing a beat.
“You’re actually proud of what you do.”
“Well how would you people ever know what you’re supposed to like if all us successful folk weren’t around for you to hate?”
“Oh, I’m sorry, is success defined by how many times you’re played on the radio in an hour?”
“Only if you like being paid.”
“Well if it means peddling that swill you call music to the masses, then I guess I am unsuccessful.”
“And… what do you do exactly?”
“Right now, I’m a waiter at the Four Seasons,” he admitted cockily. “But I’m in the process of starting a record label.”
“I hope that works out for you.”
“It’s working.”
As the opening notes to a song by The Smiths began to fill the room, Justin realized that this evening would only get worse before it even got started. “I should go. I’m clearly too uncool for this crowd.”
“What’s wrong? You afraid your fancy car’s gonna get stolen?”
“Well, Zooey’s car is more expensive than mine, so… no.”
“It was a Christmas gift from my parents!” she called out from the kitchen. “If I were loaded, I would not live here.”
“Well either way,” Justin got out of his seat and headed to where Zooey was preparing plates. “I really should go.”
“Ignore them,” she countered quietly. “They’re sitting here waiting to watch The Office. They are the paragon of popular culture. Your album is probably the most played on Andy’s iPod, behind the rouse of some ‘underground’ band called Ekal Rebmit.”
It took a minute, but he laughed when he realized she’d said his name backwards. “Jon is wearing my jeans,” he recalled.
“Stay,” she maintained, placing her hand on his. She offered him a small square piece of her homemade pizza margherita, smiling at him as he took a bite. “I’ll protect you.”
____________________
Hours later, after airings of The Office and 30 Rock, and a delicious dinner to match, when the group began to discuss Dostoevsky, Justin took that as his cue to leave.
“You guys, it’s been an… enlightening evening,” he interrupted them to announce. “Lacey, Jon, Tiana, Tennile, it was really nice meeting you.” He purposely left out Andrew, as well as the newcomer, Adrian, who apparently shared Andrew’s musical philosophies, as they had made it a point to be rude to Justin all evening. “Zooey, thanks for having me.”
She quickly leapt from her spot on the hardwood floor in order to walk him out. “You stayed longer than I thought you would.”
“Did you tell your friends to act like assholes?”
“Well you know, whenever people are given the opportunity to talk about something, the subtext is always, ‘I’m intelligent,’ or ‘I’m interesting. Now discuss!’” She rolled her eyes at some of her friends’ off-putting smugness. “Don’t let them bother you.”
“But you do have to admit that there’s a difference between arrogance and outright rudeness. Adrian and Andrew were rude.”
She smirked as she opened the door for him, escorting him outside. “I know you’re used to people kissing your ass, but like I said before, it’s okay to get knocked down sometimes.”
“Says the girl who has a party just to make people a witness to her achievements.”
“If I don’t, no one else will.”
“Well, to be totally honest, I wasn’t a huge fan of your episode tonight.”
Her green eyes brightened in shock. “Rude!”
“Shhhoooouuumm.” He made a weird sound as he brought his hand from her actual height, down to that of a child. “Down to size.”
“Anyway,” she waved him off, offended. “Thanks for coming.”
“Really, thanks for having me. Scarlett is off in New York getting her wedding dress and being preoccupied with that…stuff, so I’ve been on my own all week. It was getting lonely.”
“Scarlett,” she nodded, her expression falling. Last thing she wanted was to be able to put a name to his fiancée’s existence. “You would marry a Scarlett.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” he smirked.
“I don’t know. I just think of Scarlett Johansson when I hear that name, and she just seems like your type. Fucking perfect. Anybody named Scarlett would be your type.”
He couldn’t help but smile at the thought that his future wife was perfect. “I am engaged to Scarlett Johansson,” he confirmed, twisting the knife just a little more.
Zooey was a bit of a pop culture fiend, so she wasn’t sure how she missed that bit of information in the six years they’d apparently been together. “Of course you are.”
“We keep a low profile,” he added, reading her confused mind.
“Well then, I’m glad to be filling a void for your fucking perfect fiancée.”
“You didn’t do a bad job,” he decided, flashing his flawless grin.
“Asshole,” she whispered with a shake of her head, secretly loving the thought that she could even be mentioned in the same breath.
“Have a good night,” he saluted her goodbye and quickly turned from the scene, heading back for his Audi before he risked the possibility of being discovered by a camera lens.
He almost couldn't wait to get back to his car, back to even the slightest feeling of comfort. Zooey, as cool as she was, gave him an odd feeling. It wasn’t exactly an unpleasant one, but there was definitely something there that he couldn’t pinpoint, which he never liked. For much of his professional life, Justin was on the move, never really knowing what to expect, so in his personal affairs, he had come to crave predictability, security, and ease. Being around Zooey and her friends, he felt anything but. So he called Scarlett.
“I just sat around in my wedding dress for like three hours,” she answered his call gleefully. “Like in that one episode of Friends…”
“So I guess I don’t have to ask what you’re up to,” he chuckled lightly, though he was reminded of Zooey and her dislike for that show. He was constantly reminded of Zooey, it appeared. “Everything fits?”
“So long as I don’t gain a single ounce,” she nodded to the phone with a hoarse giggle. “And they’re gonna have to tape my boobs down.”
“Whoever ‘they’ are need to leave your boobs alone.”
“They’re a commodity, babe. They can’t be left alone.”
“I’m not sure how I feel about that,” he joked dryly.
“Anyway, where have you been? I called you a couple hours ago.”
“I went to this party,” he imparted honestly, looking over to Zooey’s house, as he hadn’t yet moved from his parking spot. She was still standing in her doorway, her thin frame illuminated by the light inside her house. “A get-together, really, for an acquaintance.”
“You sound like you didn’t have a good time,” she recognized his lackluster tone.
He looked to Zooey one last time before finally turning on his car. “I did have a good time. I just miss you.”
“Stop being adorable.”
“Ride home with me?”
“Gladly,” she agreed in a goofy, nasally tone. “Let’s play The Moment,” she suggested.
“Okay.”
“You go first.”
“Ummm,” he thought for a full minute as he pulled out of his sparking space and into the quiet street, silently saying goodnight to Zooey. “The moment you first found me repulsive.”
“Oh god, that night we had Jamaican takeout at my apartment? And you took the smelliest dump ever! I was so offended.”
“That’s nasty, Tess.”
“It’s repulsive, I know!” she laughed earnestly. “Like, we had only known each other a few weeks, I really had to think hard about calling you again.”
“I told you, though, that it was gonna be a bad one.”
“That did not help your case,” she was still giggling uncontrollably. “But, clearly, I got over it.”
“Clearly,” he suppressed a laugh himself. “You go.”
“The… moment you… knew you wanted to marry me.”
“I’ve done that one before.”
“Yeah, but I like hearing it,” she maintained, knowing that he liked telling it. “G‘head.”
“The moment I wanted to marry you was that night, it was during my second stint on SNL, the one when you introduced me,” he explained, even though she knew every detail of this story better than him by now. “…And during one sketch, you were just a few feet away at the side of the stage, watching me make a fool of myself, and there was a line that I messed up; I was trying to say, ‘A tiny beam of light,’ but pretty much everything came out but that. And I looked over and saw you cracking the fuck up, your face had turned pink, it was… moving. You were so happy. And I thought, ‘If that’s all I have to do to make her laugh… if I had anything to do with that, I would be the happiest man on the planet.’ Seeing you happy made me happy. And that was it for me.”
At least, back then, it had been.
Bon Temps, Trés Innocent by Ashley
Author's Notes:
Don't you hate when you're busy ALL weekend? I meant to post this earlier, but hey, better late than never, right? I added a link to the cast photo to the story notes, but you can ch-ch-check it out here, too: (Copy & Paste) http://i28.tinypic.com/33uxv6p.jpg
Enjoy! - Ash
4: Bon Temps, Trés Innocent
“So listen,” Zooey demanded the minute Justin finally picked up his phone after four weeks of silence. “It’s come to my attention that you haven’t used my number in about a month now, and I’m starting to feel neglected.”
“Neglected?” he chuckled, happy to hear her voice. “I’m pretty sure I gave you my number too, so your argument is invalid.”
“Well I’m an old-fashioned girl, I allow the dude to call the shots.”
“Zooey, you are anything but old-fashioned.”
“True…”
“But no, I’ve just been hella busy with golf tournaments and wedding planning and whatnot.”
“Weddings,” she remarked sarcastically, involuntarily rolling her eyes at the idea. “I’m not sure how I feel being relegated to the back burner, behind a party.”
“Again,” he began, putting on his ‘flamboyant’ tone, “I’m pretty sure I haven’t heard a peep from you, girlfriend.”
“To be honest, I was thinking that maybe my friends scared you off, so I didn’t wanna be all up on you like that.”
“Nah, it takes more than that to scare me off,” he laughed. “It’s good to hear from you.”
“I’m glad you answered,” she admitted with a grin to herself. “I’ve been so excruciatingly bored without all of our sarcastic banter.”
“Is that so?”
“Well no, I’ve been pretty busy too,” she countered, just as she began to gather her keys, wallet, purse, and a Rice Krispy Treat so she could head out of the house. “Don’t you hate being a grown-up?”
“I have yet to become one, so I wouldn’t know.”
“You’re so funny,” she commented cheerfully.
“I try. Too hard sometimes,” he grinned. “What grown-up things are you up to today?”
“Well… not a whole lot, actually. I’m about to go to work and sleep at my desk, if you want the truth.”
“Oh okay, that sounds productive.”
“I have to be unproductive until I’m productive. I’m sure you know how that is.”
“I guess so,” he realized, pulling the keys out of his ignition to head into his own home. “I s’pose that means I should let you go, huh.”
“Why are you letting me go?”
“Well you said you were going to work, so I figured you can’t really talk at the moment…”
“I wouldn’t have called you if I couldn’t talk! I’m gonna put on my Bluetooth and you’re gonna talk me all the way to the office,” she shot back enthusiastically. “Let's talk.”
”All right, well tell me something.”
“I’ll tell you anything.”
“Tell me what’s gonna happen on The Office this season.”
“I can tell you that I can’t tell you anything about that,” she laughed. She heard several doors slamming within the course of a few seconds and wondered, “By the way, what the hell are you doing?”
“I’m getting out of the car. Is that disturbing you?”
“A little, yeah.”
“Well I’m out now, so…”
“So is there anything else you care about, or do you just want me to lose my job?”
“Well…”
“Fuck, dude. I thought you liked me.”
“I like you for what you can potentially provide,” he nodded into the phone. “Sorry.”
“It’s all right. You wouldn’t be the first, I’m sure you won’t be the last,” she sighed.
“Really, I apologize. Sometimes, I act first, think later.”
“That is dangerous. Especially for someone like you,” Zooey advised. She was kidding, but it was definitely something for him to take note of.
“I know, I know. But can you blame me?”
“I can, actually.”
“So anyway…” he trailed off, entering his empty home. With Scarlett out of town and Brennan and Buckley at the groomers, the house was much more quiet than he would have liked.
“So you haven’t come up with anything to say yet, huh?”
“Not quite,” he chuckled, feeling a bit lame as he fell into his expensive beige couch.
“Okay, tell me about 'her.'"
"Her?" He knew who she was talking about, but he thought Scarlett a subject left best uncovered by he and Zooey.
"Your future wife! Let’s talk about Scarlett. Why are you marrying her?"
"Because I love her."
"That's it?"
“Should there be something else?" he asked dryly.
“Well no, but I mean, like, why do you love her? What are you getting out of this?"
"What do you mean?” he asked louder than he intended, feeling defensive. “She makes me happy, we're happy together."
“She makes you laugh?”
“Constantly.”
“That's good.”
“Is she an interesting person?” Zooey pressed. “Does she have a cool story to tell?”
“Well she's marrying me, so obviously...”
“Yeah, I suppose you do have to be pretty interesting to wanna marry a deluded person like yourself. “
“Exactly. “
“So that's cool. Is she your soulmate?”
“Undoubtedly.”
“Awesommme.”
“I'm surprised you even know what a soulmate is,” he quipped, a bit unsettled by her line of questioning.
“Well that's not at all rude.”
“You're the one who scoffed at my wedding. “
“It wasn't your wedding I was scoffing at,” she defended. “Just the general concept of marriage.”
“Oh okay, that makes it better.”
“I don’t mean to be a Debbie Downer, the thought of marriage just makes me cringe.”
“Don’t be bitter just because you aren’t in love, Zooey. Be better.”
“I’m not bitter! I mean, no I’m not in love, and I tend to be skeptical of it, but I certainly believe in the whole prospect of spectacular, conscience-altering love, yeah.”
“You do.” It was a question, but came off as more of a disbelieving statement.
“Yeah!” she exclaimed feeling slighted. “I mean, come on, I'm one of the worst exponents of the entire Jim and Pam storyline. Of course I believe in fairytales.”
“Just because you sell it doesn't necessarily mean you buy it,” he answered smartly.
“That's true,” she allowed, “but... No, I do buy it and believe in it, and to a certain extent, I even hope for it. But I also know that it's a rare commodity, and that, like, ninety percent of the people getting married these days have absolutely not found it. They say all the right words and make it look good, but all these formulaic marriages, where you get engaged after two-point-five to three years, and married within another year? That's lazy. People settle so often when they shouldn't.”
“And you correlate settling with... failing?”
“By definition, it is, yeah. Failing to meet your own expectations, agreeing on something less than what you wanted.”
“Were your parents not right for each other or something?”
“What?” The question rattled her… much in the same way you’re rattled when someone asks how much you weigh or how much money you make. But you know that in refusing to answer, you risk looking defensive or rude. “What do you mean?”
“What's so bad about people declaring their love after spending three long years together?”
“Three years is nothing! In the grand scheme of life, that's a blip. You're saying, ‘Well we've made it this long together, now's the time where society says if we haven't tied the knot yet, we have to break up!’ It's bullshit. Utter bullshit.”
“It's not bullshit. So what if people wanna be 'normal' and subscribe to societal ideals. Why do you care?”
“How long had you and ‘her’ been together before you got engaged?”
“Ummm...” he took a moment to think of that magical day that he proposed. It wasn’t magical at all, really, compared to most engagements, he guessed, but then, those stories were seldom as interesting as couples made them seem. And Justin wasn’t about pretense, he knew that he and Scarlett’s relationship wasn’t much of a fairytale, but more or less, the two of them just existing. Sure, they had had a private relationship for much of their six-or-so years together, but even in that, they reveled in uncomplicatedness.
The proposal occurred the morning they stepped off of a red-eye from New York, and into LAX. He didn’t get down on one knee or even halt their stroll towards ground transportation. He had been carrying the ring around for months, waiting for the right moment, and he found it as they treaded the relatively vacant terminal, the early morning sunlight hitting his Scarlett in all the ways that told him she was who he wanted to wake up with for the rest of his life. It was in that moment, he decided to casually pop the question, knowing that Scarlett was as undemanding and simple as he. He asked her to marry him, pulling the ring from his backpack, and glanced at her for an answer. He knew she would be taken aback, because they had never seriously discussed the idea, but it didn’t take her more than a highly-charged ten seconds to give him a resounding yes. And then, they were engaged. Simple as that.
Recalling all this before finally answering Zooey, he said, “I proposed around the five and a half year mark…”
“That's a little better," she nodded to herself. "Honestly, I much more respect the people that get married within two weeks. Not just wasting months and months to decide if he or she is 'good enough.'"
“And your parents got married when?”
“Why are you so worried about my parents?”
“Because there’s a reason you’re so adamant about this, and I feel like it started at home,” he rationalized.
“Well they were college sweethearts “ another colossal misstep, by the way. They were together six years before they got married. And then fifteen years before they got a divorce. But that's because my mother is a conniving cunt, which is a long, sordid story for another date and time.”
“Ahh. I see.”
“And you’re right, she's definitely the reason I'm like this, so don't blame me for my fucked up ideals. She molded them. “
“I think it's smart to be smart about love,” he offered diplomatically, “but cynicism is just sad. It basically means that your walls are already up before you've even met anyone. He could be absolutely perfect for you and you'd still find a million ways to fuck it all up and make him run. You'd still make him crazy with your paranoia and your closed-mindedness. You would never let the relationship work because, according to you, you already know exactly where it's going and how it's going to end."
Zooey fell silent for a moment because she felt everything he said and then some. Sometimes, she did feel like it was her fate to run every good man away, even though that was never her actual intent.
"And I understand that your mom could've completely fucked you up - that happens, because parents suck sometimes “ but the absolute last thing you should do is let that define you and your relationships for the rest of your life. Learn from her mistakes."
"Whenever I write a Jim and Pam storyline, I think of my mom and then have them do everything exactly the opposite,” she laughed playfully. “But no, like I said, I honestly believe I'm a dreamer and believer in love at the heart of it all. I just talk a lot of shit about it."
"That's those walls you're already trying to build."
"Okay, that’s enough, Doctor J.” She had had more than enough of exploring her psyche for one morning. “Fuck, I thought my mom was bad with all the psychoanalyses. Do you have degrees in this shit?"
"I don't have any degrees in anything! I just observe and report."
"You're good at it. I bet your friends come to you for advice all the time."
"My female friends do. My guy friends don't know they're fucked up, or they don't care, I guess. But Scarlett's friends? They call me before they call her if they need advice."
“That's awesome," Zooey smiled brightly into her phone. "You are absolutely my new advisor."
"Looking forward to it."
"If you fuck me up, I will sue you, though."
"Looking forward to that as well."
"You're silly," she laughed lightly, then immediately dreading that work was in such close proximity to her house. "Hey dude, I gotta get on in to work, but would it be all right if I called you tomorrow?"
"If you don't, then I'll certainly call you."
"Ho shit, is that a promise?"
"I'd say it's like eighty percent promise, fifteen percent hopeful, and six percent bullshit."
"That's a hundred and one, Justin."
"There's a one percent margin of error, so..."
"Gotchaaa."
"So we'll talk tomorrow."
"That's the plan."
"All right then, buddy. 'Til it be morrow."
"Hey," she stopped him before he could leave.
"Yeah?"
"Are you busy tonight?"
"I have a couple of things to do, but nothing pressing. Why?"
"You wanna go bowling?"
"Bowling?"
"Yeah, one of my friends is having a get together at Lucky Strike and I have no partner..."
Truth be told, Justin definitely needed to be packing for his imminent trip to New York, but he had no idea how to say No to Zooey, it seemed. "Umm, okay. Yeah, sure."
"You sure?"
“Wait, it’s not Andrew who’s throwing this little shindig, is it?” Last thing he wanted was to show up at any function that son of a bitch was hosting.
“No,” she snorted, still amused by how Justin handled himself. “I actually just met this chick like a week ago, but she invited me and said to bring along my crew, so...”
"Well okay, yeah. That sounds fun. You mind if I bring a couple of friends?"
"Not at all."
"And what time is this going down?"
"From ten-ish until... whenever."
"All right then, I'll see you tonight," he croaked out, already knowing that his relationship with Zooey was leaning towards inappropriate. But it's not like they'd spent much time alone together. They were in groups with friends and nothing inappropriate at all, when he thought about it. It was very innocent.
"Aight then, I'll holla at cha."
"Later," he chuckled before finally ending the call.
When he hung up, he saw that he had two texts from Scarlett that he hadn't at all noticed coming in, he found himself her just to apologize.
"Hey you," she answered happily.
"Sorry, I just got your texts; I was on the phone."
"This is becoming a bad habit," she noted jokingly. "You didn't have to call though, I just wanted to know what time you got in tomorrow."
"My flight lands at five-ish."
"Oookay, good so you'll be in the city by seven. Did you wanna go see In the Heights or no?"
"Umm, yeah. We can do that. Whatever you want."
"Well I'm asking what you want."
"I want whatever you want."
"I… want you to make a decision."
"Well I said yes, so..."
"But you appended that your yes was with regard to what I wanted."
"Babe. I wanna go," he chuckled in an attempt to lighten the mounting unnecessary tension. “Can we let this one go?”
Scarlett seemed frustrated all of a sudden, but she relented. "Okay, I’m sorry. Yeah."
"Yeah?"
"Yes," she sighed.
"Are you all right?"
"I'm fine." She sighed again, a bit less exasperated this time. "I'm just really stressed out, between this play and this wedding, I need sleep, I haven't eaten today. I'm a mess."
"Well we don't have to go see anything, babe. We can just stay home, order in, talk... I feel like I haven't seen you in forever."
"Really?"
"I mean, I meant it when I said whatever you want. I just wanna be with you."
"You just can’t help yourself, can you?"
“What’d I do?”
“You’re perfect and I just don’t understand how or why.”
He blushed and winced at the mere notion that he was perfect. He was far from it, as far as he was concerned. "I don't know, it's in my blood, apparently."
"I love you," she grinned into the phone with a much happier exhale.
"I love you, too."
"See you tomorrow?"
"You will see me tomorrow."
____________________
The day seemed to end on a good note, as Justin, along with Rob and Trace, had joined Zooey and her troop for a rousing two hours of bowling, where Justin was averaging about 270 per game. On top of that, the food left nothing to be desired, as they were stuffed with everything from spinach dip appetizers to fresh baked pizza, and an endless supply of any drinks they wanted, so he was definitely in a happy place by half past midnight.
And as their group dwindled, Zooey took it upon herself to finally approach him, seeing how they hadn’t said more than ten words to one another all evening. As it turned out, Trace ended up being her bowling buddy. “Did you have fun?” she wondered, walking up to Justin as he was removing his rental shoes.
“Yeah,” he smiled politely. “It was a good night. I think your friends are getting used to me.”
“Well they didn’t all hate you, you know.”
“That makes me feel sooo good,” he chuckled. He moved over so that she could fit on the leather loveseat with him. “Did you have fun?”
“Well my game wasn’t quite as ‘on’ as yours was, but yeah,” she sighed, falling back into the seat tiredly. “I’m glad you came.”
“You are refreshingly honest,” he announced, suddenly realizing what a rarity that was in a city that was full of so much bullshit. People in Los Angeles never showed their hands, always putting up a front for one reason or another, but Zooey had no poker face. She conveyed everything she felt or didn’t feel, whether you liked it or not. “I like that.”
“I get that a lot,” she nodded. “But it means a little bit more coming from you. I don’t take you to be full of shit like the rest of Hollywood.”
“I appreciate that.”
“Join me outside?”
He also kind of liked that she preferred to be outside a lot “ not confined to spaces or… anything really “ even if it was primarily so she could smoke a cigarette. “Sure.”
He followed her to the shoe rental area, dropping off their unattractive bowling shoes, trading them for his retro Jordans and her Balenciaga flats. From there, they traced outside, near the valet stand, where Zooey lit up her cancer stick and stared giddily at her new friend.
“How long will you be in New York?” she asked him, as she just had to know how long she would be forced to live without his company.
“Not sure,” he answered vaguely. “I usually play it by ear, but… probably about ten days, give or take a day.”
“Autumn in New York is so fucking badass,” she commented enviously.
“It is,” he agreed quietly. “Except my apartment is right by the river and it is fucking freezing over there anytime between October and April.”
“That sounds about right,” she recalled the days when she briefly lived in New York, where her apartment, as well, was situated along the East River and she wanted to kill herself. Even after growing up in Boston, the chill was biting to her some days.
“Did I tell you I’m hosting SNL next week?”
“Well, I kind of knew that, probably before you did,” she reminded him that her job was exactly zero degrees of separation from Saturday Night Live.
“Right,” he grinned knowingly.
“That doesn’t make me any less jealous, though. That’s one thing I’d love to be able to do.”
“What? Host SNL?”
“Yes!”
“Really?”
“Or head writer. Hell, I’d clean the toilets if it meant I got to roam those halls once in a while.”
“You’d be good as either one,” he noted earnestly, thinking of how much she made him laugh, seemingly effortlessly.
“I like to think so, but… I don’t know. I look at people like you and Jon Hamm and wonder if I could ever compare.”
“Oh, god.” He could feel himself turning a shy shade of pink.
She chuckled to herself, thinking of Justin playing Shelby Hastings. “There are few things sexier than a man who doesn’t take himself seriously.”
“I couldn’t disagree less,” he granted in jest.
“See? Sexy.”
“One that thing is sexier, though, is a woman who doesn’t take herself seriously.”
“My only worry is that I don’t take myself seriously enough,” she revealed, letting smoke billow from her mouth.
“By the way, this portion of our conversation has seriously overused the word, ‘seriously,’” he remarked.
Half joking, she concurred. “Seriously.”
Noticing that Trace had come outside, presumably searching for Justin, he deduced that it was time to finally say goodbye. “Well, I guess I should head on out,” he sighed, not quite ready to put the cap on his good night.
Zooey nodded and stared out to the parking lot scene before them, finally putting out her cigarette altogether. “When do I get to meet your better half, mister?”
“I dunno,” he shrugged, not sure whether he wanted to take Scarlett down that awkward road. Or Zooey, for that matter. “You want to?”
“I would love to meet the woman that snatched you up.”
He smiled bashfully and leaned against the building behind them. He always felt like the lucky one in their relationship, being the guy that managed to swoop up Scarlett Johansson. “One day,” he promised, not really intending to keep that one.
“All right, leave me, dude,” she motioned to give him a hug, feeling a slight butterfly effect in her stomach when his hand accidentally slipped underneath her leather jacket and grazed the small of her back. “Have fun in New York.”
“Have fun in Los Angeles,” he returned. “I’ll call you.”
She smirked, hoping that he actually would. “You better.”
Just as he disappeared back toward the entrance, Zooey realized that some guy with a video camera was approaching, and she knew he was headed straight for her. Thanks to Emile, she had had her share of run-ins with the paparazzi, but never one-on-one, and never having to defer them herself. “Shit,” she whispered to herself, yet still thankful there was only one guy.
She immediately turned to the valet stand, wanting to get her car as quickly as possible and get the hell out of there before her night was fucked up.
“Hi,” the sloppily dressed camera dude came up to her, his recorder clearly focused on her.
She didn’t say anything, but didn’t want to go back inside, figuring things would only be worse when she came back out.
“How do you know Justin?” he asked her nosily.
She pulled out her phone, hoping to warn Justin before he could make it back outside, but just as she did so, he and his two friends appeared in the doorway, ready to leave as well. Maybe it was the several drinks she had consumed that were making her inwardly overreact to it all, but she was definitely freaking out.
“Zooey,” Rob called out to her, oblivious to the cameraman in front of her.
“Hey, dude.”
“You have a good time?”
“I did.” She hated sharing any part of her life with the stranger in front of them, but she knew that the weirder she acted, the more suspicious it would all seem. And in reality, all of it was very innocent. “Did you?”
“I did.” He offered her a hug as well, apparently extra friendly when tipsy, while Trace gave up their valet ticket.
“You gonna be okay getting home?” Trace asked, being that he was he designated driver for his own crew that night.
“I live, like, literally, around the corner,” she waved him off, just as her car approached. “I’ll be fine.”
“Justin,” the camera guy eventually interjected into their exchange, “did you have a good time tonight?”
Justin, as usual, ignored the unwelcome company and bid his friend Zooey a good evening. “Bye, Zo.”
She smiled in reply, allowing the valet driver to help her into her white SUV. “Bye, you guys.”
“Bye, Zooey!” Rob and Traced called back, almost simultaneously.
Once in her car, she let out a long, exasperated sigh of relief and vowed to never hang out with Justin in public again. She knew from experience how quickly pictures and videos circulated and how rumors got started “ and the last thing she wanted was for something that trivial to be the reason she couldn’t be friends with Justin anymore. Even if it was all very innocent.
Author's Notes:
I just wanted to give you guys a big ass THANK YOU for all the feedback you've given me. It keeps me so motivated and smiley lol. I'm slowly but surely replying to everyone, work is a bitch and I'm swamped, so bear with me! In the meantime, I don't even know what to say but thank you, thank you, thank you. You're far too kind. ILU guysss. - Ash
5: Fireworks
Is Justin cheating on Scarlett?
Quiet as it’s kept, superstars Justin Timberlake and Scarlett Johansson have been dating for several years now, and if you ask the right person, they’re even set to be married sooner than later. But video has surfaced of Justin hanging out with another woman this past Friday night, and he shares more with her than just a cigarette break. They are seen laughing and talking for several minutes outside Lucky Strike in Hollywood before embracing and then parting ways.
The mystery lady wouldn’t speak to our videographer, but separate sources say that she is Zooey Levin, sister of the ultra-fab girlfriend of Kanye West, Emile Levin. We’re not sure what this means for Justin’s impending nuptials, but watch the video and decide for yourself: Is Justin cheating on Scarlett?
Zooey had made the dire mistake of setting up a Google alert for any news-like items containing Emile’s name, as she found much amusement in most of the things bloggers had to say about her. She wished she had kept count of how many times the phrases, “absolutely fabulous” or “trying too hard” had been used to describe her sister. But the more recognizable Em became, the more Zooey realized she didn’t want to know what other people thought. Comments went from comical to downright vicious and she meant to edit her Google settings long before that morning.
But alas, she hadn’t yet gotten around to it, and so when she scrolled through her alerts, imagine her surprise when she glossed over a Justin Timberlake headline in relation to an ‘Emile Levin’ search.
“What the hell?” she said out loud to her empty kitchen. She quickly read through the story, mortified to find that the blurb was actually about her. “What the hell?!”
She only stared blankly at her glossy computer screen, scared to click on the linked video and see firsthand what the implications of a homewrecker looked like. Shocked and annoyed, she didn’t know what to do but call her sister.
“What?” Emile answered, though she shouldn’t have, as she had clearly been preoccupied with a deep slumber.
“Em, I’m on Google,” she whined, sounding every bit the baby sister that she was.
And coming off like the perpetually-agitated big sister, Emile barked back, “What?”
“I came up in a Google alert with you.”
“Bitch, do you know what time it is?”
Zooey glanced at the top of her computer screen and frowned. “It’s almost eleven thirty.”
“Oh.” With a loud sigh, Emile sat up in her bed in order to listen to her sibling. “Okay, what are you buggin’ about?”
“Goddamnit, Em. Okay,” she exhaled. “You know how we went out with Justin on Friday?”
“That was Friday? I thought that was weeks ago.”
“Not you and me ‘we!’”
“You went out with him again?”
“I told you I did!”
“Look, hooker, you know he’s getting married,” she reminded her, as if that weren’t part of the dilemma in the first place.
“No shit,” she rolled her eyes.
“You should’ve had your ass at a Temple Israel on Friday.”
As neither one of them had practiced Judaism for over a decade, Zooey easily glossed over Emile’s comment. “So anyway,” she went on, “we went bowling with a whole group, everything ended on a good note, and then my dumb ass asked him to go outside with me for a smoke.”
“Okay…”
“So we’re talking and doing a little of the tipsy flirt, I think, but still all harmless… and then we say good night.”
“Okay…”
“Then, like not more than a minute after he leaves, this cameraman appears out of the blue and starts talking to me.”
“And what did you say to him?”
“I didn’t say anything! I totally ignored him.”
“So… what’s the problem exactly?”
“Well, like I said, I woke up this morning, and the first thing I see is the video of us with a headline asking if Justin is cheating on his fiancée.”
Emile, in her groggy state of mind, tried to piece all of this useless information together and came to an irritating conclusion. “Is that why you’re calling me? Because of some fucking blogs?”
“Well what am I supposed to do?”
“Why do you need to do anything?” she asked as if the answer were obvious. “Did you kiss?”
“No,” she shook her head as if her sister were in front of her. “We just hugged.”
“You slutacious little harlot,” Emile joked, still wanting to strangle her sister for waking her up. “Seriously, Zo, this is a non-problem. Someone like Justin is more than used to bullshit like this. What did I tell you about caring so much?”
“That I’ll only get myself hurt,” she flatly repeated her sister’s words of wisdom from back when their parents were divorcing.
“That’s right. Now. Go revel in the fact that you’re about to be famous, little sister.”
Just when Zooey had resolved that she’d overreacted, she was back in a flit. “What?!”
“Well yeah, people are already deciding, at this very moment, that you two are fucking each other, so… prepare yourself!”
“Em, what--.”
“I gotta run, babe. Call me if you need to.”
And with that, Emile’s end of the line went silent, leaving Zooey to fend for herself. To put thoughts of her “affair” out of her head, she went on to read about Em and how she had been spotted in New York City rocking a neon multicolored, skin-tight dress, “looking brighter than a pack of tropical punch Capri Suns.” Knowing her sister, that sounded just about right and she couldn’t help but laugh. And maybe that was all she could do in her own situation as well. Laugh it off. She certainly hadn’t done anything wrong, so what else was there to do?
____________________
Meanwhile, at the other side of the country, Justin was engaged in things completely unrelated, oblivious to the rumor mill that had been started. Justin was certainly no stranger to speculation, but it had been years since anyone bothered to insinuate that he was cheating on his girlfriend. It seemed they got bored with the prospect, seeing how it always panned out to be nothing. That was precisely why he was mildly surprised when he got a text from Zooey warning him that they’d been “outed.”
A bit nervous at the thought, he locked himself in the front bathroom of his apartment and replied to her announcement: Lol, what do you mean?
Well it seems that after our outing on Friday night, people on the internet have decided that we’re in the midst of a torrid affair…
By ‘people on the internet’ please tell me you’re referring to the voices in your head
Lmao I wish
Are you serious right now?
Yes. I stumbled upon the stories this morning.
Plural?
Well it’s really just the same story in several different places, but still… embarrassing lol.
And suddenly, Justin found himself in a panic. A litany of thoughts ran through his overactive imagination, all of which concluded with Scarlett finding out, canceling the wedding, and leaving him to stew in his own misery. How had a harmless night out with a group of friends turned into a sordid affair? Fucking Hollywood, he thought.
Annoyed, he halted their textual conversation to call his cohort. “What the hell?” he greeted her once she picked up.
“I know,” she chuckled back, feeling a bit guilty for no reason at all. “I was shocked.”
Justin wasn’t quite shocked, because he knew the nature of his business, but he was a bit blindsided. He had done so much flying by the seat of his pants with Zooey, he let a little bit too much of his guard down. “I should’ve known better.”
“There’s no way we could’ve predicted this,” she offered diplomatically.
“No, I could’ve. I wasn’t thinking.”
“Well we did have a few drinks.”
“I mean all along,” he came to realize, slightly irritated by the notion. “I’ve been acting recklessly, hanging out with you and your crew, knowing that I shouldn’t have.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“Zooey.” He said her name as if she were a child that needed reprimanding. “I’m getting married in two weeks. How do you think that looks?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t think about it at all, I guess.”
And that statement more than annoyed him, because she was too smart to not have had the thought cross her mind at least once. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
“Well, I mean, I thought about it, but I never really let myself come to a conclusion.”
“Uh huh.”
“I know it doesn’t necessarily look good, Justin, but we’ve done nothing wrong. Have we?”
I could tell it wasn’t love, I just thought you fucked with me
Who could’ve predicted Lucky Strike would have you stuck with me
“I dunno,” he exhaled, exasperated. When she was in his presence, none of the things he knew made sense anymore. Nothing was absolute, nothing was succinct, he just found himself questioning everything. Even Zooey’s genuineness. “I just feel like I’ve been set up or something.”
Zooey felt a drop in the pit of her stomach, absolutely saddened by the idea that he would think anything like that. She had done nothing but show him everything. She hadn’t lied to him, put up any pretenses, if anything, she was too honest with him, and there he was, blaming her for it. “What?”
What happened between us that night, it always seems to trouble me
“I didn’t mean it the way it came out,” he tried to take it back, hearing the disdain in her voice. “I just… I dunno.”
“What, you think I brought you outside with the intent of having us caught on camera? Really?”
“I don’t think that.”
“Then what do you think?”
“I don’t know what I think, honestly.”
She chuckled, but in a way that clearly said she was put off, and then sighed. “Wow.”
Now all of a sudden these gossip rags wanna cover me
And you makin’ it seem like it happened that way because of me
“I didn’t mean to offend you, I’m just say--.”
“No, it’s fine. It’s actually better this way,” she snipped. “Nothing worse than being in a one-sided relationship. Hey, by the way, is Scarlett there? Are you paying attention to her this week?”
He balked at her insinuation, looking at his phone as if it had just spat on him. “You know what? Fuck you, you brought this to me.”
“I was trying to give you a head’s up, not criminalize myself!”
“Just in time to be too late, of course.”
“You’re an arrogant bastard,” she sputtered angrily. “I have done nothing but be completely honest with you, I don’t know where the fuck you get off acting like I have any reason to deceive you. If anything, you’re the liar between us.”
“What the hell have I lied to you about?”
“I don’t know whether you’ve lied to me, really, but I’m betting you’re not a hundred percent honest with your future wife about your whereabouts. Which, if you haven’t figured it out, is a lot more troubling than anything you may or may not have told me.”
“How would you have any clue what I am with my future wife?”
“Does she know who I am?”
“Who are you?” he retorted coldly.
“Wowwwww,” Zooey replied exaggeratedly, attempting to hide the fact that his little quip really stung like a bitch. “Okay.”
“I mean really, who are you? Why would you be important to her?”
“All right, Justin, I get it. I am nobody and nothing to you.”
There was smoke in the air before, that was me clearin’ it
That couldn’t be further from the truth. He was frustrated and nervous, but he wasn’t trying to hurt her here. “Stop.” He sighed heavily, wishing he had never started this. “I take that back.”
“You can’t just take it back, you fuckin’ said it. If that’s how you feel, own that shit.”
“It’s not.”
“Fuck you, it is.”
For Justin, it was hard for him to allow new people into his life, knowing that they may want any number of things from him. He wasn’t used to being so open to strangers, so welcoming and at ease with someone he didn’t know prior to “making it big.” Having one of the most recognizable names and faces on the planet didn’t allow him many freedoms, and it was only natural for him to be guarded… jaded, even. So why was it that when Zooey appeared, all of that flew out of the window? It fucked with his head, to say the least, and all he could think, for just a moment too long, was that his carelessness had come to bite him in the ass. He was wrong.
“I’m sorry,” he proclaimed after a long silence “ one he stubbornly refused to fill. “I don’t know what I’m saying.”
“Yes, you do.”
“You’ve never said anything you wished you could take back?”
“No.”
“Bullshit.”
“I say what I feel and think before I speak.”
“Well sorry for not doing things exactly the way you do.”
“Apology not accepted,” she rebutted, frustrated with their whole exchange. As trusting as Zooey was, she didn’t want to understand why it was so hard for him to reciprocate. “I guess we should just end this here.” She was surprised to hear the words come out of her mouth, because she thought for sure he would be the one to say it first. “…While we’re still nobody to one another.”
“Zooey, I don’t wanna just end it. I’m trying to apologize here.”
“It’s too late.”
“It was like three minutes ago!”
“You hurt my feelings. I don’t do that to people and I expect the same respect, so fuck you.” It took a lot for her to get angry. She was an excessively open person that didn’t hold onto much of anything, but when she did get mad, it was hard for her to shake.
All in all, I learned a lesson from it though
You never see it coming, you just get to see it go
“Zooey.”
“Bye, Justin.”
And then she was gone, leaving him with a bizarre combination of detachment and interest, pride and scorn. He knew he shouldn’t have said what he said, and he didn’t even know why he reacted the way he did. Maybe he was subconsciously trying to do what he hadn’t been able to “ let her go. After all, he was getting married, and a new female friend didn’t really fit into that equation. But none of those thoughts really mattered when it boiled down to it. He wanted her in his life, no matter how it looked to the rest of the world.
Escaping the bathroom, he filed back into the kitchen with a frown on his face. “Fuck,” he whispered to himself.
“Who was that?” Scarlett entered the room breezily, seeing him drop his phone to the kitchen counter.
Dazed, he looked up at his girlfriend, unsure of how to answer that without lying. “Nobody,” he decided to say.
“You were yelling at nobody?” she chuckled.
“What?”
“You just yelled to somebody, ‘That was three minutes ago!’” she reminded him. “Are you waiting on a car or something?”
Thankful that she had given him an out, he took it. “Oh. Yeah. I was thinking…”
“That’s always dangerous,” she smirked, oblivious to the thoughts running rampant in his mind.
“Let’s go get our marriage license today.”
“What?” She almost choked on the raspberry she had stuffed in her mouth, surprised by his suggestion.
“I’m not busy today. Are you?”
She only shook her head, confused by his sudden need. “But we’re not getting married in New York, it won’t count for anything.”
“Really?”
“I’m pretty sure, yeah,” she sighed, disappointed. “It was a nice thought, though.”
He watched in defeat as she moved further into the kitchen, beginning to stow away their clean breakfast dishes. She was going to be the perfect wife, he thought. “Hey.”
She paused to look at him, as she always did when he spoke.
“What if…” he took her delicate hand into his, gazing at the two-carat diamond he’d placed on her finger just a few months before. “What if we got married in New York?”
“We’re getting married in Mexico,” she reminded him, pursing her lips in amusement. “What are you talking about?”
“I know we’re having a wedding there, but what if we got married here first. Just the two of us.”
“Are you serious?” She watched him nod confidently and her smile grew tenfold. “No bullshit?”
“I’m for real, Tess. We can apply for our license right now,” he maintained, pulling all the details together as he spoke. “And then twenty-four hours later, we can get married.”
“But it’s Sunday. None of the license bureaus will be open.”
“Okay, well we can start online and then be married in forty-eight hours.”
“Like Beyonce and Jay-Z?” she giggled.
“Something like that.”
Ecstatic at the thought, Scarlett could only nod as she held back her tears, falling further in love with her fiancé as the seconds passed. She nodded excitedly.
I should’ve looked up in the sky at first
Now I can see it in her eyes
If only she knew what had prompted his sudden burst of spontaneity.
Fireworks
Lyrics: "Fireworks" - Drake feat. Alicia Keys (Thank Me Later)
Eleven-Ten-Nine by Ashley
Author's Notes:
Sooo... yeah. Don't kill me for this one, y'all. 8o
6: Eleven-Ten-Nine
The previous night’s rain had cast a damp chill over the city of New York, most of the city’s occupants scurrying into one building or another. But not Justin. He was reveling in the epitome of autumn in New York, feeling like he was on top of the world as he roamed the streets with his mother, the two of them searching for the ensemble she would wear to his marriage ceremony that evening.
“I still can’t believe you’re gonna ditch your wedding,” his mother, Lynn, was saying as they strolled into one of the many shops at the Time Warner Center. She was a cheerful woman, for the most part, but her son’s decision to get married on some random gloomy November day really didn’t please her. “Is this really something you both want?” she wondered.
“This is what we both want,” he assured her, taking her hand into his. “The day doesn’t matter. It’s everything else, isn’t it?”
“That’s true,” she sighed for what felt like the hundredth time to him. He called her up from Memphis because he knew that she would be devastated if she missed his official ceremony, but since she’d arrived the night before, all she had done was express her dislike for their choice. “I just don’t understand why you’ve spent six months planning a wedding just to scrap it all at the last minute.”
“We’re not scrapping it. We just feel like we’d rather be married first. Before the big party.”
“But why?” Lynn pressed. Knowing her son and how he operated, it just didn’t add up to her. “What’s the sudden rush?”
“Because we’re simple, mom. Always have been. The wedding, the reception, that’s all for you and Melanie and all the other guests. We don’t get down like that.”
“And it took you half a year to come to that conclusion?”
“Well… yeah,” he half-lied. Truth be told, the idea was prompted by his fight with Zooey, but there was nothing disingenuous about it. He would be married in just a few hours, and as crazy as it sounded, he couldn’t wait for it to become a reality. True enough, marriage hadn’t been an active dream of his for most of his life as it was for most people, but it had certainly been an abstract goal since Scarlett came into his world. There had never once been any doubt in his mind that she was the person he wanted to spend eternity with, and there was no reason to prolong it, as far as he was concerned.
“Justin, there is something wrong,” his mother prophesized, pulling him into J. Crew with her. “But you know that I’ll support you in whatever you want.”
“That’s all I ask, ma.”
With just a few hours between then and the ceremony, Lynn knew that she didn’t have much time to waste arguing with her son over a few weeks and a few wasted dollars, so she decided to ignore her instincts and find a dress. “I just hope you know what you’re doing.”
Justin wasn’t one to question himself very often. He was one of few people his age that did know what he was doing. He knew what he wanted out of life, where he wanted to be within a given amount of time, and had a general guide on how to get there. He never showed the slightest lack of self-assurance, which was why so many people trusted him and his judgment. But now, as his mother stood there doubting him, he found himself unable to completely trust his own instincts as well. Was this what he wanted? The mere thought kind of scared him, but he also found it… exhilarating.
____________________
Even though they were forfeiting their original wedding plan, Scarlett did insist that some traditions remain in place. Her mother absolutely had to be there, she wanted to wear a white dress, and Justin was in no way, shape, or form allowed to see her the day of their nuptials. He quietly agreed, knowing how lucky he was to have a woman that didn’t care about the spectacle. He knew that most women who’d spent the better part of a year planning a wedding in Mexico wouldn’t even entertain the idea of eloping, but not Scarlett. She didn’t care one way or another, so long as she got to spend her life with him.
Justin smiled at this poignant thought as he waited for his bride atop the roof of his “ or more aptly, their “ apartment building. It was on the chilly side, yes, and the sky a bit dull because the sun hadn’t come out to play that day and darkness was settling over the city, but they didn’t care. They had mulled over several options of where to actually get married “ city hall, one of the many parks in the city, several restaurants, Yankee Stadium, and Madison Square Garden “ but none of them seemed as sincere as doing it on home. Why not be married at the place where you’d be embarking on a new stage of your lives together?
So in spite of the time or place, the weather, the guest list, or what anyone else thought of it, Justin was ecstatic to be standing there, beneath the glow of street lights and Christmas lights strewn above them, waiting for his bride. She finally appeared on that rooftop, dressed in a vintage full-skirted tea-length white Chanel dress, adorned with an open swing coat in satiny white. Her wavy blonde hair was swept up from her face and neck, while her makeup was warm but dramatic, which matched her bouquet of orange and red lilies and roses. Justin had to fight back tears as he realized that this was “it.”
“She looks beautiful,” Lynn commented, watching from her son’s side as Scarlett, alongside her own mother, carefully sidestepped the puddles in the tar to make it to her groom.
“You’re breathtaking,” he noted softly when she finally made it to him.
Beaming as she eyed him in his brand new Hugo Boss tux, she replied, “You’re not so bad yourself.”
Unable to wait anymore, they both turned to their wedding officiant so that they could begin. “Family, we have been invited here this evening to share with Scarlett and Justin a very important moment in their lives. In the years they have been together, their love and understanding of one another has grown and matured, and now, they have decided to begin their lives together as husband and wife.”
Justin smiled to his bride at the mere fact that the dream was becoming a reality, while the mothers of the bride and groom looked on nervously, hoping that this was the best decision for their respective children. Eloping wasn’t always a sign of trouble or a reason to worry, but for two people who had no reason to rush, they couldn’t help but question it. Lynn and Melanie, who had become good friends quickly after their children began a relationship, had discussed the situation at length, but neither one of them had come to a satisfying conclusion. Maybe their kids really did decide they didn’t want the hullabaloo. Still, it was all a bit curious for two people with no financial worries or pressing obligations to elope two weeks before their scheduled wedding.
“Who supports this couple in their marriage?” the officiant asked of the four people on the roof.
Both Lynn and Melanie smiled, in spite of their reservations, and replied, “We do.”
“In that case,” the judge went on, “congratulations! Today is your day, you’re off to great places, you’re off and away. You have brains in your head, you have feet in your shoes, you can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You’re on your own and you know what you know and you are the couple who’ll decide where to go. You’ll look up and down streets, look them over with care. About some, you will say, ‘We don’t choose to go there.’
With your heads full of brains and your shoes full of feet, you’re too smart to go down any not-so-good street. And you may not find any you’ll want to go down. In that case, of course, you’ll head straight out of town. It’s opener there in the wide open air. Out there, things can happen, and frequently do, to people as brainy and footsy as you. And when things start to happen, don’t worry, don’t stew. Just go right along, you’ll start happening too. Oh, the places you’ll go!”
Scarlett and Justin couldn’t help but chuckle at one another as their wedding reading came out of the judge’s mouth. Sure, they had chosen a Dr. Seuss passage, but listening to how awesomely ridiculous it sounded out loud made them giggle.
“You’ll be on your way up,” he went on enthusiastically. “You’ll be seeing great sights! You’ll join the high fliers who soar to great heights. You won’t lag behind, because you’ll have all the speed. You’ll pass the whole gang and you’ll soon take the lead. Wherever you fly, you’ll be best of the best. Wherever you go, you will top all the rest. Except when you don’t, because sometimes, you won’t. You’ll get mixed up, of course, as you already know. You’ll get mixed up with so many strange birds as you go.
So be sure when you step, step with great care and great tact, and remember that life’s a great balancing act. Just never forget to be dexterous and deft, and never mix up your right foot with your left. And will you succeed? Yes! You will indeed. Ninety-eight and three-quarters percent guaranteed. Kids, you’ll move mountains!
So, be your name Buxbaum or Bixby or Bray, or Scarlett Tess Johansson or Justin Randall Timberlake, you’re off to great places. Today is your day! Your mountain is waiting, so… get on your way!” He paused, waiting for the light laughter to subside and then asked, “Did I do it right?”
“You did it right,” Scarlett assured him with a mile-wide smile.
Grinning proudly himself, he went on to announce, “And now, the couple has written their own vows that they would like to share with one another at this time…”
“Shit,” Scarlett hissed, looking guiltily at her soon-to-be husband, realizing that she had completely glossed over a major detail of their wedding.
“What’s wrong?” Justin wondered, seeing a panic take over her blue-green eyes.
“I forgot to write my vows!”
“Oh… Well, it--.”
“How the hell did I forget this part? This is the most important part!” she reprimanded herself. “Oh, my god.”
“Scar, calm down,” he smiled at her warmly. “It’s okay.”
“It’s not okay! This is the opposite of okay!”
“It’s okay,” he insisted. “We can wing it.”
“No, we can’t!”
“Yes, we can, babe.” He took her cool hand into his, hoping it would soothe her a bit. “If you’re feeling it, it’ll come out.”
“I’m so sorry,” she maintained, still feeling horrible for forgetting.
“Think nothing of it.”
“If you want, you can bring this up during an argument in a couple of years and cash it in as your ‘get out of jail free’ card.”
“I would never…”
“You would.”
“Make me a promise,” he instructed lovingly, wanting her to put it out of her head.
“Okay, what?”
“No, you have to come up with one,” he chuckled. “Something you want to vow to me, right here and now.”
“Oh!”
“Like… I vow to never walk in front of you. And I’ll only walk behind you if there’s not enough room for two.”
Smiling as she caught onto what he was aiming for, she thought of her own pledge to make to him. “I promise--.”
“Vow,” he corrected softly.
“I vow… to laugh,” she answered, looking him squarely in the eyes. “I’m gonna laugh loud and I’m gonna laugh often, even if it isn’t that funny.”
“That could get annoying,” he grinned. “But I’ll take it.”
“I know you will.”
“I vow to stop going to dinner in jeans and sneakers when you’re dressed in a dress and heels,” he offered with a childlike giggle.
“I don’t mind you wearing jeans and sneakers.”
“I’m vowing to be on the same page with you here. Go with it.”
“Sorry!”
“Your turn.”
“Ummmmm,” she looked at the decorations above them and came up with another one. “I vow to decorate for Christmas. Especially when we have kids.”
He could only smile at the thought. “I vow to help you.”
“Have kids?” she asked jokingly. “You’re gonna have to.”
“That, too.”
“I vow to not wanna name our kids anything ridiculous.”
“Like, ‘Freckle Moonbeam Montana?’” he guessed.
“I was thinking more along the lines of… ‘Justin,’ honestly.”
“Fair enough.”
“I vow to not just agree with anything you say. I’m going to have input and be active and present and accountable for our lives.”
“I vow that, too,” she nodded seriously.
“I vow to turn off the TV before I come upstairs for bed.”
“I vow to leave the light above the steps on for you if I go to bed first.”
“I vow to come home for dinner,” he smiled.
“I vow to make dinner. Outside of the microwave. At least once every seven days that we spend together.”
“Seven consecutive days?”
“Yes,” she returned with a playful, knowing smirk.
“Bullshit vow. You know that’s never gonna ever happen.”
“Once every four days?”
“Three and a half,” he negotiated.
“You drive a hard bargain.”
“I vow to fight for you,” he promised earnestly. “Especially when you feel like giving up is the easiest option. When you’re sick of looking at me and there’s that little voice in your head chanting, ‘Go. Run. Now. Leave.’ I promise I’ll be in the doorway, blocking you, pushing you back in, insisting that you stay.”
“I vow to fight with you,” she croaked out as tears spilled onto her porcelain cheeks. “Even though we don’t fight, we will at some point, and I’ll be ready for a death match, if that’s what you want.”
“I vow to never stand in the way of something you want. Unless what you want is to leave me.”
“I vow to never wanna leave you.”
“I vow to bring you back pancakes when I go to breakfast. The Oreo ones that you’re scared to gorge on in public.”
“I vow to answer the phone whenever you call. So long as I’m not on set.”
He shook his head teasingly, knowing that she was more likely to be on a set than not. “I vow to put my Lakers games on pause if you tell me there’s a life or death situation a-brewin’.”
“I vow to not bother you during your Lakers games unless there’s a life or death situation a-brewin’.”
“I vow to always come home with something interesting to say.”
“I vow to always come home.”
“You better,” he laughed.
“You better.”
“I vow to make you happy.”
“I vow to make you a better man.”
“I vow to be honest with you. No matter how much it hurts.”
“I vow to be there when it hurts.”
“I vow to never try teaching you to golf again.”
“I vow to never ask to learn again,” she giggled, remembering that one horrible day…
“I vow to be your best friend.”
“You already are my best friend.”
“I vow to stay that way,” he smiled proudly.
“I vow to be yours, too.”
“I vow to be open-minded and understanding, to be caring and loving, to be intelligent and funny whenever you need me to be. When you look to your right, I vow to be standing there.”
“When you look to your left, I vow to be standing there.”
“Stalker.”
Still beaming, tears still rolling down her face, she winked at him. “Every breath you take…”
And as he realized his new life was beginning, he finished by saying, “I love you, Scarlett.”
“And I vow to love you.”
Carefully pulling her ring from his pocked, he rubbed her hand gently as he placed the platinum Neil Lane band around her third finger, looking at her tearfully. “Blah, blah, blah, in sickness and in health… I do.”
And she smiled in reply, pulling his ring from her own coat pocket, softly placing it on his finger. “And yada, yada, yada, for better or for worse, I do, too.”
And that was it. Scarlett and Justin were married.
____________________
The newlyweds, after bidding good night to their mothers, decided to have a celebratory dinner in the heart of the city at a chic little sushi restaurant called Masa. It was arguably the most popular and expensive restaurant in New York, but Justin made sure that he and his bride would get a bit of privacy on their wedding night, paying to have the whole place shut down for the night.
Hand in hand, he escorted his new wife into the posh Time Warner Center, leading her to the bar, where the illustrious Masa Takayama would simultaneously entertain and serve them dinner. The bar, which had been decorated for the two of them, was set to perfection and polished with a congratulatory $3200-dollar bottle of 1989 Chateau Haut-Brion to top it off.
As they settled into their seats, the two of them side by side, Justin couldn’t help but stare at Scarlett, her face radiated by the candlelight. “What are you thinking?” he wanted to know.
“Well…”
“Be honest. Now that we’re married, is the magic gone?”
“It’s funny that you ask that. Because ever since the wedding…” she paused for effect.
“Just say it.”
“Well, I just… find you kind of… repulsive?”
“That’s honest,” he commented with a long sigh. “All right, so… divorce then?”
“I think so.”
“It was really fun while it lasted.”
“Okay then,” she answered sarcastically, though her smile was anything but. “See you later.”
He then pretended to leave, getting up from the bar and heading out of the restaurant completely, only to return a few moments later, toting a gift for his new wife. ”For you, future-ex-wife.”
“And I didn’t get you anything!”
“Oh, well then lemme take this back,” he grinned.
She dropped her mouth in pretend shock and took the small box into her hand. “Well I’m guessing this isn’t the dog I wanted, so…”
He didn’t say anything, but watched anxiously as she tore the wrapping from the box and pulled it open to reveal a small metal collar.
“Shut the front door!” she shrieked hoarsely.
“It is the dog you wanted,” he looked her up and down teasingly. “Now what.”
“It’s a girl?”
“Well I wouldn’t name a boy ‘Consuela Bananahammock,” he rolled his happy blue eyes, referring to the name on the collar. Friends was one of Scarlett’s all-time favorite shows, he couldn’t help himself. “Clearly.”
“Clearly,” she chuckled. “What kind of dog is she?”
“Well, I know you have enough Boxers in your life. Consuela is a Westie.”
“Oh god, I bet she’s adorable.”
“She is.”
“When do I get to meet her?”
“She’ll be there when we get home.”
“Home here or home LA?”
“Home here.”
“Thank god.”
“This better not become a situation where you love her more than you love me,” he charged, knowing how quickly Scarlett had attached herself to Buckley and Brennan. She loved dogs.
“You know how I am about my dogs.”
“I do.”
“But I don’t think I could ever or will ever love anything more than I do you.”
Wiping fake tears from his face, he looked at his wife happily. “Girl, you gon’ make me cry.”
Justin was so pleased and content in that moment that he almost couldn’t believe this was his life. It was so… easy. He questioned himself earlier in the day, yes, but nothing that made him actually hesitate to take that leap and say his vows that evening. But he did wonder how all of it was possible. How did he not have cold feet? No talking himself out of going through with it? Nothing in the pit of his stomach, nagging him, saying that this was the wrong thing to do? As he sat there, staring at Scarlett, who seemed to be nauseatingly perfect, he started to wonder if it was all a little too easy.
Full Disclosure by Ashley
Author's Notes:
I'm having so much fun with this story thanks to you guys and all the fantastical reviews! Thank you so much for every single encouraging word, you don't know how inspring it is. Anywho, I'm running out to dinner, but I will reply to everyone, I promise! I say this all the time, but really, I love y'all! -Ash
7: Full Disclosure
“So is married life everything you thought it would be?”
Without notice, Justin pulled his phone from his ear, pausing his conversation with his friend Rob, to approach the receptionist of the warehouse-like building he had just entered. “Hey, could you tell me where I can find Lee Eisenberg or Gene Stupnitsky?”
The plain Jane grinned in his direction and pointed down a long, taupe hallway. “At the end of the hall, take a left, and then all the writers’ offices will be right there. Gene and Lee share a suite, you’ll see their names on the door.”
“Thanks,” he nodded, putting his phone back up to his ear. “Sorry, dude, what’d you say?”
“I asked if being married to Scarlett is as spectacular as I imagine it is.”
“Ah man,” Justin sighed, moving down the corridor, “to be honest, I don’t even know.”
“What you mean you don’t know?”
“Well you know she’s been in New York preparing for this play--.”
“That’s right,” Rob recalled.
“And I’ve been here rehearsing for a movie and trying to be an ‘actor,’ so all four weeks of our marriage have been pretty nonexistent.”
“That shit sucks.”
“It sucks a little bit,” Justin nodded, just as he passed an office with the name ‘Zooey Levin’ plastered across the door. He couldn’t help but do a double take as he replied, “It’ll be all right, though. We have our lives to spend together.”
“That’s true, this is just the beginning.”
“Right.” He ended up doing a triple take, trying to figure out why he would be seeing “ or imagining? “ Zooey’s name was on a door. And then it dawned on him that obviously, as writers for the same television show, Gene and Lee’s office would be in the same building as Zooey’s. “God, I’m stupid,” he chuckled to himself.
“What?” Rob snorted.
“I’m talkin’ to myself.”
“What I tell you about that, man?”
“I told you, I can’t help it.”
“Voices in your head,” Rob commented, shaking his head at his friend. “What you gettin’ into today?”
“Well, I’m here at this place where they shoot The Office, I think. I’m meeting with two of the writers.”
“Uh oh, is Zooey one of them?”
“She’s not, actually,” he laughed, finally locating the door he had originally been searching for. “These dudes, Lee and Gene, they wrote this movie I’m doing. They wanted to do some revamps and get my input.”
“I got you, I got you.”
“So… after that, I dunno. What you doin’?”
“Ah man, probably gonna hit the gym in a bit and then head to the studio.”
“You stay in that studio, man.”
“Hey, it pays the bills.”
Just when Justin was about to come up with some uninspired reply, he heard laughter behind him and he couldn’t help but turn to the sound, knowing who he’d find behind him. It was Zooey, and the smile in her laugh caught his eye before anything else. Before he really saw her freckled face or joyful green eyes, before he noticed her upswept hair or adorable striped cardigan over a flowery sundress, the first thing he noted was her smile, and it made him smile, too. It was involuntary, the last thing he wanted to do was let her know he was happy to see her, but he couldn’t stop himself. That is, until he realized she was holding hands with another guy. Then, the smile disappeared and he snapped back into reality. “Rob, lemme call you back,” he finally told his friend after a little too long.
“Yeah,” he finished.
Justin entered the writing duo’s large suite, but finding it empty, turned right back out, unsure of what he wanted to do. Stand there, pretending he still didn’t see Zooey heading in his direction? Go back to his car and wait for a call to come back in? If he stood there any longer, going back and forth through that one door, he would look like a crazy person.
Having not decided on anything, still standing between a hall and a doorway, he watched Zooey and her companion part ways, her heading into her office, him entering an office adjacent to hers. Who was this guy, Justin wondered. More importantly, who was he to Zooey?
Unwilling to question it anymore, he went to Zooey’s door, prepared to grovel while prying. But when he reached her office, where the December sun was beaming through her windows, illuminating her golden features, he found himself silenced.
She looked up from a stack of papers, not surprised to find him standing in front of her, but unsure of what he could possibly be there for other than to see her. “Hey.”
“Hey,” he returned dryly, hesitant of how he’d be received.
“What are you doing here?”
He removed his sunglasses from his eyes and gave her an awkward glance as he shook his head. “I’m here for work.”
“Same,” she nodded, holding up a script. “What kind of work are you doing?”
“Well I think I told you I was working with Gene and Lee on a film, right?”
“Right,” she was nodding again, trying to hide the fact that her ego had just been put in major check. “Yeah, Bad Teacher.”
“Right…”
“So… that’s cool.”
“Yeah…” Feeling suffocated by all the awkwardness surrounding them, Justin wanted to put the bad blood behind them and apologize. “Zooey, I know the last time we talked, I was really shitty to you--.”
“You were,” she confirmed coolly. “But I don’t wanna talk about it.”
“Well I just wanted to say that I’m sorry.”
“I don’t wanna talk about it,” she maintained, rising from her seat. She willed him into the room, shutting her door behind him. “You were out of line, but… so was I. Let’s just let it go.”
“What did you do?”
“I dunno, I think that… with you and your fiancée and all your ‘baggage’ or whatever, I put myself in a situation I shouldn’t have and I lashed out at you. Or her. I don’t know.”
“I don’t think you said anything you should feel bad for.”
“I did.”
“Well… whatever you said, you are forgiven for.” He forced out a smile and watched her reclaim her seat. “You forgive me?”
“Yep.”
Nodding slowly and uneasily, he sat down in one of her two extra chairs, both of which were full of stacks of papers also. He glanced over his surroundings, taking note of her ample but messy space. She sat at a big glass table that served as her desk, which did nothing to hide her collection of shoes in one corner and box of Flaming Hot Cheetos in the other. There were filing cabinets to her left, but with all the paper scattered everywhere else, he couldn’t imagine that they weren’t empty. And most curiously, she had a big iMac monitor situated to her right, but a MacBook sitting in front of her, which made him chuckle as he figured it must take quite a bit of work to be who she was.
“So…” he finally broke the considerable silence, “Who’s your new dude out there?”
“What?” she frowned, clearly still annoyed by his mere presence.
“The guy you came down the hall with. You were holding hands, I just assumed…”
“Jonathan?” she laughed loudly at the absurd thought. “Oh god.”
“He’s… not?”
“No!” she was still laughing. “He’s just a colleague. I hold hands with lots of people.”
“Oh.”
“Is that why you came down here acting all remorseful and shit?”
“No, I mean, I really am sorry! I just…”
“God, you’re an asshole.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be offensive, I was just--.”
“Fuck it,” she waved him off, not wanting to go down another unnecessary and unpleasant road with him. She leaned back in her chair, grabbing another script and then brought herself face to face with Justin again. “So how’s the fiancée, anyway?”
“I don’t know if you’re just being sarcastic, but she’s not my fiancée anymore.”
“You broke up?” she asked, clearly a little too optimistic at the notion.
He let out a short chuckle and then held up his left hand, which showcased his new platinum wedding band. “No.”
“Oh.” Zooey tried to force out a smile, but she could feel it coming off as more of a wince.
“So… yeah.”
“Wow. Congratulations.”
“Thank you,” he nodded.
“When was the wedding?”
“Umm… about a month ago?”
“Has it been that long since we’ve talked?”
“It has,” he confirmed. “I was really busy, so… sorry about disappearing. If you were looking, that is.”
“Well, I wasn’t looking,” she returned dryly. “But you did cross my mind a few times.”
“Same here.”
“You could’ve called to apologize, you know.”
“You said you didn’t wanna talk to me.”
“You could’ve called,” she repeated, finally showing the slightest hint of a smile.
“You missed me?”
“You missed me,” she told him as though she knew it was a fact. “…And I missed you.”
“Clearly,” he offered distractedly as his phone vibrated in his hand. It was Gene, more than likely calling to commence their meeting, but Justin was not ready to end his interaction with Zooey “ not after they’d been separated for so long.
“Okay,” Zooey began, noticing his preoccupation with his phone, “so… I guess I’ll see you around?”
Dumfounded, he asked, “Where are you going?”
“Oh come on, I know what the phone glance means. It’s the silent way of saying, ‘Yeah, I’ve checked out of this conversation now, thanks.’”
“It’s just a nervous habit,” he countered genuinely, as he honestly did not want to leave. “It’s not like that at all.”
She wanted to believe him, because she certainly didn’t want him to want to leave, but his actions spoke something completely different. “You’re a liar.”
He checked his phone again, as if something had changed drastically within those few seconds. “Are you free for lunch?” he questioned out of the blue.
A bit stunned, Zooey stumbled over her thoughts and all that came out was, “What?”
“I asked if you were free for lunch,” he repeated, a bit more confident this time. “I mean, if you’re hungry, that is. I know it’s only eleven, so if you’re not, I--.”
“No, I’m always hungry,” she cut him off to accept. “And I’m free, yeah.”
“Yeah?”
She nodded, though still a bit wary of him. “As long as your wife doesn’t mind.”
“Pretty sure she wouldn’t,” he winked. “Do you like Le Petit Four?”
“Never heard of it.”
“On Sunset? Really?”
She shook her head but agreed to it anyway. “I like French food. Let’s do it.”
“Let’s… do it,” he repeated in agreement, glad that she was open enough to consider going out with him again. “I’ll meet you there?”
“Uhhh… okay? Yeah.”
“I mean, she wouldn’t mind me having lunch with you, but riding in the same car might be pushing it.”
“I gotcha,” she accepted hesitantly. “I’ll meet you there.” Rather excited, Zooey left the conversation to head for her Range, anxiously anticipating the next few hours with her newly reunited friend.
____________________
About half an hour later, Zooey and Justin had been seated in a corner of the restaurant’s busy sidewalk seating area, exploring the menu while ignoring the fact that people were gawking at Justin.
“Have you ever had a French martini?” Zooey wondered as she closed her menu.
“I don’t think I’ve ever had the pleasure.”
“Oh, you are in for a treat, sir.” She signaled for their waitress and took it upon herself to order him one. “To start, could we get him a French martini? And I’ll have a white sangria.”
“Sure,” the waitress nodded, glancing to Justin to make sure he was all right with that. “You’re good?”
“I’m just following her lead,” he agreed nonchalantly.
“Coming right up.”
Zooey cheekily watched their waitress walk away and then looked back to Justin. “Does it ever get boring?”
“Your company?” he guessed sarcastically. “It can get a little redundant, but… no, I wouldn’t say boring. I’m someone who craves routine.”
“I sensed that,” she pretended to accept his answer, willing herself to ease back into their charming way of interacting with one another. “But also, I was asking about the people that constantly stop and stare at you. How does that make you feel?”
“Umm. A little bit like a caged animal,” he admitted. “But I figure at least they usually don’t throw things.”
Smiling, Zooey grabbed a sugar packet from the small basketful on their table and chucked it at her lunch companion. “Ha.”
He only blinked as it hit his forehead and fell back to the table. “Rude.”
“I was just trying to make you feel more comfortable.”
“What do you know, it worked.”
She grinned again and took a sip of her water while he stared at her. “Tell me about your wedding,” she requested when she began to feel a bit uneasy.
“My wedding was awesome,” he stated sincerely. “You should’ve been there.”
“That’s so nice to hear. So often, I’m invited to weddings that are kind of terrible, so it’s great to know that I was actually not invited to an awesome one. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.”
She was going to reply with another nonsensical statement, but she noted their drinks making their grand arrival and stopped herself. “Ooh lala,” she commented when Justin’s cocktail was served.
He gave a hesitant look to the tan-colored concoction and then looked at Zooey. “What’s in this?”
“I’m not gonna tell you,” she smiled mischievously. “Just drink.”
Not one to back down from a challenge, Justin took a long sip from his martini and immediately winced at the taste. “What the fuck is that?”
“It’s good, right?”
“Zooey. What’s in that?”
“Ummm. Chambord, pineapple juice, vodka, and a hint of vanilla schnapps.”
“You’re fucking evil.”
“I’m sorry,” she laughed quietly. “I do it for that one look people get when they first realize that they’re tasting actual shit in liquid form.”
“Evil!”
“I am a little evil,” she nodded. “I didn’t warn you of that?”
“No, you didn’t warn me of that,” he mocked her as he took a big gulp from his glass of water. “You’ve ruined my whole tongue, you know.”
“In that case, I send Scarlett my sincerest regrets.”
“You just don’t want me to like you, do you?”
“Of course I do!”
“Every time I stop thinking you’re a psychopath, you do something to prove that I should’ve listened to my intuition,” he supplied, shaking his head.
“Well how about this, let’s just officially subscribe to the notion that I am a psychopath and then you’ll know exactly what to expect out of me.”
“We can do that,” he chuckled. “Immediately lower the bar.”
“Exactly.”
“I like it.”
“I wish people really did that, by the way,” she appended enthusiastically. “I wish that when you met people, it was like, ‘Hi, I’m so-and-so. Just so neither one of us wastes our time, here’s all the weird shit you need to know about me beforehand. If you can deal with it, awesome, welcome to my world; and if you can’t, well… hey, have a great life.’ You know?”
“Really? You’d prefer it if I was like, ‘Hi, I’m Justin. When I eat, I compartmentalize everything on my plate and then eat the foods in alphabetical order.’ That’s what you want?”
“I’d prefer that, yeah,” she chuckled heartily. “Full disclosure,” she called it. “Hi, I’m Zooey and I have a slight obsession with the shapes of people’s toes.”
Justin blinked at Zooey for a long moment and then finally returned with one. “I’m Justin. I absolutely believe in ghosts, and for that reason, I refuse to go anywhere near a cemetery. Ever.”
“I’m Zooey and I’ve had three donuts today. And I’ll probably have three more before the end of the day.”
“As many times as I’ve sung it, I still don’t really know how the Star Spangled Banner goes.”
“You unpatriotic son of a bitch,” she laughed in response as she realized that any bad feelings she previously had about him were quickly melting away as they talked.
“Hey, love me or leave me alone.”
“I saved iTunes’ email address under a pseudonym in my phone so that it looks like some guy is constantly emailing me.”
“You’re lonely, huh?”
“I am, quite often.” She was kidding, but… she was serious.
Justin feigned a sad face before continuing. “My mom bought me condoms until the age of twenty-eight.”
“Wowwww.”
“I’m twenty-eight, by the way.”
“Whenever I go jogging “ or rather, that one time I went jogging last year “ I put on Viva La Vida and pretended I was in a Nike commercial.”
“Sometimes, I just like to steal.”
“You got that from Chris Rock,” she proclaimed as if he didn’t know.
“That doesn’t make it any less true,” he rebutted. “There’s a good chance I’ve taken something out of your purse without your knowledge.”
“That’s very Costanza-esque of you.”
“George was not a klepto, if I recall correctly.”
“Yeah, but it’s totally something he would do.”
“Fair enough,” he accepted after little thought. “I think it’s your turn.”
“Okay… brace yourself,” she warned before taking a deep breath. “I started smoking when I was twelve, I started drinking when I was fourteen.”
“Are you serious?” he paused their little game to ask.
“Very,” she nodded slowly. “It was my coping mechanism. I had a batshit crazy mother who cheated on my dad incessantly and she made me keep it from him. That was when I started smoking. Then, she left him and took me with her “ left my sister with him “ and that’s when I started drinking.”
“Wow.”
“Speaking of which, I always get nervous when I hear a vacuum cleaner because my dad used to turn on the vacuum to drown out the sound of them arguing. And so, now, I never vacuum anything.”
“Zooey--.”
She put up her hand to signal that she didn’t want to be interrupted. She needed to get some of this out, once and for all. “My mom drove me insane. She had me on pills at the age of thirteen because she didn’t want to deal with my ‘moods.’ Between the ages of fourteen and nineteen, I didn’t really know what it was like to feel anything.”
“Nothing?”
“Nothing genuine. Nothing emotional,” she realized. “I felt happiness and sadness, but it was manufactured. I was emotionally placid for years, and honestly, it fucked me up.”
“You seem balanced now, though.”
“I’m not. Maybe I just play the role convincingly enough, but I definitely use comedy as a defense method, and it all comes from a place of extreme darkness.”
“That’s kind of sad,” he noted.
“Even sadder, I think the older I get, the more I come to the realization that I hate my mother for doing that to me. For giving up, for saying, ‘Okay, instead of dealing with these problems, instead of owning up to the mistakes I’ve made, I’m going to cover them up with psychoanalytical nonsense and… prescription drugs. It makes me feel like I was a lab rat and not a daughter.”
Justin didn’t know much of pain in his privileged life. He’d had a wonderful childhood, and he certainly couldn’t complain about any of his adult years. He and Scarlett were like the poster children for a fairytale “ sickeningly happy from past to present. He couldn’t imagine what it must have been like to be in Zooey’s situation, trying to overcome something you never had control over, like a shitty parent. It actually made her a bit more charming when he thought about it. “Well everything that she did turned you into who you are now, so you can be thankful that she made you go through something… it helped you get to something,” he offered encouragingly.
“I know. Honestly, it’s fine, it makes me real. I’m flawed.”
“You are definitely real.”
She smiled softly and watched him take a sip of his water. “By the way, I lied. I’ve had five donuts today. And I’ll probably still have three more.”
He gave her a comforting smile in reply. “A Roomba is a good alternative to a vacuum cleaner. They’re quiet.”
“Thanks,” she returned, gazing at him fondly. “But honestly, I probably still wouldn’t vacuum.”
“I figured.”
“You know me so well…”
“I don’t think I know you at all,” he was starting to see for himself. And maybe that was why he was so drawn to her. He couldn’t figure her out, he couldn’t always read her, he couldn’t place her in a box and assume that she would fit neatly into it. She was someone who held hands with coworkers and was drinking vodka and taking Xanax in middle school. She worked hard but played often and she wore things that didn’t always go together. She kept a clean house and a messy office, she was funny, she ate horribly, and she said everything she was thinking. She was always thinking. No, Zooey Levin didn’t fit in anyone’s box. He liked that. “But I look forward to getting to know you.”
Author's Notes:
I think this chapter is one of my favorites, so I hope you guys enjoy. But I was particularly inspired by the movie, Up In The Air, as well as a certain chapter of Emily Giffin's fantastical book, Love the One You're With, so I take very little credit for what you're about to read lol. And go indulge yourself in both, if you haven't already! -Ash
8: Up In The Air
The holidays had steadfastly approached, and Zooey wasn’t sure where the time had gone, but much to her dad’s chagrin, she had somehow managed to completely miss every single day of Hannukkah. But determined not to miss Christmas, she hopped on the first available flight to Boston, which had her flying out of LAX at 9:00 p.m. December 24th, landing in Boston on Christmas morning after a short layover in New York. It wasn’t ideal, but better late than never, she figured.
Fumbling with her carryon luggage, Zooey made her way to the second row of seating on the left side of the aircraft, shoving her duffel bag into the overheard compartment before plopping down into the roomy chair. She’d flown first class just about all her life, and she always preferred seat 2A if it was available. There was no galley in front of her, she didn’t have to use those weird tray tables that appeared out of the armrest “ seat 2A contained all the amenities of first class with the convenience of a coach seat.
And while she reveled in the fact that she managed to get this seat at the last minute, a young woman appeared at her side, apparently in the mood to talk. “Hi,” the woman greeted her jovially, her tanned cheeks expanding into a smile that showed off her perfect teeth. “I guess I’m your seat buddy tonight.”
“Looks like it,” Zooey returned, a bit deflated. She was tired and not much in the mood to gab the flight away. Still, she introduced herself. “I’m Zooey.”
“Awesome, I’m Emily,” she grinned, pushing her chin-length brown hair behind her ear.
“That’s my sister’s name,” she observed, watching the tall, attractive girl take her seat. “She spells it with an ‘E’ at the end, so people always try to pronounce it, ‘Em-eel.’”
“That’s so funny, I have a cousin named Zoe, she spells it ‘Z-O-E,’ and people always pronounce it, ‘Zo.’”
“Really?” Zooey tried to sound interested, but the fact was that wasn’t really funny at all. If Emily with a Y actually found that amusing, she couldn’t imagine what the rest of her conversation was going to be like. “People are so… dense.”
“That’s what we said!” Emily seemed enthusiastic to find someone that agreed with her.
Zooey, on the other hand, just wanted to put on her iPod and find a way to ignore the pretty person next to her. But not wanting to be rude, she continued to try and be her usual engaging self. “So are you from New York?” she decided to ask, as that was always a harmless enough conversation-starter.
“I’m from LA, actually.” Zooey should have known that Emily with a Y was an Angeleno. She was too attractive “ in the very typical sense “ to be from New York. East Coasters tended to have a more unique beauty that you couldn’t always pinpoint. A New Yorker would more readily be described as handsome than ‘cute’ or ‘pretty.’ Emily with a Y was definitely pretty. “I’m headed to the city to surprise my boyfriend for Christmas.”
Zooey nodded, as if she knew what that feeling was like. She actually had no idea. “That’s pretty cool.”
“Yeah, hopefully he’s not headed to LA to see me or anything crazy like that.”
“Well, unless you’re in the middle of some nauseatingly cheesy romantic comedy, I don’t think you have to worry about that.”
Emily chuckled and then sighed. “That’s true.”
“So you’re in a long distance relationship?”
“Going on seven years now.”
“Wow,” Zooey marveled, a bit happy to see that Emily and her guy weren’t one of ‘those’ couples she had discussed with Justin. There was no evidence of an engagement ring either, so it seemed they were okay with not being your average relationship. “Isn’t it difficult to be apart for so long?”
“Not really. I kind of like it,” Emily rationalized as she spoke. “Time doesn’t matter, it’s more like every time we see one another, it’s like the first time.”
“That’s sweet,” she smiled to herself, thinking that that was a refreshing notion. It goes to show that those on the outside can never really understand what’s going on between two people. The relationship you have with another person is sacred, it’s only for the two that are in it. There’s no way a third party could make a fair assessment about what’s happening inside.
“Excuse me,” a familiar voice interrupted, just when Zooey was about to come up with something groundbreaking to say. She looked up, utterly stunned to see Justin staring back at them.
“Oh, my god,” Emily croaked out, flabbergasted for a completely different reason than her seatmate.
“Hi,” Justin grinned at Zooey and then at the stranger. “Would you mind terribly if I asked you to switched seats with me?” he requested of Emily. “I’m sitting right up there,” he pointed to the first row across the aisle, “you can even listen to my iPod if you want.”
The shocked stranger only nodded and began to gather her belongings before bidding Zooey adieu. “It was nice meeting you.”
“Same here,” she called back.
“Thank you,” Justin offered genuinely, adding that his iPod contained over 60,000 songs, and he was certain she’d be able to find something. After making sure Emily was settled, he took his rightful spot next to his friend with a sigh of relief.
Zooey, who was grinning from ear to ear, resisted the urge to pinch herself as she asked him, “What the fuck are you doing here?”
“Stalking you, of course,” he retorted in a ‘duh’ tone.
“Right, of course. But seriously.”
“But seriously,” he changed his tune, “I’m going to New York to spend Christmas with Scarlett.”
“Ah, the wife,” she remembered, silently wishing she could put Scarlett out of her head, wishing that she could wish her out of existence, really. “Sounds lovely.”
“It will be.”
“God, it’s getting scary how we keep ending up in the same places.”
“I think it’s kinda cool,” he shrugged casually. “What are you going to New York for?”
“To spend Christmas with you and Scarlett, obviously.”
“Obviously.”
“What’d we get her for Christmas?” Zooey didn’t know why she asked him such probing questions about his wife, she certainly didn’t want to hear the answers or care to be reminded that he adored her.
“We don’t get each other gifts,” he announced, proud of their immaterialism.
Just as the plane began to depart from the gate and the captain came over the intercom to do his welcomes, she looked at Justin with a wild curiosity. What the hell kind of couple doesn’t buy gifts for one another? “What?”
He chuckled at her incredulousness and explained, “We’re lucky enough to be in a position where we don’t want for anything. We just like being with one another during the holidays.”
“You two are worse than I thought,” she rolled her eyes at him.
“There really is no point, though,” he went on. “There’s nothing in this world I can buy for her that she can’t buy for herself.”
“But what about sentimental gifts,” Zooey rebutted. “Things that cost nothing but time… That’s what rich people are supposed to give, but none of you assholes seem to grasp that.”
“Well why do you think I’m flying to New York at midnight on Christmas Eve?”
Well, she did have to give him that, but still… nothing to unwrap on Christmas? “If you were my husband, I’d beat you up for such a shitty gift.”
“Well then, it’s a good thing you never wanna get married, isn’t it?”
“Justin, you are making up things. I never said I never wanted to get married!”
“You said something very similar to that, and it made me look at you funny.”
“You look at me funny anyway, what else is new.”
“Well what did you say?” he gave her the opportunity to explain herself.
“I said that relationships are… difficult. I said that I didn’t know how I’d be able to be married.”
“And why is that?”
“Because,” she began to talk with her hands, trying to let them say the things she didn’t know how to explicate.
“Go on.”
She thought momentarily as they made their ascent into the Los Angeles night, headed for the other end of the country toward their loved ones. As she thought of seeing her sister, her dad, and eventually her mom on this trip, she came to a conclusion. “Your relationships are the heaviest components of your life,” she proclaimed. “All those negotiations and secrets, compromises, they bear so much weight.” This theory especially applied to her mother and imagined that it would only multiply in a relationship with a man. “The slower we move, the faster we die,” she prophesized.
“So do you just hate people,” he joked, “or is it the baggage they come along with?”
“A mixture of both.”
“So how could you ever be married that way?”
“I dunno...”
“You wanna die alone?”
“Make no mistake, we all die alone,” she replied somberly.
“Well that’s morbid.”
“And cynical. But it’s true.”
“You’re weird.”
“I don’t mind being married to my career.”
“But your favorite memories… the most important moments of your life, where you were receiving all those honors and accolades, when you got your acceptance letter to Harvard and got your job with The Office… were you alone at those times?”
“No...”
“So… don’t you see that life’s better with company? Everyone needs a co-pilot, Zo.”
“Well I know that! And I have friends! I’ll never not love my friends or my family. “
“And when they’re all boo’d up with their husbands and wives, where will you be? At their kids’ graduation parties with absolutely no one.”
“That’s mean!” she whimpered, glancing out of the window at the dark skies. “And that’s still not to say I don’t want to be married. If it happens, I’ll be happy. I just don’t want to depend on it, I don’t want to be defined by a need for it.”
“You’re not like other women,” he marveled, gazing at her. “Not even a little bit.”
“Not if I can help it,” she smirked. “I consider myself realer than most of the women I encounter.”
He nodded. “My rule of thumb is that if you tell me within two minutes of meeting me that you're ‘real,’ you are, in fact, not. But… hey. Nice dress.”
She smiled at his analysis, loving his points of view on so many things. “Why couldn’t I have met you first?” she blurted out softly, feeling a bit more truthful than she intended.
“First?”
“Before her.”
“Oh.” He wondered the same sometimes.
“What made you choose her?”
“Are you sure this is what you wanna discuss?” he asked, feeling uneasy about the question and how to answer it without bragging and without selling his wife short.
“Morbid curiosity.”
“Curiosity killed the cat,” he retorted.
“Satisfaction brought it back,” she quipped.
“Very well,” he sighed, thinking for a second. “I chose her because… well, I felt like she was real.” There was that word again. But it was the truth. “In a sea of facades, she just came across as honest. She has no idea how to hide who she is.”
“That’s an important character trait to you?”
“Supremely.”
“Then why in God’s name would you marry an actress?”
He chuckled at the irony of her statement, not really knowing how to answer it. She was right “ hiding who she was was the definition of Scarlett’s job “ but Scarlett was so much more than that. He knew that, but didn’t quite know how to vocalize it. “In spite of that, I feel like I know her. And that’s really all that matters to me.”
“Good answer,” she accepted with a small smile. She felt a pang of jealousy, but quickly swept it away, as it wasn’t her place. “I guess you’ve spent the past six years coming to that conclusion, huh?”
“I have. I feel pretty confident in it.”
“That’s good. Nothing worse than a rushed relationship.”
“I think that’s why so many people get divorced,” he hypothesized, thinking that Zooey actually was on to a little bit of something when she said people were too quick to get married because of social norms. “People aren’t patient. We want quick fixes and instantly gratifying relationships. And then we quit when we don’t get what we want within the unrealistic timeline we put into place.”
“Exactly,” she vehemently agreed. “It’s sad to watch, honestly.”
____________________
As time traveled along with them towards the east coast, Zooey and Justin’s conversation continued, as it usually did, each of them honest and engaging, with only the most comfortable silences between them until they found other things to say. She regaled them with the details of her sister’s relationship with Kanye, which she admitted was completely intriguing to her. She told him about how often and ridiculously they fought, not speaking to each other for weeks and then holing up in a hotel room together for days, not leaving for any reason whatsoever.
She explained how they got together “ when of his homeboys accosted her friend at one of his LA shows during the Glow in the Dark Tour and Emile bumrushed the backstage area to find her. Randomly, in passing, she told Kanye that his mother was an angel and she was deeply sorry for his loss. She didn’t think that he would acknowledge her, or even hear her amid the chaos that was ensuing back there, but he did, and made it a point to say Thank You. He demanded that she come back the next night as his personal guest, and from then on out, the two were virtually inseparable and insufferable. They subsequently got tattoos for one another just days into their relationship “ her with a line from “Golddigger” going around her left wrist, him with the all caps letters H-E-L-L on his back, the middle E and L dedicated to her initials.
Justin seemed enthralled by it all, never knowing what it was like to have such a turbulent relationship. Everything he’d been through in life had been relatively simple, straightforward, easy. He had minute problems, just like everyone else, but there was no one and nothing that he felt that strongly about, which was actually a little sad when he thought about it.
Even so, there were small details he felt comfortable sharing with Zooey. After she did her confessions the previous week over lunch, he thought it only fair that he tell her his deepest, darkest secrets, even if they were slightly shallow and fairly light. He revealed to her his innermost insecurities “ things he hadn’t shared with anyone, not even his mom or his new wife, not wanting to offend them. He talked about how he wished that he had gone to college or finished high school because he sometimes felt inadequate around Scarlett and their friends with all their Upper East Side private school upbringings. His Memphis roots didn’t exactly scream to the upper crest of society.
And in listening to him, Zooey couldn’t believe that someone as calm, cool, and collected as Justin had an insecurity in the world, but it only made her like him more. “Well I want to Harvard, so how does that make you feel about me?” she asked lightheartedly.
“Not gonna lie, I kind of hate you a little?”
She let out a nearly silent chuckle, one that was mainly only visible.
“But no,” he sobered up, “you’ve always had a very unintimidating way about interacting with me. Like, even though you’re smug about pretty much everything, you still make the conversation easy.”
“Well thank you.”
“Not to mention, you very quickly humanized yourself when you told me about your mom and everything. For a moment, I felt closer to you than I ever have to Scarlett.”
Flattered by the compliment, she felt herself blushing for the first time in ages. “Well then I’m glad my mom was a thoughtless slut,” she joked in a futile attempt to dissuade her onslaught of bashfulness.
“So am I,” he grinned, watching her bit longer than he wanted to.
She avoided his gaze, feeling simultaneously dejected and inspired by the moment. She was slowly but surely feeling things for him that were bordering on the inappropriate and it made her feel jittery. She wasn’t used to being out of control, and absolutely hated to be out of control of her emotions. She wasn’t sure how she was going to handle this one, but it was clear that if they kept at the rate they were going, this would not end well. Still, she looked up from her thoughts, meeting his gaze.
“I can’t figure out whether you have everything… or if you have nothing,” he told her as honestly as he knew how, staring deeply into her green eyes.
“I live in the moment. Nothing is everything to me.”
“That sounds about right,” he nodded slightly, realizing that she always had the perfect answer to everything.
She was glad when he yawned because the intensity of their exchange was beginning to stifle her and she wasn’t sure where it came from, as she never had an issue talking to him before. Perhaps it was the fact that there was absolutely nowhere to go, as they were 40,000 feet in the air, and all she could do was accept whatever he offered. The problem was that she wanted it “ all of it “ no matter the eventual price she’d have to pay.
And it only got worse… and better when Justin reclined his seat and moved his arm onto the rest against hers so that the skin of their forearms was touching. She closed her eyes, reveling in the sensation, feeling a rush of energy that took her breath away. It was the feeling of wanting something so much that it bordered on an actual need, and the power of that need began to overwhelm her. She could feel herself almost shaking.
Justin could feel it too, as he clutched the edge of the armrest like his life depended on it. He commanded himself to move his arm, knowing how imperative it was that he did the right thing. He could hear the scream inside his head “ You’re married, you love your wife! “ but it did no good, he literally could not make himself move. Instead, he just watched her recline her seat so that they were even, and he uncurled his fingers, desperately hoping that she would find them. And she did, clearly hesitant at first, their pinkies barely touching, then overlapping slightly, then a bit more, and more still, as if there was a slow, magnetic pull between them.
Time passed, but neither of them spoke, as Zooey’s hand completely covered Justin’s. The weight and the warmth of it all made it feel so innocent “ friends held hands, didn’t they? But the gesture felt exactly the opposite. The contact was not supplementary to a conversation; it was the conversation. It spoke volumes to the attraction between them and the dangerous chemistry they’d conjured up in the short time that they’d known one another.
He listened to the sound of Zooey’s breathing, her face close to his, as their fingers interlocked, unlaced, rearranged, and they flew east that way, eventually drifting off, suspended in the sky, in twilight between two time zones, together.
The pair didn’t awaken for good until their final descent into JFK. Groggily, she looked out of the window at the lights of New York City, then turned to find Justin still sleeping, still holding her hand. His neck was bent, his body curled slightly toward her, his face illuminated by the bright cabin lights. She frantically memorized the moment, feeling a definite drop in her stomach when she realized that there was nothing hopeful about this instant. When she first met Justin that day at WME, she was only filled with optimism, not only for her new career endeavor, but for the possibility of a new friendship with Justin. But in the present, as their flight was coming to a regretful end, she got the sinking feeling that he would soon realize the weight of their hand-holding and that this would be the decline of their closeness as well. At any second, he would wake up, let go of her hand, and be whisked off to spend Christmas with his wife.
When the plane hit the runway in a sudden jolt, Justin’s eyes blinked open and he immediately yawned, stretching his shoulders. “Hey,” he greeted Zooey with a sleepy smile.
“Hey,” she returned softly.
“What time is it?” he wondered, glancing past her and out to the dark scene of the runway.
“It’s about six-thirty.”
“Three-thirty our time,” he calculated, his face reflecting the sinking, conflicted feeling that she had as well.
“Ah yes, the time zone switch,” she commented, really wanting him to verbalize anything about what he was feeling. She absolutely did not want to discuss the time. She wanted him to say that he didn’t want to leave, that he wanted to come to Boston with her, that they could escape in the city for the day. Anything to prolong their time together, anything that meant not going their separate ways when they de-boarded the plane.
Instead, he looked down at their clasped hands and said, “Wow.”
“What?” she questioned, following his gaze to their crisscrossed thumbs.
“You know what…”
She nodded in defeat and squeezed his hand one last time before letting go.
Sitting in first class obviously had its perks, but right then, Zooey wished they were at the very back of the plane, having to wait for everyone else to get their slow asses out of the way before they could leave. Instead, they were the first ones off the aircraft, the only two of them in the tunnel between the plane and the gate for quite a few seconds. She wanted to give him a big hug and kiss and tell him Merry Christmas and all that jazz, but when they reached the end of the walkway, all she did was offer a little wave. “Happy Kwanzaa,” she joked with a small, disappointed smile.
“Merry Christmas,” he sent back, hoisting his backpack further on his shoulder, leaving her to find her connecting flight to Boston.
She didn’t move until he was completely out of sight, and even then, the only thing she could muster up was a solitary tear from each of her sad green eyes.
Oh Friend, You've Left Me Speechless by Ashley
Author's Notes:
Sorry for the delay, I've been SUPER busy. I'll do my best to update again this weekend! Love you guysss. -Ash
9: Oh Friend, You’ve Left Me Speechless
The holidays had ended on a somber note, despite Emile’s fantastic news that she was 3.5 months pregnant with Kanye’s baby and they were making plans to get married. Zooey just couldn’t find it in herself to be as ecstatic as she should have been, as the feelings she was forming for Justin were taking over her consciousness. She thought about him throughout Christmas and the New Year, desperately wanting to call him just to see what he was doing, just wanting to hear his voice. But she knew that he was with his wife, and that was something she shouldn’t even think to intrude upon.
So she returned to LA, unsure of whether Justin was back yet, but knowing that she needed to focus on other things. Like her job. Over the two weeks she was away, she talked to her dad a lot “ about her future, in particular “ and he encouraged her to follow her instincts.
More than anything, she knew that reaching her goals was a process, and her only choice was to take one step at a time, so logically, she opted for the next rung on her ladder “ she wanted to be a producer on The Office. It was a prestigious position, and something that a writer of her experience could realistically only dream of, but she figured she was getting more experience with every word she wrote, and it couldn’t hurt to at least ask.
So that second Monday in January, Zooey got up bright and early and went in to work at a time where only the executive producers were on set, hoping that she wouldn’t be intimidated by the big wigs. Luckily, the first person she ran into was the person she felt most comfortable with, the show’s co-creator, Greg Daniels.
“Greg, can I talk to you?” she requested, seeing him headed down the hallway just a few feet ahead of her.
“Zooey,” he turned, a bit surprised to see one of his writers in so early. “Hey. Welcome back.”
“Thanks.” They gave one another a slight and awkward New Year’s embrace as they continued down the hall. “Hard at work, I see.”
“Never stops,” he commented, guiding her into his office. “Shut the door, have a seat.”
Nervous, she did as told and fell into the chair across from her boss, wondering how she was gonna let these words come out of her mouth.
“What’s on your mind, Zooey?”
“Well… okay,” she grinned uneasily. It was not in Zooey’s nature to be nervous about… anything, but there she sat, on the verge of shaking and crying, almost terrified as to what his response would be. “I know I haven’t been here very long. Like, two years is nothing, really, but… I think I’ve done well. I think my work is good--.”
“It is,” Greg assured her, gazing at her stoically.
“And, well… I want to become a producer for the show. And I hope you’ll tell me what I need to do to make that happen.”
He sighed in a way that said he was annoyed but still attempting to find a way to be diplomatic. “Zooey…”
“I hope I’m not overstepping my boundaries…”
“What do I have to do for you?” he frowned at her, sitting back in his big leather desk chair.
“I don’t feel like it’s unrealistic, I’m just asking what I need to do…”
“Jesus, Zooey, every time I turn around, you have your hand in my pocket,” he snapped. “You want a job, you want a raise, you want a different job, you want a different office. Who do you think you are? Mindy? You walk in here straight off of Harvard’s campus and think you’re the hottest shit we’ve ever seen?”
“That’s not what I’m saying,” she blubbered out. “I-I-I just want a chance”.”
“No, you’re saying you want more. Something else, on top of the tons of other favors I’ve done for you.”
“I didn’t know--.”
“You need to put your nose down and focus on your work, because there’s not one thing you’ve done here that I can’t live without,” he told her bitingly. “You’re good, Zooey. Get better. Stop asking for shit.”
Zooey was completely stunned and hurt by his words, but determined not to allow her boss to witness her crying, she nodded in understanding and stood from her chair, extending her hand. “Thank you for your time, Greg.”
He curtly returned the handshake and watched her leave, instructing her, “Shut the door on your way out, please.”
As soon as she made it into the hallway, she burst into tears “ something she wasn’t yet accustomed to “ and fell into the wall behind her. She was so used to being strong at work, indignant even, because her colleagues looked at her as a spoiled brat who had things handed to her, but never once did she think that their judgments of her were fair... until now. She thought maybe that was just how they treated the new kid on the block, but if her own boss believed that this job had been spoon-fed to her, how the hell would she ever be able to convince anyone else otherwise?
“Hey, kid.” A female voice interrupted her sobs and Zooey looked up to find her self-professed mentor, Mindy Kaling, staring down at her. Mindy, one of the shows many talented writers, and the face of Office character, Kelly Kapoor, was holding her Starbucks cup in one hand while offering the other to Zooey to help her off of the floor. “What’s cookin’, good lookin’?”
Zooey gave her a small smile, as Mindy was the only writer that hadn’t really treated her like shit in the two seasons she had been there. “Nothing,” she lied, not wanting to seem like even more of a spoiled brat.
“Liar, liar, pants on fire,” Mindy submitted her warm, childlike grin. “Why you cryin’, boo?”
“Greg just kinda… yelled at me… I dunno,” she sniffled. “It’s not a big deal. I’m on my period, I’m emotional right now.”
“Oh, well Greg’s on his too,” she joked, dismissing his current attitude, “we just got word that Steve isn’t renewing his contract.”
Zooey could only blink at her, not knowing what else to say or do with that news. When the inimitable star of your show leaves, doesn’t that mean your… show leaves, too? “I’m sorry, what?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m sorry… Steve, as in Carell?”
“Yeah. Michael Scott has given us his ‘one more season’s notice.”
Zooey felt a whole new batch of tears coming up, so she dropped her head, watching them fall to the floor. “Fuck.”
“Right.”
“What’s… gonna happen?”
“We don’t know yet,” she shrugged, her usually chipper voice thick with melancholia. “Ideally, we go on without him, but worst case scenario, season seven is it for us.”
Zooey calculated everything in her head, knowing that they only had three more episodes of the current season left, and only rewrites on that, so that meant possibly only twenty-two more scripts to do. This show had become her life over the past few years… what was happening? “Oh, my god.”
“Hey,” Mindy stared at her from underneath a Red Sox cap. “Whatever happens, you will be fine, okay? You’re good. You’ll be on another show in no time.”
Several images flashed into her mind, none of which included her being a staff writer on an uber-successful show on a network that had money to actually pay her. In fact, most of the images she conjured up involved her standing at the corner of Hollywood & Highland, dressed as Keira Knightley’s character from Pirates of the Caribbean. “I wish I knew that were true,” she finally supplied shakily. Zooey was not used to this feeling of uncertainty and insecurity. 2010 had definitely not begun on a good note. “God.”
“Zooey, you know you’re good. Whatever happened with Greg, whatever happens with Steve, it doesn’t mean anything except new opportunity. Okay?”
Zooey nodded, and even though she grasped the concept, she still didn’t know how she was supposed to just accept what was happening. Her job, her livelihood, her passion was crumbling right before her eyes, and she couldn’t pretend she was okay with that.
“Do you need to take the day off?” Mindy wondered, knowing that her apprentice was still inwardly panicking.
“No, I’ll be fine.” There was no way in hell she was taking days off when there might be a shortage of them sooner than later.
Even though she wanted to scream for mercy, she just took a deep breath, attempted to collect herself as quickly as possible, and decisively moved on with her day. As Justin said on their Christmas flight, looking for quick fixes and instant gratification was no way to live. This would all be all right. Right?
____________________
The day came to a slow close and Zooey found herself nearly drowning by then, mostly in her own thoughts. She didn’t want anyone to know she was cracking, but the pressure really did seem to be suffocating her as she sat in the writing room, pretending to be paying attention, pretending to care about Michael Scott’s affair with a married woman, or Dwight dumping Angela and their baby contract. None of it mattered to Zooey, because all she wanted was to run from that fucking stuffy conference room and never look back.
And as soon as the proverbial bell rang on her work day and she was unleashed from their last meeting, Zooey raced to her office to grab her things and headed out of the building as fast as her size seven feet would carry her.
The first thing she did was call Justin, too unnerved to really worry about whatever awkwardness they’d left lingering on their Christmas morning flight.
“Hello?” he answered, dazed by the traffic in front of him. He knew he shouldn’t have answered, as his Bluetooth wasn’t in the vicinity, but when he saw who was calling, he couldn’t help but pick up.
“Hey. It’s me.”
“I know,” he resisted the urge to smile. “Happy New Year.”
“Yeah. Are you in LA?” she asked, hurriedly.
“Yeah…”
“Are you busy?”
“Are you all right?” he wanted to know first. It wasn’t like her to cut to the chase, there was always sarcastic banter to throw around before she actually said what was on her mind.
“I’m feeling crazy right now, but I’m… okay. I just… I need to see you.”
Over the holiday, he made a quiet resolution to let his relationship with Zooey kind of dwindle away, as he began to feel things that he shouldn’t as a married man. Their Christmas flight to New York had ignited something he wasn’t ready for, and instead of putting himself in a terrible position, one that he wouldn’t be able to get out of, he thought it best to try and keep his distance from her. But at that moment, none of that really stopped him from wanting to be there for her.
“O…kay,” he relented hesitantly. “Where are you?”
“I’m on my way home. Or wherever you need me to go,” she sighed, leaving the lot of her now-temporary job.
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
Justin quickly swerved out of his current lane on Sunset so that he could head the opposite way and hit Franklin Avenue in order to head toward Zooey’s area of Hollywood. “Okay, I’m on my way to your house. How long will you be?”
Relieved that she could rely on him in her hour of need, she let out another sigh. “Thank you so much,” she relayed sincerely. “I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
All I know is that you’re so nice
You’re the nicest thing I’ve seen
Twenty minutes later, Zooey pulled up to her charming casa in Los Feliz, pleased that Justin was there waiting, leaned sexily against his Audi, playing with his BlackBerry.
“Hey,” he smiled sheepishly, removing his William Rast sunglasses from his face.
Zooey, who had spent much of her day in tears, reluctantly removed her own sunglasses to reveal her puffy red face and heartbroken green eyes. “Hey.”
“You scared the hell out of me, you know.”
“How did I do that?” she attempted a smile, leading him up her driveway to the front of her home.
“The urgency in your voice, it was… alarming.”
It only mirrored what she had been feeling, she thought. She was uneasy, she felt panicked and unstable, not only about her job, but about the fact that Justin was the only person in the world she felt like sharing those feelings with. A married man. What was happening to her? “Sorry,” was all she could muster up in response.
I wish that we could give it a go
See if we could be something…
As they entered her tidy home, he watched her drop her purse to the floor and then fall into her sofa as if the day had kicked her ass. “So what’s up?” he had to know.
“Today was terrible,” she confirmed as she slowly removed her leather jacket and flung it over the nearest armrest. “Fuck today.”
He followed her lead, taking off his own jacket and sitting on the couch at the opposing end from her. “What happened today?”
“Well… my boss basically said that my spoiled ass was lucky to have a job, and then two minutes later, I find out that Steve Carell is leaving after next season.”
“Okay.” Justin sat back in his seat, digesting the news for her and nodded slowly. “So?”
“’SO?’” she repeatedly loudly. “What do you mean, ‘SO?!’”
“I mean… who cares what your boss thinks. You still have a job, right?”
“For now, yeah.”
“So what’s the big deal? I mean, Steve leaving kind of sucks, but that is the nature of Hollywood. You can’t be big forever.”
“Well not if we go by your résumé,” she mumbled jealously.
“You can’t go by my résumé,” he smirked. “I’m a lucky son of a bitch.”
“No fucking kidding.”
“But here’s the thing,” he went on to add, knowing that his simple words wouldn’t resonate with someone as stubborn as Zooey. “You, my dear, are a rare commodity in this business. You are not only funny, but you’re dangerously intelligent and excruciatingly attractive in an approachable way. There’s no way in hell you’re not going to be able to do whatever you want in this town.”
Zooey gave him a small smile, feeling very bashful as she marveled that such a simple statement could be so healing and thrilling and unsettling, all at once. “What are you doing to me?”
“I’m serious, Zo. If only all hilarious women could look like you.”
“Your wife isn’t hilarious?” she stupidly brought herself out of the moment to remind it that his wife even existed.
Justin looked at her for a long time, not wanting to say she wasn’t, but… well. “My wife doesn’t look like you,” he noted quietly.
I wish I was your favourite girl
“Why are you married?” she wondered sadly, again, resisting the urge to cry uncontrollably.
“Because I fell in love.”
And that did it. Zooey felt her cheeks flush, her eyes well up with tears, and they came spilling onto her face in an embarrassing rush of honesty.
I wish you thought I was the reason you were in the world
I wish my smile was your favourite kind of smile
I wish the way that I dressed was your favourite kind of style
“Zooey…”
“I’m sorry. I’m a fucking wreck right now.”
“It’s okay,” he replied, avoiding her tear-filled face.
“Have you ever wanted something so much that it hurt? Like, to the point where you needed it?”
He nodded, knowing full well that they were way past discussing her situation with work.
“What do you do about it?”
He knew that it was a bit of a rhetorical question, but he thought it only fair to respond some way. He didn’t want to leave her sad words hanging in the air. “I dunno,” he finally said, feeling just as gloomy about the situation.
I wish you couldn’t figure me out
But you’d always wanna know what I was about
If anything, it was clear that he was in the same boat she was. Conflicted, contrite, but unwavering in his feelings. At the very least, she thought, they were in this together. It wasn’t unrequited, this was no lopsided crush. They had mutual feelings for one another that they couldn’t do much of anything about.
“I’m sorry, I suck at cheering people up,” he glanced back at her, realizing that she was still crying.
But she didn’t care. She was just glad that he was there, not looking towards the door, looking for an escape route. He was there, with her, in the thick of it, not leaving. She pulled her legs up onto the couch with her, contorting into a crosslegged position as she wiped at her face. “I’m sorry. I don’t know why I’m doing this to you.”
I wish you’d hold my hand when I was upset
I wish you’d never forget the look on my face when we first met
“You’re not doing anything. We’re friends. You can… confide in me whenever you want to.”
Friends. That dreaded word. “I have enough friends. I don’t wanna be your friend,” she blurted out, hating the sound of her own voice as she heard it.
Basically, I wish that you loved me
“Well… I am married, so there’s not much else we can be.”
I wish that you needed me
She nodded quickly as another few frustrated tears slid down her face. “I know.”
I wish that you knew when I said two sugars, actually I meant three
“Zooey, I’m not… equipped to handle this.”
“I know.”
“So what are we gonna do?”
“I don’t know.”
It was all too much. There he sat, with this infinitely awesome woman at his side “ a woman that wasn’t his wife “ and all he was thinking of was finding a way to make her smile. He wanted to hold her hand and tell her that it would all be all right. He wanted to envelope her and kiss her and assure her that nothing mattered, so long as they had one another, but there it was. The simple fact was that they didn’t have each other. They had the moment and the moment was wrong for every reason imaginable. What was he supposed to do?
“I should go,” he announced when his thoughts became overwhelming.
“Do you really have to go?” she requested, even more saddened by the notion of being alone with her own thoughts.
He nodded, standing up to put on his jacket.
She stood as well, tempted to take his hand and make him stay. Instead she just walked him to the door. “I appreciate you coming by.”
Knowing that he shouldn’t have, he only blushed in response. “Everything will be all right,” he promised, not really sure whether that was true.
“You don’t know that,” she read his mind, gazing into his pools of sad blues. “Do you?”
He shook his head and slowly lowered his head. What was he doing? Her head began to raise and then tilt, eventually colliding with his softly. They were cheek to cheek, then nose to cheek, then nose to nose. They both held still for a moment, just listening to the other breathing nervously, and it seemed like an eternity was passing. But then his bottom lip to grazed her top one and it took only a millisecond for their mouths to squarely find one another, their lips parted.
I wish that without me, your heart would break
I wish that without me, you’d be spending the rest of your nights awake
I wish that without me, you couldn’t eat
Yeah, I wish I was the last thing on your mind before you went to sleep
As they kissed, Justin’s mind went completely blank. In that second, anything and everything outside of her quiet abode didn’t exist. There was no Scarlett, no wedding, no ring on his finger, nothing but his attraction to Zooey, demanding that he not stop.
Zooey, on the other hand, had a million thoughts swirling around her overstuffed brain. She knew, more than anything, that this could signify the beginning of the end once his conscience took over, and she could feel the sting of more tears as she imagined not being able to see him anymore after this. Regrettably, she pulled away.
“Justin,” she exhaled shakily, wiping her face and her lips.
“Zooey, I am so sorry.”
“I’m sorry,” she countered, backing away from him. “You’re married. This is ridiculous…”
“I’m so sorry,” he repeated, feeling more remorseful with every second that passed. “I’m so sorry.”
“I’m sorry.” It was all she could say too, knowing that this was so, so wrong.
“Fuck.” He knew that the fact that he couldn’t help himself spoke volumes to what he was feeling. In six years with Scarlett, he’d never been tempted to even take another girl’s number, much less end up in her home, kissing her. Physicality or not, this was a full-blown affair due to all the feelings he had for this girl. No denying it. “We can’t do this.”
“I know.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I am, too.”
“I have to go.”
“Is our friendship totally fucked?” she wondered out loud, even though she was beginning to realize that they never really had a friendship to begin with. She had feelings for him about two minutes after their first conversation, quite honestly.
“Zooey…”
Look, all I know is that you’re the nicest thing I’ve ever seen
She didn’t want to hear his answer if it was going to be Yes. “Okay, go,” she insisted, quickly swinging her front door open.
“Yeah, I should...”
“Okay.” As more tears streamed down her face, she wondered if that would be the last time she saw him.
And I wish we could see if we could be something
Yeah, I wish we could see if we could be something…
Lyrics: “Nicest Thing” “ Kate Nash (Made of Bricks)
End Notes:
If you don't know this song, seriously, go download it. It's fantastic!
The Two Sides of My Brain Need to Have a Meeting by Ashley
Author's Notes:
Mmmk, so I know I suck, like, really badly. I'm so sorry, you guys. I've just been so freaking busy. New position at work = more responsibility = extra tired ALL the time. But I appreciate you guys more than you know, and I'll absolutely try not to take so long with the next update. Thank you for sticking around! -Ash
10: The Two Sides of My Brain Need to Have a Meeting
“Ughhh, I am so not a fuckin’ red carpet kinda girl,” Zooey complained as her BFF, Lacey, pulled her into yet another designer Beverly Hills store. They were searching for a dress that Zooey could comfortably rock to the Golden Globe Awards, but so far, they had come up empty.
“Why do you say that?” Lacey scolded her, still somewhat envious that her friend would even get to go. “What makes you any different that anyone else on that carpet?”
“I don’t want to be there.” She walked into Saks, already noticing it full of women with tons more money and clout than she could ever amass, and immediately wanted to walk right back out. “Let’s just order a dress online.”
“No, crazy ho. We came to find you a dress, we’re gonna find you a dress.”
“Lacey, you don’t understand. I don’t do diamonds and dresses and crap like that. I usually have pencils stuck in my hair, not curls.”
“I understand that completely,” she gently pushed her further into the store, “but it’s one night. Play dress-up and it’s over before you know it.”
“I hate pretending,” she frowned impishly. “You’re an actor, go in my place and play my part.”
“I’m not an actor,” she smiled meekly. “I’m aspiring.” If anything, Lacey should have been a model with her thin 5’10” frame and flawless chocolate skin covering Janet Jackson-like cheekbones. But alas, she “ and every other restaurant hostess in Hollywood “ was a wannabe actor, taking menial odd jobs in order to pay the rent until the ‘big break.’ And in her spare time, she aided Zooey in pretty much everything. “And trust me,” she went on, “if I thought I had even the slightest chance at being you, I would try.”
“Oh god, shut up.”
“I’m serious!”
“I know you are, that’s why I want you to shut up,” she teased, accompanying Lacey towards the formal wear. She already knew, without looking too hard, that their entire selection was way too boring to suit her tastes. Dresses that would look fairly fantastic on most women just screamed drab to Zooey. “Lace, this is not gonna cut it.”
“What you mean, boo?”
“I mean… everything sucks,” she explained curtly. “Do they sell anything unique in this city, or is it all this ‘original and vintage’ bullshit where five of us will inevitably end up at the show in the same fucking dress?”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. What’s with the ‘tude, dude?”
“I don’t have a ‘tude.”
“So why are you snapping at me?”
“Because!” Zooey sighed in frustration, knowing that her disdain actually had very little to do with the dress search. She was just annoyed in general. At everything. “Because,” she reoffered, softer this time. Lacey only looked at her.
“What the hell is wrong, Zo?”
“You really wanna know?”
She nodded as if the answer was obvious.
“Do you really wanna know?” she asked, louder this time.
“Zooey.”
“Do you really wanna fuckin’ know?!” she shouted this time, laughing as she got the words out, mostly to hide the twinge of pain she felt when she thought about it.
“Yes!” Lacey giggled in response.
As onlookers passed them by, Zooey stared her friend down before confessing, “I kissed Justin.”
Lacey’s small brown eyes got big and bug-like and before she knew it, she was yelling, “But he’s married!”
Zooey quickly grabbed her dear friend and covered her mouth with her hand so that she couldn’t yell anything else incriminating. “Why do people keep telling me that as if it’s new information?” she wondered out loud, dragging Lacey back outside. “Can we discuss this quietly?”
Lacey nodded while trying to breathe past Zooey’s hand.
Zooey let her companion free and then immediately avoided her accusing stare. “Don’t look at me like that,” she demanded.
“I’m not looking at you like anything.”
“You’re looking at me like I should know better.”
“Well… you should.”
“I do. But I’m here now, and I’m not sure where to go next.”
“What the hell do you mean, what kind of options do you have?”
“I don’t know,” she realized somberly as they came to a halt to wait for passing traffic so they could cross from Wilshire over to Rodeo. “I mean, I guess there’s nothing to do but either get my emotions in check or stop hanging out with him.”
“Or both,” Lacey offered unhelpfully.
“No.”
“No?”
“What would be the point in both?”
“Put yourself out of your misery. The more time you spend with someone like that, the more likely you are to be out of control.”
“Someone like that?” Zooey felt offended by something that hadn’t even been said. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Well you know.”
“I don’t.”
“Justin is… unique. He’s rare.”
“You make him sound like an endangered species.”
“He is,” Lacey nodded. “A real live gentleman? Successful? In Hollywood? They’re a dying breed, Zo.”
“I don’t think that combination of characteristics was ever found in a breed to begin with.”
“Right. As I said, he’s a rarity. And I think that the more you spend time with him, letting him… infiltrate your life, the more likely you are to fall in love with--.”
“I’m not gonna fall in love with him,” she assured her friend “ though, mainly, it was for herself.
“First of all, there’s no way you can guarantee that. Secondly, I was going to say you were susceptible to falling in love with the idea of him.”
“How do you fall in love with an idea?” she asked rhetorically as they crossed another street towards one of many Rodeo restaurants, The Farm. “That sounds weird.”
“People do it all the time. They create an image of the person they’re with, no matter how accurate or inaccurate it may be, and then they engage in it.”
“But is that really falling in love?”
“Who’s to say it isn’t,” Lacey shrugged, pulling her sunglasses to the top of her head as they took to a table in the patio seating area. “I just know it’s dangerous.”
“Stop exaggerating,” Zooey sighed, mimicking Lacey’s actions. “It’s not that big of a deal.”
“Yet.”
Zooey could only look at her. “You just really want me to feel like shit about this, huh?”
“I want you to think about the ramifications if you go any further. Like, why would you want to involve yourself in something that has absolutely no potential for success? What will you get out of this if you don’t walk away now?”
“A friend?” she asked innocently.
“You have friends. Zo. You make friends every other day.”
“But you’ve never met someone that just… gets you?”
“Everyone gets you.”
“No.”
“Who doesn’t?”
“No one does,” she answered as honestly as she knew how. “Except him.”
“This is what I mean! You’re creating some ludicrous notion that doesn’t really have to exist, Zooey, and you’re turning it into, ‘He gets me like I’ve never been gotten before.’ It’s in your head.”
“It’s not in my head, I swear to god,” she felt herself beginning to tear up. “You can tell me a lot of things, and logically speaking, I’ll understand them one way or another, but you cannot tell me that whatever I’m feeling for Justin is made up or disingenuous. I feel better when he’s around. It’s not in my head.”
“Zooey…” Lacey didn’t know what to say to convince her friend otherwise. She wanted to help her, but she didn’t want to push her towards Justin by being obstinate about it either.
“What do I do?”
“You walk away.”
“What if I can’t?”
“You’re gonna have to. Either let it hurt now, or let it get too far and hurt a hell of a lot more down the road.”
“Lacey, I don’t want to pursue anything with him, I just want him in my life.”
“And that’s dangerous.”
“Why?”
“Because you kissed him, which means that you obviously are not in control of your emotions.”
“That wasn’t my fault.”
“Yeah, and the dog ate your homework,” she rolled her eyes. “You have to stop. Everything you’re doing, just stop.”
____________________
The Golden Globes had come, and as planned Zooey went with Emile as her escort. She finally settled on an electric blue knee-length Zac Posen dress that would’ve set her apart from the crowd had her sister not been sitting beside her, wearing a long neon yellow Herve Leger gown. And it certainly didn’t help in her quest to do as Lacey said and avoid Justin for the night. Her table was situated just a few feet from his, and with Emile acting as a blinking sign, it wasn’t very long into the show before he approached.
“Something keeps putting us in the same room together,” he greeted her evenly during a commercial break, when most of the table’s occupants were off schmoozing. “What is that about?”
She was nervous to see him, given what had occurred just a week before, and she was surprised he made a move to speak. For once, she didn’t know what to say. “Maybe we’ve been put in the same room for years. We just notice each other now,” she hypothesized.
“Maybe so,” he nodded. He motioned for Emile, offering her a quick hug and cheek kiss. “How are you, Emile?”
“I’m very good,” she returned cheekily.
“Congratulations, by the way. Zooey told me you were expecting.”
“Thank you,” she beamed, clearly very much in love with her life. “Congratulations to you, I don’t think I’ve seen you since you got married.”
“Thank you, thank you,” he grinned shyly. “You think you’ll be walking down the aisle soon?”
“I would say so,” she sighed happily. “Certainly before the end of the year.”
“Send ‘Ye my regards,” he offered before looking back to Zooey. “You feel like going to get a drink?”
After tuning out their exchange, Zooey looked up, a bit startled by his request. “Really?”
“Walk with me.”
Daintily, she rose from her seat and escorted him to the lobby of the famed Beverly Hilton, where dozens of guests were gathered to gossip and collect cocktails.
“You look great,” Justin commented, realizing how nice she looked when she glammed it up. “Blue is a good color on you.”
She gave him a tight-lipped grin.
“What’s wrong?” he wondered, seeing the tenseness in her expression.
“Nothing,” she lied.
“Zooey.” He moved in closer to her so that he wouldn’t be overheard by anyone nearby. “Talk to me.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
“What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking we shouldn’t be here. Or at least, I shouldn’t be.”
“The good thing about an award show?” he whispered. “Everyone here is famous, they’re all too egotistical to give a shit about what I’m doing.”
“Yeah,” she forced out a smile. “But who’s to say they’re not looking at me.”
“They should be, you look fantastic.”
“Don’t flatter me.”
“Why not?”
“I blush easily.”
“That’s not even a little bit true.”
“It’s true when it’s you.”
“Sorry.”
“Can I go?” she requested, growing weary of his hot breath on the side of her cheek.
He pulled back to look at her, wondering why she was so irate. “Are you supposed to be mad at me?”
“Not at all.”
“Then what?”
“I’m uncomfortable.”
“You’re uncomfortable with me now?” He was visibly offended by the prospect. “What gives?”
“It’s not you. It’s them.”
“Ignore them.”
“Well it is you, actually. You and us and what happened. It’s… unnerving to stand here with you, acting like it didn’t.”
“So… what? You need some space? Are we done now? What happens?”
“Let’s talk about it,” she suggested hopefully. “I don’t want any awkwardness between us but I need to... talk it out.”
“What is there to say?”
“Why did you kiss me?” The way she said it was almost harsh and accusatory, as if she didn’t like it.
Nervously, he pulled her away from the crowds and towards a secluded corner where they could speak more candidly. “You’re mad that I kissed you,” he guessed.
“I’m not mad,” she shook her head, harried. “I just need to know why you did it. Were you feeling sorry for me? Or were you feeling… me?”
“I don’t know, I was feeling you. I think.”
“You think.”
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Why did you kiss me back?” he had been wondering for over a week now.
“You know why.”
“Say it anyway.”
“Because I like you. And you like me. And that knowledge controls a huge part of me.”
He nodded but stayed silent.
“Say something,” she demanded.
“What am I supposed to say?”
“If I knew, I’d say it myself.”
“I don’t know what’s happening here, Zooey, but I don’t think we should be angry at each other.”
“I’m not angry at you.”
“Then what is this?”
“Confusion?”
“I get that. And I get that you’re trying to make this easy by being rigid, but it’s not gonna help. I know that when I’m with you, I feel a certain something that I haven’t in a long time. And I don’t want it to go away.”
“What way is that?”
“I don’t know. I just feel… yellow,” he intimated softly.
“Yellow as in happy? Or yellow as in scared?”
“I dunno,” he repeated, shaking his head. “I think both.”
“That’s… sweet.”
“It’s true.”
“This sucks,” she pouted.
“Do you trust me?”
“No, Aladdin, I don’t, actually.”
“What? Why not?”
“Because everything you say and do propels me further into this quandary. And in turn, it means I don’t trust myself, which is a dangerous, dangerous game.”
“You’re exaggerating.”
“Sadly, I’m not.”
“Well…”
“Would you say I know a little something about you?”
He looked suspiciously around the crowded room before answering. “Yeah…”
“Well if I know you, I know you’re not someone who enjoys being out of control...”
“I don’t,” he admitted, “but I think you are.”
“I don’t know if that’s true.”
“You don’t live by rules, Zooey. Everyone knows that.”
“Well maybe I should.”
“Maybe I shouldn’t.”
“What do you want from me?” she demanded, feeling naked and so uncomfortably vulnerable as she stood there.
“I want you to stop acting like we have to let a moment of weakness define us. We made a mistake, but that’s all it has to be if you’d just let it go.”
“So just forget it happened?”
“Yes!”
“It’s simple for you, huh?”
“Simple enough,” he deigned.
Zooey was trying to do the right thing. She was trying to address it and assess it. She was trying to make sense of what was happening and not ignore how wrong it all was. She wanted to do as Lacey said and accept that her and Justin could never be… anything. But if he was going to insist otherwise, how could she? “Fine,” she finally relented, glancing around the room as it began to thin out. “But we really should go back to our seats, people are gonna start thinking thoughts.”
“We wouldn’t want that,” he smiled warmly at her. He finally looked up from her well-decorated face to see that his date “ his mother “ was waiting for him near the bar, while Emile stood by the door, presumably waiting for her sister. “I’ll call you,” he whispered to his companion before allowing her to escape.
Comforted, this time, by his breath on her neck, she smiled to herself. “Maybe I’ll find you at an after party tonight.”
“Catch me if you can,” he finished, finally strolling over to where his mother sat. “Hey, mommy.”
“Who was that?” she didn’t waste any time wondering, referring to Zooey.
“Just a friend,” he replied casually, picking up the drink one of the bartenders had prepared for her, handing it over. “Here you go.”
“Thank you,” she smiled tensely, taking a long sip of the pink concoction. “How do you know her?”
“Through a friend,” he frowned at her line of questioning. “Why, you know her?”
“No. You just seemed to talk to her for a long time.”
“We haven’t seen each other in a while.”
“She’s a good friend?”
“We’re not especially close, but more than acquaintances, I suppose.”
“Hmm.”
They reentered the ballroom, seeing Christina Aguilera and Cher on stage, so they stayed at the back of the room until their presentation ended. “What are you getting at?” he whispered to his mother apprehensively.
“You smile with all your friends like that?”
“What?”
“You seemed particularly… enchanted by her.”
“I did?”
“Yes.”
“Well maybe it’s all the champagne. It’s nothing serious, I assure you.”
“Hmm.”
“Mom.”
“I’m not saying anything!” she hissed.
“I know, that’s why it’s annoying.”
“Well… I’m not gonna say anything.”
“Okay, but we both you’re gonna be silent for all of ten minutes and then blurt it out at the most inconvenient moment, so you might as well just say it now.”
“I have nothing to say,” she maintained, taking another long sip of her drink. “Just be careful.”
“Be careful of what?”
“Be careful of whatever feeling it was that made you smile at her like that.”
He knew what she was talking about, because the feeling tended to surface whenever Zooey was around. Ambiguously happy, maybe? He didn’t know what it was or where it came from, but it was there, slapping his happy ass in the face. “All right, well thank you for your input, mom.”
“You’re not listening to me,” she noted, not appreciating his flippant response. “I’m serious, Justin.”
“I’m serious, too!”
“You’re not. You think it’s all fun and games, but that ring on your finger represents a serious commitment. And I think you’re playing with fire.”
“I think you should mind your business,” he retorted, annoyed. He watched in irritation as she stormed away from their conversation while he turned back to the bar to get his own drink.
Meanwhile, Emile and Zooey had convened in the ladies’ room for a makeup refresh, but also for a little gab session. Emile had also noticed her sister’s conversation with Justin and found it intriguing, to say the least.
“What were you and Justin talking about?” she demanded to know after making sure that the bathroom was empty.
Zooey, who had never ever been able to hide anything from her sister, just glanced at her in the mirror and then looked down to the sink in front of them. “Nothing.”
“You fucking liar!”
“Nothing important.”
“What’d he say, he’s leaving his wife for you?”
“What?”
“Come on, Zo, I’m not stupid. I see the way you look at him.”
“What way is that?”
“Like he let you in on some fantastic secret.”
That was an accurate depiction of how she felt about him, too. And that fantastic secret was… him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
They both turned as the bathroom door swung open and in walked Justin’s mother. Neither of them had ever met the woman, so it didn’t really register that Justin was, in fact, her son, and so they continued their conversation.
“You know exactly what I’m talkin’ about, bitch, don’t try to play me like I don’t know your ass.”
“We’re just friends.”
“For now, maybe.”
“Forever,” she supplied sadly. “He’s married, remember?”
“I saw the way he looked back at you, boo. He is not thinking about that woman.”
“Well… I am. So none of this matters.” She finished applying a fresh coat of lip gloss and then watched her big sister fluff her hair a bit. “How are you feeling, Em?”
“I’m feeling like my sister is a big pussy.”
“What?!”
“You want him, Zooey, and I’m actually surprised that you’re letting something as insignificant as a wife deter you.”
“Just a couple of months ago, you were scolding me for going bowling with him because he was engaged.”
“Girl please,” she waved off, just as their other bathroom companion joined them at the sinks. “Two months later, he’s still hanging on your every word. You’re my sister, not that other woman. Get yours.”
“He’s not mine to get.” She looked over to the third party, who seemed to be ignoring them, and smiled. “Hi,” she offered cordially.
“That is such a pretty color on you,” Lynn sweetly replied, ever the Southern charmer.
“Thank you,” Zooey grinned in her direction, recalling Justin saying something similar just a little while before.
“I picked it out for her,” Emile inserted proudly, even though the dress she picked was hot pink. Zooey was the one who opted for the blue.
“You have good taste,” Lynn replied with a grin, drying her hands. “You ladies have a good evening.”
“You too,” Zooey returned, watching nervously as the woman disappeared. She then shot her eyes back to Emile, who was completely oblivious. “I think that was Justin’s mom,” she whispered.
“Nuh uh.”
“I’ve seen her on TV before, she kinda resembles the image I have in my head. And she definitely sounds like the woman I’m remembering.”
“Well we didn’t refer to him by name. Maybe she doesn’t know who we were talking about.”
“Yeah, and maybe I’m the queen of Abu Dhabi,” Zooey snapped. “Fuck, Em.”
“Calm down. She wouldn’t have complimented you if she knew.”
“Maybe she’s just a nice Southern lady who compliments everything. But in the back of her mind, she thinks I’m a homewrecking slut,” she realized. “Shit!”
“Even so, you were nice and respectful about the situation. If anything, she thinks I’m the insensitive cunt.”
“That’s true.”
“So let’s just go back out and enjoy the rest of this boring ass show.”
As Emile switched out of the restroom, Zooey shakily pulled her phone from her shimmery golden clutch and typed out a text message to Justin. You make me feel yellow too... but right now, the scared version.
She took a deep breath and stared at herself in the mirror a bit longer, watching her remorse pour over her entire face. She hated the way she felt, so deeply infatuated with this amazing man, who happened to be someone’s husband. And even more, she hated how avoidable this all was, if she’d just had fifty-five cents that day. Or if she’d taken the many opportunities she’d been given to just not talk to him. But it was like she couldn’t help herself “ no matter how much he gave her, she always wanted more. And now, she stood there, at the Golden Globes, of all places, waiting for something to guide her out of her guilt. It finally came in the form of a text message response from Justin.
Move forward zooey. This never happened. It will shock you how much it never happened. (Five bucks if you know where that’s from.)
She immediately chuckled, because she instantly recognized it as one of Mad Men’s many pearls of wisdom. And as much as she found it adorable that Justin was using this moment to quote Don Draper, his words actually didn’t help her at all. She was miserable and no one seemed to get that. Everyone had a different answer to her problem, but none of them satisfyingly told her how to deal with the part where all of this was hurting like hell. And no matter where she went from there, it would only hurt worse. Where was the advice for what to do with that?
Not All Surprises Are Bad by Ashley
Author's Notes:
Sooo... remember me? I KNOW how much you guys must hate me, and I really am sorry, but I come bearing kinda good news! I didn't want to post another chapter until I finished the story, but... I also wanted to let you guys know that's what I'm doing lol. So. Here's one more chapter until I complete this mess I've made. And I'm verrry close to being done, so it shouldn't be long at all. But in the meantime, enjoy this chapter, if you can even remember what this shit is about, and I'll be back soon, I swear! If you're reading this, thank you so much for not disappearing on me like I did to you. :happysmurf - Ash
11: Not All Surprises Are Bad
“Justin, are you here, babe?” It was Scarlett, walking through the house, searching for her husband, who was apparently missing in action.
He rounded the corner of his kitchen, shocked to find his wife staring back at him. “Whoaaa, what are you doing here?”
“I’m here to see you, obviously,” she grinned proudly. “Did you really think I was gonna miss your birthday?”
“I… didn’t think about it, I guess.” He pulled her into a long embrace, one full of panic, and kissed the top of her auburn hair. “I missed you.”
“I missed you, too,” she pulled away with a smirk. “Happy birthday to you.”
“Happy birthday to me,” he commented back wryly in an attempt to hide his state of uncertainty. “So you’re coming with me to my party?”
“Well…”
“Well?”
“I was thinking…”
“That’s always dangerous,” he smiled warmly.
“Right?” She took his hand into her own and pulled him towards their living room. A living room she’d yet to set foot in since they became husband and wife. “I was thinking that we could skip all the parties and Grammy festivities tonight and have a quiet dinner, just the two of us.”
It hadn’t really registered with him that it was Grammy night, or that his birthday party was set to be hosted at a pretty popular club in West Hollywood, where club promoters needed their celebrity guests to show up when they said they would. All that he could think was that he wouldn’t get to see Zooey.
“I’m sensing that you don’t really wanna do that,” she guessed.
“I mean, I do. Of course I do,” he countered. And he did. He hadn’t seen his wife in ages, spending the night with her sounded… relieving, actually. But… “It’s just that you know, Trace and Rob, they planned this whole night for me, I think they’d be a little disappointed if I didn’t show up.”
“Babe, it’s your birthday. They would not get mad at you for doing what you wanna do.”
“Ideally, you’re right, they shouldn’t. But realistically, I’m pretty sure they would and will.”
“Then it’s up to you, I’ll do whatever you wanna do.”
Truth was, he really wanted to go to his party and hang out with his friends “ namely, Zooey. But he would’ve felt like an asshole having his wife come all the way from New York just to have her sit in a club and socialize with his group of friends. “You’re right. Let’s go out to dinner, babe. Wherever you wanna go.”
“No, it’s your birthday. Wherever you want is fine.”
“What I want is to spend the evening with my beautiful wife. The city is crawling with parties, so I’m sure we can have a nice quiet dinner somewhere without drawing much attention.”
“Okay,” she grinned happily. It felt like an eternity since she’d been able to spend a quiet night anywhere, much less with her husband. “How does Beso sound?”
“Beso sounds good.”
“Kay, go get dressed and I’ll make a reservation.”
Nodding, he did as told, pulling his BlackBerry from his pocket in order to warn his friends that he wouldn’t be able to make it, but Scarlett had other plans for his phone as well.
“Hey.”
“Hey,” he paused, turning back to her.
“No phones tonight. Gimme that.”
“No phones?”
“No phones.” She snatched the phone from his clutches and threw it in a nearby drawer. “It’s just you and me tonight.”
“O…kay,” he agreed hesitantly, inwardly panicking about the fact that he had tons of texts from Zooey in his inbox, just waiting to be discovered. “Can I just let the guys know that I won’t be there?”
“No,” she playfully waved him off. “Go get ready, it’s getting late.”
He quickly turned to do as Scarlett said, knowing that his inward alarm was going to quickly be shown all over his face, and the last thing he wanted to do was field questions all night about what was wrong with him. He’d have to chalk this one up to a loss and move on with his evening.
____________________
The time was rounding the eleven o’clock hour, the Grammy’s were well past over, and the club was getting more crowded as the minutes passed, everyone still waiting on the guest of honor to show up. Zooey was particularly antsy because she’d been texting him for over an hour with no reply. She wondered if he was mad at her, or did he forget? Was he sleeping? Was he hurt? What was going on?
She left her table full of acquaintances and strutted over to where Trace sat, entertaining a table full of females. “Hey, Trash,” she called him out, referring to the tattoo on his forearm where he’d inked himself as Tennessee Trash, “where’s your friend?”
Trace looked up from underneath his cap and stared for a moment, as if trying to place Zooey’s face. “What?”
“Where’s Justin?” she shouted over the music. “This is his birthday party, isn’t it?”
“Oh, yeah. He’s probably on his way. You know how he likes to make an entrance.”
“Does he?”
“Well not really, but it’s his birthday, it’s Grammy night, there are a bunch of parties in the city, he’ll be here soon.”
“Have you talked to him? Have you confirmed this information?”
“No, but I know him. He’ll be here.”
Annoyed, Zooey shook her bangs out of her face and scanned the crowded area, searching for someone with a shred more sense than Trace apparently had. Spotting Rob, she stalked over to his table, where he sat with a bunch of ‘music people’ as Justin previously introduced them to her as. “Rob, where’s Justin?”
“Oh, man he can’t make it,” he seemed to suddenly remember. “I talked to Scar a little bit ago, they’re hanging out tonight.”
“Scar as in Scarlett?”
“As in his wife, yeah,” Rob smirked. “Is that all right with you?”
She felt like she was sensing some brand of mockery and she didn’t like it. “Fuck you, Robin.”
“Oh come on, I was just kidding,” he shot up from his seat to apologize before she walked off. “You know I didn’t mean it like that.”
“Whatever,” she nudged him away, frustrated that she’d just spent two hours waiting on nothing. “Have a good night.” Silently, she grabbed her jacket from her original table and headed out of the busy club, hating herself for even caring.
But alas, she did. She cared a lot, and it stung like hell to know he was ignoring her many attempts to contact him because his wife was in town.
“I am so fucking stupid,” she whispered to herself.
Leave me out with the waste
This is not what I do
It’s the wrong kind of place to be thinking of you
“Babe, what is wrong with you?” Scarlett wondered as she drove the streets of Los Angeles with her husband next to her, seemingly in a trance. “You’ve been acting weird all night.”
“Huh?” was his dazed response.
“Are you here? With me?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“I said you’ve been acting weird all night. Like, weirder than usual.”
“I have?”
“Yes!”
“I dunno, I guess I’m a little thrown off because I don’t have my phone.”
“That is not what’s wrong with you.”
“There’s nothing wrong with me,” he maintained. “I’m a little distracted, I guess, but there’s nothing wrong.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“What’s not to believe,” he chuckled tiredly. The wine from dinner had apparently kicked in and nothing was really making sense. “I mean, you show up out of nowhere and throw my plans out of whack, I’m sorry I’m not in my usual state of awesome.”
“Oh, I’m sorry I interrupted your plans,” she retorted, her tone swimming in sarcasm. “I’m so sorry that I made the effort to come and see you for your birthday and you missed out on the opportunity to hang out with Trace and Rob for the thousandth time this month.”
“Whoa, when did this turn into a fight?”
“When you implied that I ruined your night.”
“I didn’t say that, Tess, I just said I was a little weird because of it. I’m not mad that you’re here.”
“Well you sure as hell aren’t happy.”
“I am happy. We had a good night, I thought.”
“Were you there, Justin? Because the dinner I had was awkward and silent.”
“I thought you liked silent. You said you didn’t need to talk to enjoy yourself with me.” She was the one who said she loved the ease of marital, nonverbal communication while he was the talker in the relationship. He hated that they no longer had to speak to one another to get their points across. Except for that night, it seemed.
“That’s usually true, but I haven’t seen you in a month!”
“We talk like everyday, though.”
“It’s not the same, Justin. And if you don’t know that we should be able to talk easily after not spending any time together, then I don’t know what to say to you.”
He was so thankful that they were rounding the corner to home, because the feeling of not being able to escape this conversation was suffocating him. “I’m sorry, Scarlett. I really am. I didn’t know that I was making you so uncomfortable.”
“I didn’t know I was making you so uncomfortable,” she replied softly. Turning up their driveway, she began to dig through her purse to locate his phone, which he had clearly been suffering without. “Here.”
He looked down, unsure whether he wanted to take it. He saw the red message indicator blinking, which meant that at least one person had called or sent a text, but he knew that it was more along the lines of several to many. “Thank you,” he hesitantly accepted.
“Sorry for ruining your birthday.”
He sighed exasperatedly and looked at his wife as she pulled in front of the house. “You did not ruin my birthday. Why are you being so dramatic?”
“Why are you?”
“What did I do besides say that I wasn’t expecting you?”
“Forgive me, I thought I would be a pleasant surprise.”
“You were! You are…”
“That sounds sooo convincing.”
She piled out of the car as quickly as she could while Justin stayed behind to look through his messages to see what he had missed. Thankfully, they were mostly birthday wishes and ‘Where are you’s from people at his party, but there was quite a collection of messages from Zooey, ranging from random to irritated. He scrolled through them, smiling at the funny ones and wincing at the ones that asked when he would be showing up. He hated that he had ditched her. He had to call her quickly.
It’s the wrong time for somebody new
It’s a small crime and I got no excuse
“Hello?”
“Hey,” he found himself involuntarily smiling at the sound of her voice.
“Oh, so you are alive,” she answered dryly. “That’s good to know.”
“Listen, I’m really sorry, Zo. Something else came up and I just--.”
“Where the hell were you,” she demanded to know. “I sat there for two hours, watching the door like a punk, waiting for you to show up.”
“I’m sorry,” he whispered again, as if Scarlett were somewhere listening, even though she had been in the house for minutes now. “Scarlett came home, she wanted us to go out, just the two of us. She took my phone so we wouldn’t be interrupted.”
“Convenient.”
“I’m serious.”
“Well why are you calling me now?”
“We just got home. I honestly didn’t even go in the house yet, I feel so bad for not calling anyone… not calling you.”
She sighed in frustration. “Justin…”
“I know.”
And is that all right, yeah
Give my gun away when it’s loaded
That all right, yeah
If you don’t shoot it how am I supposed to hold it?
“I gotta go.”
“Zooey, wait.”
“What?”
“I’m really sorry.”
“I heard you the first two times. Go hang out with your wife.”
“Zooey--”
And then she was gone. He knew that she was still pissed, and rightfully so, but he hated it. Dangerously, he hated it even more than the fact that his wife was pissed at him, too. What the hell was wrong with him?
He hesitantly headed inside his home, where Scarlett sat at the kitchen counter waiting for him to come in.
“Justin, what’s going on?”
Leave me out with the waste
This is not what I do
It’s the wrong kind of place to be cheating on you
“Nothing,” he answered without looking at her. He dropped his box of leftovers to the counter with her and then headed back for the door. “I’m gonna drop by the party, say hi, thank everybody and all that.”
“All right…”
“You wanna come?” He had no plans to drop by any party, but his asking her to come was pure reverse psychology.
She shook her head and somberly pulled his leftovers in front of her, beginning to pile cold sweet potato French fries into her mouth. “Have fun.”
He didn’t know what happened to this night, and even worse, he didn’t really care. All he wanted was to get to Zooey.
It’s the wrong time
She’s pulling me through
It’s a small crime, and I got no excuse
____________________
It was midnight now “ officially Monday, officially no longer Justin’s birthday, and Zooey had officially surrendered to her bad mood and decided to go to bed. But no sooner than her head hit the pillow did her doorbell ring, completely knocking her out of her state of fatigue.
She knew it was Justin “ there was no one else it could possibly be, unless there was some kind of emergency where her cell phone number had been forgotten “ and it made her simultaneously furious and satisfied.
Quickly puttering to the front of her home, she peeked through the living room window, and sure enough, there sat one of Justin’s many Audis. And for one more confirmation, she looked through her peephole to find him standing there, with his hands stuffed in his jacket pockets, looking at the ground.
She pulled the hood of her sweatshirt over her head and swung the door open. “What are you doing here?”
“I feel bad.”
“Shouldn’t you be with your wife?”
“Yeah.”
“Then go away. What is wrong with you?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Justin…”
“Can I come in?”
She shifted her weight from one heel to the other as she raced through all the different outcomes of this scenario “ none of them had a particularly pleasant ending. She felt a sudden chill go down her spine and found herself wishing for more than just the sweatshirt and boxers she was wearing. “Could you just go?”
“No.”
“Someone’s gonna see you.”
“Then let me in.”
She reluctantly did so, looking down to her own floor as he took the half a dozen steps to come inside her house.
“Why are you upset?” he wanted to know.
“I’m not.”
“Why do you keep saying you’re not when you clearly are?”
“I’m just trying to learn to keep my distance.”
“Why?”
“Why?” she felt like shouting. “Because… maybe I’m the only that seems to remember this tiny little factoid, but you’re married.”
“I know that, Zooey.”
“So what the fuck makes you think that you being here right now is okay?”
“I don’t know what to say,” he whispered guiltily. “…I like you.”
“That doesn’t matter,” she shook her head sadly.
He moved in closer to her, silently amused to see her stumble backwards. “Zooey, tell me you haven’t thought about me and us kissing every time you walk through your front door.”
“I can’t say I haven’t,” she admitted. “But then I have the luxury of rewriting that memory. I conjure up an ending where I don’t end up falling in love with that moment and I make myself react differently… Correctly.”
“Why are you so hard on yourself?”
“Because I know how this ends.”
“So what.”
“So I don’t wanna get hurt, Justin. When everything breaks open, you’ll still have a wife to go home to. I’ll have nothing.”
“You’re the one that said nothing was everything.”
“Everything means nothing if I ain’t got you…”
He hated how she made him laugh in even the tensest of moments. He also loved it. “I want this, Zooey. I want you. I don’t care about the consequences “ finally. That has to mean something to someone like you.”
She shook her head vehemently, trying to shake all her thoughts and temptations away. She had to walk away.
“Where are you going.”
She walked back into her living room and took a cross-legged seat on the floor, still looking down. “I’m trying to do the right thing,” she said to her chest. “Why are you making it so hard?”
He entered the threshold of the room, watching her in the middle of the floor, looking like a crazy person, and smirked. “That’s what she said.”
“Justin, I am fucking serious here!”
“Calm down.” He took a seat in front of her and exhaled loudly as he thought of an answer he didn’t really have. He didn’t know why it was so hard to stay away from her. “I dunno,” he replied honestly. “Sometimes, the right thing… isn’t always the right thing.”
“We would regret it.”
And is that all right, yeah
I give my gun away when it’s loaded
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
“Is this really how you wanna spend your birthday?”
“There’s nowhere else I’d rather be, Zooey.”
Is that all right, yeah
You don’t shoot it how am I supposed to hold it?
Is that all right, yeah
I give my gun away when it’s loaded
He made her feel the good kind of weak. The kind of weak that made you stop by Krispy Kreme because you just saw the ‘Hot’ light come on and no one was in line yet. The kind of weak that made you push the snooze button on the alarm clock one more time than you should have. It was the kind of weak that led to temporary bliss.
“Fuck it,” she sniffled, pulling off her sweatshirt. Without giving any of her reservations another thought, she crawled to Justin and kissed him.
Is that all right with you?
Lyrics: “9 Crimes” “ Damien Rice feat. Lisa Hannigan (9)
End Notes:
Again, a fantastic song that you should add to your library if you haven't already.
Author's Notes:
Well, as usual, I fail, so I'm posting before I've completed the story lol. BUT I only have two chapters left to write, so I think we're safe. And so, here's a long one until I do finish this thang. I can't thank you guys enough for still being here. Loves. -Ash
12: Wake Up Calls
Hours later, as the dark night began to turn to dawn, Justin awoke to his mistake. At Zooey’s house, naked, on her sofa, with her laying next to him, equally as undressed. His mind raced back to Scarlett, who he’d left at home, confused and agitated. When he arrived at Zooey’s house, he had no intentions to royally screw up his marriage or his relationship with Zooey, but the road to hell is paved with good intentions. All men mean well, they just don’t do well. And while the sex with Zooey was ridiculous “ made of poetry and porn “ he was forced to face the awful truth when he awoke from it: there was no turning back now.
“Zooey,” he called out to her hoarsely, sniffling from the slight chill that had washed over the house. When she didn’t budge, he touched her shoulder and called her a little louder. “Zooey.”
She groaned in irritation, “Nooo.”
“Zooey, wake up.”
“One really important thing to know about me,” she croaked out, “is that no sunrise is worth waking me up to see.”
He couldn’t help but smirk. “No, I’m just telling you that I have to go.”
“Write a note,” she shot back groggily, placing one of her sofa’s pillows over her head.
“Zooey.” He hated trying to be serious when she clearly wasn’t.
“What.”
“This is kind of a big deal for me, so if you could just pay attention…”
Slowly, she pulled herself up from her comfortable position, rubbing the sleep from her eyes as she tried to focus on the man in front of her. “What’s up.”
“I think I’m gonna tell Scarlett.”
Frowning, she watched him in the dark room as he began to put his clothes back on, and all she could muster in response was, “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Okay,” she repeated.
“That’s all you have to say about this?”
“I mean, I’m not married to you, so I can’t tell you what you should or shouldn’t say. But if you could just use my alias, that would be great…”
“Zooey. Everything is not fun and funny. This is my life we’re taking about here. My marriage.”
“If you were so concerned about your marriage, then why did you come over?”
“Because--.”
“Why would you be on my doorstep making speeches about how you didn’t care about consequences and that you wanted this?”
“I did want this. I mean… I do.”
“This is my life we’re talking about too,” she went on, “and I’m not about to let you traipse in and out of it with a list full of regrets taped to your forehead. If you want your wife, then go be with her, but you don’t get to drag me through your range of emotions every time you get bored with her either.”
“You are cold,” he commented, pulling his shirt on. “I hate how cold you are sometimes.”
“I’m not cold. I’m pragmatic.”
“Thank you for not being an asshole about this,” he retorted sarcastically.
“Justin, I am literally the last person you should come to for marriage advice.”
“And yet you hand out omens like you’re a psychic.”
“Well what I do know is that when I met you, you seemed transcendently happy with her. Since marrying her, it seems that you’ve experienced some sudden withdrawal from her “ and this is coming from someone who’s never even seen you two in a room together. So all I’m saying is, if you weren’t ready, then you shouldn’t have put a ring on it.”
He eyed her for a long time, trying to conjure up words that expressed exactly how much he hated these conflicting feelings. Sadly, Zooey was right. He certainly had withdrawn from Scarlett, and not just because she was gone “ they’d gone through long breaks before. And it wasn’t because he had gotten married either. It was because he met Zooey, and she lit up his life in a way he didn’t expect.
Now, he stood in her living room, tired and confused, she sat before him, naked and angry, and he had no idea what to say. “Where’s my jacket?”
Ignoring him, she laid back down, pulling the pillow over her head to go back to sleep.
____________________
Justin pulled up to his home in The Hills just as the sun began rising over them, dumfounded as to what he would say to his wife when he walked inside. He couldn’t figure out what he was doing with himself, and still had no idea whether he should let her in on this massive secret. On the surface, he felt terrible, and that was mostly because he knew he should. But deep down, the fact was that Zooey made him feel good, and he didn’t want that to stop.
When he walked inside, the house was silent, which he found odd, because he knew that Scarlett hated to be alone in a quiet house. If he wasn’t home, she always went to bed with at least one television on full blast. She said that it made her feel like she had some company. She said she felt less vulnerable, somehow. But apparently, she’d found some solace in silence the night before, because you could hear a pin drop.
He traipsed upstairs, hoping he could hop in the shower and wash Zooey off of him before crawling into bed, but was surprised to go into his room and find his wife sitting upright, wide awake.
“Hey,” he greeted her.
“Hey,” she answered hoarsely.
“You all right?” Scarlett was by no means an early riser, so if she was up at 5 a.m., it was because she hadn’t been to sleep yet.
“Yeah.”
“Couldn’t sleep?”
“It’s weird being in this bed without you sometimes.”
He offered a warm smile in reply and began to strip his clothes.
“Did you have a good night?”
He nodded.
“Are you all right?” she wondered, noting his silent responses.
“Yeah. I just overdid it, I think. Which was dumb, because I have to be on a movie set in a few hours.”
“Which movie is this?”
“’Bad Teacher.’”
“Mmm.”
“What?”
She shook her head, watching him throw his clothes to a small pile in the middle of the floor. “Nothing.”
“Why does this feel awkward?”
“Probably because you left last night in the middle of an argument and now, you’re either too drunk to remember or too much of an asshole to care.”
“Shit.” It was more like he was too much of an asshole to remember.
“What is happening to you?” she questioned softly, almost scared to hear what the answer could be.
“I don’t think anything is happening,” he lied. “I just… I guess I wasn’t prepared for you to be here.”
“Why do you have to be prepared for that, though? That’s what I don’t understand.”
“I… had plans. I guess I didn’t anticipate having to change them.”
“You show up out of the blue all the time and I change my plans without hesitation whenever you come into town. Because there are few things, if anything, that mean more to me than you. Why isn’t that reciprocated?”
“I don’t know. I’m not used to being the surprisee,” he chuckled awkwardly, trying to avoid the fact that he was being a total dick about all of this. “I’m sorry, Tess.”
“You made me feel so unwanted last night. Totally unwelcome in my own home.”
“I don’t know what else to say except that I’m really sorry.”
She sat quietly for a long time, staring at the wall across from their bed, absolutely hating what she was feeling. Was this how it all began, she wondered? Was this the point where her three-month-old marriage went downhill? How could that be?
“Scarlett, are we all right?”
“Yeah,” she nodded, finally looking at him with a pursed-lipped smile. “Of course.”
“All right. Well I’m gonna get a shower.”
“You want some company?”
He knew he should’ve said yes, just to keep from rocking the boat anymore than he had, but he didn’t even have it in him to fake it at that moment. “I really gotta get ready to head to work, so… raincheck? Tonight?”
“Sure. Of course.”
Realizing that he hadn’t even greeted her with a kiss, he went to the bed to plant one on her understanding lips. “I love you.”
“Love you too, babe.” As they pulled apart, Scarlett made a disgusted face when she tasted his morning mouth. “Gross, have you been smoking?”
“What?” he chuckled uneasily.
“I feel like I just kissed an ashtray. What the fuck, Justin?”
“I mean, I’ve been in a club for, like, four hours. You know what it’s like.”
“I know that unless you licked an ashtray, you shouldn’t taste like one.”
Zooey and her cigarettes, he thought to himself regretfully. “Whatever, as fucked up as this is to say, Trace kissed me, as a joke. I guess he’d had a cigarette beforehand… I didn’t really notice.”
“That’s disgusting,” she commented, getting up to brush her teeth. “And tell him to stop smoking before he kills himself.”
“You smoked like a pack a day when we met.”
“And now I don’t. Tell him to stop,” she demanded, taking over the bathroom before he could enter.
With a sigh of relief, Justin leaned against the door and closed his tired eyes. “Jesus.”
____________________
A few hours later, Zooey finally awoke from her turbulent slumber, to the sound of her doorbell ringing. She couldn’t imagine that Justin had come back, but she also couldn’t imagine that anyone else would be at her door at 8:00 a.m.
“This motherfucker just hates to call first,” she mumbled as she puttered towards the door, once again, in her boxers and hoodie. When she reached the front of her house, she was surprised to not see Justin staring back at her. She swung the door open with narrowed eyes. “Andy, what the hell are you doing here?”
“Long time, no see,” he smirked, letting himself into her home. “Where the fuck have you been?”
“Around,” she answered evenly, watching him head back towards her kitchen. “What do you want?”
“What the fuck, Levin, I haven’t seen you since your party for the Christmas episode. How about some courtesy?”
Zooey hadn’t been in a particularly courteous mood since Justin left a few hours earlier. But Andrew was the last person that should be preaching anything about politeness to anyone. “Seriously. Why are you here?”
“I was in the neighborhood.”
“Doing what?”
“Breakfast.”
“I’m not in the mood to be harassed right now, dude.”
“I get it,” he relented, pulling her last package of Pop tarts from its wrapping. “You clearly just woke up.”
“Yeah. If you just had breakfast, why are you eating my food?”
“I’m a growing boy,” he grinned impishly, piling the pastry into his mouth. He eyed her living room, which was disorderly in comparison to how she usually kept it. The sofa pillows were strewn about, wine glasses and beer bottles sat along the coffee table, and crumpled sheets were on the floor. “You had a party without me?”
“No,” she frowned, wiping her tired face. “Just a little bit of company.”
He eyed her playfully as he retreated from the kitchen to inspect the scene. “Male company?”
“No,” she lied, pretending to yawn so that she wouldn’t give herself away. “Just… a friend.”
“Zooey Levin.”
“Why are you here?” she asked for the third time in five minutes.
Just as he was about to make a lewd joke about her ‘company,’ Andy noticed a scarf stuck between the last seat cushions of her couch. “Is your friend still here?” he wondered.
She followed his gaze to where the plaid scarf sat and inwardly kicked herself for not being more cautious. “No.”
“Well whoever it was forgot their scarf,” he announced, moving swiftly to pull it from the sofa. The black and red wrap very obviously smelled of cologne, while its tag read, ‘William Rast.’ It didn’t take long at all for Andrew to put the pieces together.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” Zooey jeered.
“What am I looking at you like?”
“Like you know something I don’t.”
“I just know something you don’t want me to know.”
“What would that be?”
“That guy was here again, wasn’t he?”
“That guy…”
“Zo.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she insisted, snatching the scarf from his clutches. She began to straighten up before anything else could be inferred from the current state of the living room, while ignoring her friend’s implications.
“Zooey, did Justin Timberlake spend the night here?”
“Andy, what are you talking about?”
“I know Jon wasn’t here, and he’s the only other person I know that wears that crap ass brand that Timberlake calls a clothing line.”
“Fuck you,” she spat without thinking of how defensive it would seem. “And no, ‘Justin Timberlake’ was not here last night.” She yawned again as she began to collect the wine glasses.
“You know that you yawn whenever you’re lying to me, right?”
“And also when I’m tired.”
“Maybe,” he allowed, following her back towards the kitchen. “But at the end of a sentence, it means you’re lying.”
“While I wish I had all day to entertain your theories about who I am and what I was doing last night, I have to get to work, Andy, so… I think it’s time to put this conversation on hold.”
“That’s fine,” he grinned. “You’ve already told me so much more than you meant to.”
Ignoring his comments, she went on to fill her dishwasher with the contents of her sink. “Have a good day, Andy.”
Just when she thought she’d be relieved of the agonizing Q & A, Andy spun on his heel with realization. “Wait a minute, isn’t he married?”
“You have to be kidding me,” she sighed, slamming her dishwasher shut. “Can you please let this go?”
“No, I’m pretty sure he’s married,” he confirmed for himself, trying to think of Justin’s new wife. “Who did he marry?”
Zooey stayed silent, hating to be reminded of her perpetual mistakes.
“The girl with the lips. She was in that movie.”
“That movie.”
“That movie with umm… that guy.”
“That movie with that guy…” Zooey repeated him tonelessly, hoping he’d take note of how ridiculous he sounded.
“Scarlett Johansson!” he miraculously arrived at her name after a good minute of contemplation. “That’s his wife, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“What the fuck,” he laughed snidely as he added more pieces to the puzzle. “Why the fuck would anyone cheat on Scarlett Johansson with you?”
“Fuck you, Andrew.”
“No, seriously. I mean, Justin is kind of a douche, so I kind of get it, but at the same time… what the fuck?”
She rolled her eyes at his heartless words “ as she usually did “ but for some reason, on this occasion, they stung a little more than they should have. “Why is that an impossibility to you?”
“Zooey, come on. I love you, kid, but look at you and look at her.”
“Get out of my house,” she retorted quietly.
“I’m not saying it to be mean; these are just the facts.”
“You’re an asshole.”
He flashed a smile and attempted to approach her for a hug. Snaking his arms around her hips, he leaned in to whisper, “You used to like that about me.”
“Not anymore,” she pulled away, heading back to the front to let him out. “I’ll see you around, dude.”
“I see how it is,” he nodded sarcastically. “You fuck a pop star, now you think you’re the shit.”
“I was the shit long before I fucked a pop star.” She snatched her remaining pop tart from his hand and bid him adieu. “Goodbye, Andy.”
“Call me?”
She smiled for the first time since he’d been there, but only because she was quickly realizing how insane he was. “…Sure.”
Just as she was about to close the door on him, he turned back for one last word of advice. “Zooey.”
“What?”
“You know that it’ll never last, right? He’ll never leave her for you.”
“Who said that I want him to?”
“Guys like him don’t enter our world for long periods of time. They come to visit, have a drink and a laugh, steal our taste in everything, and then go back to their world of rich and famous friends.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” she almost yelled.
“I mean, he likes you now because you seem quirky and fascinating compared to whatever he decided to marry. But when he gets bored with you “ and I assure you, he will get bored “ he’ll act like this never happened. He’ll act like he never knew you at all. And everything you taught him, he’ll act like he miraculously discovered on his own,” Andrew prophesized. “Just avoid this and fall for your type, Zo.”
The tears that stung the backs of her eyes were threatening to come spilling down, and she couldn’t afford to let Andrew know that his words were actually her biggest fear. So she just turned away, slamming the door behind her.
When Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky asked Zooey to work on their screenplay for Bad Teacher as a story editor, she jumped at the opportunity. Back when their movie was just a kernel of an idea, there were a number of big names that had been thrown around to play the leads, and she was more than happy to be getting her first shot at a big Hollywood production. Then, when Justin’s name officially became attached to the project, she was even more excited, as everyone in the movie industry was clamoring to get him in their comedy. But little did she know, that a few short weeks later, a number of things would transpire between her and “Justin Timberlake,” thereby curbing her excitement drastically.
“Good morning,” Zooey attempted to cheerfully greet a conference room full of department heads, actors, and writers. Holding a cup of coffee in one hand and a red velvet cupcake in the other, she took her seat amongst her colleagues, and tried to ignore the fact that Justin was just a couple of chairs away from her.
“Zo, you have a copy of the script?” Gene questioned before she could finish getting settled.
With a closed-lipped smile, she pulled the Bad Teacher script from her messenger bag and held it up for him. “Have there been any changes since we last talked?”
“A couple. Nothing major,” he waved off. “One of the kids is making copies.”
She nodded quietly and looked around the large room, as she took a long sip from her coffee. It appeared that everyone had shown up except for Cameron Diaz, which she was glad to see. Table reads for The Office always took forever, and those scripts were for only 22 minutes. She imagined that a 100-minute movie would be a lengthy process, and waiting for a bunch of stragglers would make it even more annoying.
She tried to pretend not to notice Justin, but the truth was that she was watching him more than anything. He sat quietly, playing with his phone, leaning against his right armrest, perhaps doing his best to not notice Zooey, too. His plaid shirt hugged his slim torso, while his thick-rimmed glasses magnified all of his facial features, which made Zooey involuntarily refer to what Andrew had mentioned a few hours earlier about Justin stealing their style.
“So Zooey,” one of her fellow writers, Archie, interrupted her thoughts, “you have any plans for Black history month?”
She knew he was joking, but became a bit indignant when Justin looked up with a shocked expression. “I’m not sure yet,” she began sarcastically. “Maybe terrorize some white people,” she nodded.
“That’s what I always prepare myself for,” Archie approved with a smile. “Did you go to any Grammy parties last night?”
“I didn’t.” She hated that she was forced to remember her previous night. “I went to a birthday party, but it was super duper lame.”
“Depressing.”
“It was.”
“Hey Justin, wasn’t your birthday yesterday,” Gene managed to remember as he overheard their conversation.
Justin, who’d gone back to his phone, looked up from it innocently. “Umm. Yes. It was.”
“Did you have a happy birthday?” Zooey inserted with an imperceptible agitation to her tone.
“I had an excellent birthday,” he grinned directly at her. “My wife actually came into town last night, we had a great night out on the town.”
“That is lovely,” she shot back enthusiastically. “She came in just to see you?”
“She did. Yeah.”
“Wow. Now that’s love,” she commented to the rest of the room. “I want a wife like that.”
“You want a wife?” the director, Jake, wondered out loud, thinking Zooey had just admitted herself a lesbian.
“Absolutely. Not that I’m gay,” she was sure to clarify, “but I need someone to take care of me before I turn into some undernourished spinster… and not to be sexist, but a man just couldn’t do it.”
As the rest of the room laughed, one of the other principal actors, Jason Segel, volunteered to try. “While I do I love a good undernourished spinster, I swear to god, I’d make myself a girl if that gave me the slightest chance with you.”
“As flattering and as creepy as that is,” she blushed, “I think I’d prefer a real woman…”
“Bitch,” he sighed jokingly.
The room was engrossed in laughter again as the movie’s star, Cameron Diaz, finally entered the room breezily. “I know, I know, I am a bitch,” she announced, hearing the tail end of the conversation. “So, so sorry I’m late!”
“So we’ve got everyone, I’m assuming,” the executive producer, Georgia Kacandes came forward to proclaim. “Is this everyone?”
“Everyone that’s supposed to be here,” her assistant confirmed.
“Okay, great.” She moved to the middle of the extra large roundtable in the center of the room and pulled her cap further over her stringy brown locks. “So thank you, everyone, for being… relatively on time. This is our very first read-through, I’m so excited to see all of you, and excited about this project in general. We think it’s gonna be a really, really fun couple of months. Gene and Lee wrote a fantastic script, we’ve got a great team here, and… let’s have some fun today. Okay?” She waited for a collection of positive responses before continuing. “So I guess we’ll get started. I think Katy has a copy of the script for anyone that doesn’t have one “ so long as you’re willing to sign over your life for it,” she chuckled. “And umm… let’s make this a good one, kids.” The room began to clap in reply just as she added, “Oh, and for anyone that doesn’t know me, I’m Georgia, and basically, your life on this project depends on how much I like you,” she grinned. “So… welcome.”
____________________
As much as Zooey had dreaded being in the same room with Justin for much of her day, she was quickly proven wrong when the table read ended up being more fun than anything. As she already knew, the script was hilarious, and with the added bonus of comedic geniuses like Jason Segel and Eric Stonestreet, she spent much of her morning laughing instead of constantly reminding herself that she’d just slept with a married man.
It was when they broke for lunch that all of her anxiety came back, because she saw Justin headed straight for her before the room even cleared.
“Hey,” he approached, watching her pick up her trash of donut wrappers, Cheez-It bags, and Cherry Coke cans.
“Hey,” was all she said in reply.
“What are you doing for lunch?”
“Not too hungry,” she shrugged.
“That makes sense,” he smiled shyly. “But you do have an hour to kill…”
“I think I’m just gonna catch up on some work.”
“Really.”
“Yeah?”
He rolled his eyes, noting that two of the PAs were watching him “ watching him with her. “Take me to lunch,” he finally decided. “I’ll meet you at your car.”
She obstinately waited until he left the room before gathering her belongings to leave. As she stuffed her script back into her bag, and pulled out her keys, she also noticed the production assistants staring her down. “Take a picture, it’ll last longer.”
“Are you friends with him?” one of them found the balls to ask.
“With who?” she frowned.
“Justin. Timberlake.”
The truth was, she didn’t know what to refer to their relationship as anymore. And while they probably weren’t ever friends in the first place, they sure as hell weren’t anymore. “No.”
“Oh.”
Escaping as quickly as she could before they asked another question, she retreated outside to find Justin waiting at her car, just as he said he would be. “This is really just lunch, right?” she questioned, unlocking the door for him. “You’re not gonna bombard me with some hidden agenda as soon as we get too far on the road to turn back?”
He scoffed jokingly as he entered the passenger side. “Contrary to what you may think, you are not that important to me.”
“Oh, is that why whenever I looked to my left, you were staring at me?”
“And there you were, staring right back,” he reminded her.
“I was just giving you something to look at.”
“Which is much appreciated, but you don’t have to stare at me in order to do that.”
She rolled her eyes dramatically and began to back out of her space, regretting that there was probably no way she would be able to get it back. She hated parking far from the door. “Do me a favor and don’t speak, okay?”
“What?”
“Just… be quiet.”
Per Zooey’s request, their ride to Umami Burger was uncomfortably silent, aside from sounds of Jay-Z’s Blueprint 3 filling up the car. But Justin made sure to break the tension as soon as they sat down for lunch.
“I didn’t know you liked Jay-Z,” he commented breezily as he studied his menu.
“You’d be hard-pressed to find an artist I don’t like, actually.”
“Oh, except for me, apparently.”
“What?” She couldn’t help but smirk at his readily apparent insecurity.
“You like pretty much everyone but me, it seems.”
“Who said I didn’t like you?”
“Well your friend Andy explicitly explained that my music was the scourge of the music industry. True enough, LoveStoned isn’t gonna save the world, but I don’t think--.”
“Let me stop you before you embarrass yourself,” she interrupted, setting down her menu. “First of all, there is no song that will singlehandedly save the world, so you shouldn’t make that your gauge for quality music. Second of all, Andy’s opinion does not equate to my opinion. I can think for myself, thanks, and I think you’re a fantastic artist. Are you my favorite? No. But trust me, I will never turn my nose up at a good beat and a catchy chorus. Unless it’s Elvis. Third of all, Andy is an idiot. And I’m pretty sure I told you as much that same night. Please don’t let people like him fuck with you, he hates anything popular unless he’s a part of it.”
Dumfounded yet relieved, Justin could only smile. He had been a bit disappointed when Zooey seemingly agreed with her friend back when they first met, but he was glad to see that he was wrong. “Oh.”
“So as an artist, of course I like you. As a person… eh.”
“Well fuck you,” he chuckled, even though he felt she might have been serious. “Why is there such a chip on your shoulder lately?”
“Lately? What the hell, didn’t I just fuck you last night?”
His eyes widened in shock that she would blurt that out so loudly. “Are you kidding me.”
“Sorry,” she immediately lowered her voice. “I forget you’re married sometimes.”
“You’d like to.”
“I can’t even express in coherent words how much I’d like to.”
“I’m sorry.”
“For being married? Or for fucking me while doing so?”
“I don’t know,” he dropped his head apologetically. “I don’t know anymore.”
“I don’t either. Which is not something I’m used to,” she lectured, going back to her menu. “I mean, I’m used to knowing everything.”
“Ha ha.”
“I mean, seriously, I know that calling… whatever this is a friendship was a stretch in the first place, but I just feel like we’re ruining something that could have been kind of fantastic, you know?”
“I know,” he nodded. “And that’s what I’m hating, too. Like… I really like you. As a person.”
“Ditto.”
“So what do we do?”
“Well last night, you said, and I quote, ‘I want you and I don’t care about the consequences.”
“I know what I said.”
“Have you changed your mind?”
“No.”
“I don’t see any scrapes or bruises on your face, so I’m guessing you didn’t tell Scarlett.”
“I didn’t.”
“So then… why am I mad at you?”
“You were mad at me?”
“Yes, asshole! I’ve been hating you for like six hours now!”
“Hmm.” He obviously knew that she had been pissed at him, but instead of acknowledging it, he just stared at her blankly and waited for her to reply.
“Stop. Making me laugh.”
“I’m not even doing anything!”
“I know, which makes it all the more pathetic,” she grinned. “What are you getting?”
“What am I getting?”
“To eat?”
“Oh! Right. I… don’t know yet. Probably the SoCal Burger, as usual.”
“Cali boy,” she shook her head. “Are you sure you’re from Memphis?”
“What the fuck you tryin’ to say?” he smirked.
“You’ve gone soft,” she chided. “And I didn’t even know your bitch ass before you moved out here, but I’d bet anything that you’ve changed a lot since you came out here.”
“Oh, and you haven’t gone Hollywood? Did I not meet you at the biggest ‘talent’ agency in the land?”
“Yeah, and?”
“And I bet you weren’t driving a Range through the streets of Bahston,” he teased her, adding the accent for good measure.
“For the last time, my parents bought me that fucking car,” she shouted with a laugh. “And yeah, I love it. So what?”
“So. We all change here and there. We’re human. We adapt.”
“And that’s to be expected. But I guarantee, you won’t find me ordering any pussy ass burgers with sundried tomato spread and avocado on them.”
“Open your mind, Zo. You’ll go much further in life.”
____________________
“So let me just say this,” Zooey began, as she and Justin’s pleasant drive from lunch was coming to an end. “I’m glad you didn’t tell your wife, but… if you feel you need to, then I will understand. Okay? I don’t want you to ever resent me or regret meeting me, or anything equally as heartbreaking, so… do what you need to do to be all right. All right?”
He nodded earnestly and gazed out to the parking lot approaching them. “I’m not gonna tell her, but… thank you. For understanding.”
“I can only imagine how difficult this must be for you. And even though we asked for it, we don’t have to be defined by it.”
“Listen, the fact is, what I said last night was true. And for whatever reason, I can’t just remove myself from this situation or displace what I’m feeling. So… until I can figure this out, until I can figure out where to go next, you’re stuck with me,” he smiled shyly. “If that’s all right with you.”
“I don’t know if it is. But I know that I don’t want to lose you, so… I’m relieved that I’m stuck with you,” she grinned back. She pulled back into the lot, somehow finding the space she left, and felt totally compelled to give Justin a kiss. She knew it wasn’t the time or place, so she refrained, but she told him just as much. “I wish people didn’t exist so I could kiss you right now.”
He smiled genuinely and began to get out. “Let’s just get through the rest of the day and then we can do whatever we want.”
“Fair enough.”
Happily, they escorted one another back into the building, only to be greeted by those same nosy production assistants that had questioned Zooey earlier.
“Hey, Justin,” one of them spoke confidently. “Looks like you’re just in time.”
He frowned at her and then at Zooey. “Shit, I thought we were early. Is everyone waiting on me?” He began to rush back towards the conference room.
“No, no, you’re fine on time,” she called after him. “Your wife was looking for you, I think she was just about to leave.”
“What?”
“Your wife is here?”
He immediately pulled his phone from his jeans, and sure enough, there were two missed calls from Scarlett. “Oh.”
“I think she’s still in the conference room…”
“Did anyone tell her I went to lunch?”
“Yeah, I think so. But don’t worry,” she smiled, glancing at Zooey, “nobody knows you were with her.”
“Right,” he ignored her last comment. “Come on, Zooey.”
Dumfounded, she followed him to the long hallway that led to the conference room, waiting until they were out of earshot to speak to him. “We can’t walk in there together.”
“I know. But those chicks are annoying, I just wanted to get away from them.”
“So… I guess you’ll go in first, and I’ll just run to the bathroom or something.”
He nodded purposefully as they met the restrooms and quickly whispered, “Thank you.”
“It’s always gonna be like this, huh?”
He hated to admit it, but the truth of the matter? “Probably. Yeah.”
Author's Notes:
I figured since I have one chapter left to write, it would certainly be all right if I posted one more, yes? Plus, my little story is apparently featured right now, which is just awesomery squared. I don't even know how that happens lol. But anywayyy, I want to thank you guys so much for sticking with me after so long. I read all your reviews, and while I don't have time right now, I look forward to responding and conversing with everyone once I finish this last chapter. But in the meantime, please know how much I appreciate you! Y'all go on some crazy rides with me, and your feedback is truly invaluable. You just don't know. But I'm gonna stop rambling and let you read. Just... thank you. -Ash
13: All… Right?
It was a sunny late-February morning, and Zooey was headed into the office for the day when she was pleasantly surprised to see Justin calling. He had been in New York visiting Scarlett for the weekend, and truth be told, she kind of hated when they weren’t in the same city. They’d exchanged a couple of texts, but beyond that, they hadn’t spoken it all. His call immediately made her smile.
“Oh shit,” she answered jovially via speakerphone. “Haven’t talked to you in a minute.”
“Hello?” a female voice answered. Despite its tentativeness, she knew it had to be Scarlett’s.
“Hello?” Zooey returned, her good mood already washed away by apprehension.
“Who is this?”
“I’m… “ she paused, not sure whether to actually say her real name or if she should call herself Samantha, as she knew she was referred to in Justin’s phone. “I’m not sure I should say until I know who this is.”
“This is Scarlett. Justin’s wife?”
“Oh. Hi.”
“Hi.”
“Can I… help you with something?”
“I… don’t know,” she exhaled softly. “I don’t know why I’m calling.”
“Oh. Okay.”
“Is this Zooey?”
Suddenly, the steering wheel seemed to be slipping through her fingers as her hands began to sweat. She wasn’t sure what to say, and since lying wasn’t at all her forte, she just told the truth. “Yeah.”
“Okay.”
“Is everything all right?”
“Yeah.”
“Justin’s all right?”
“Yeah, he’s fine.”
“O…kay. Well… I am heading in to work right now, so…”
“I’m sorry. This is fucking weird, I know. I’m just “ I don’t know what I’m doing,” Scarlett admitted skittishly. “I’m sorry.”
“Okay.”
“I’m gonna let you go.”
“Are you sure you’re all right?”
“You were at lunch with Justin a couple of weeks ago, right? That’s what one of the interns on the set of your movie told me?’”
“Umm… yeah. Yeah, we went to Umami Burger, if I recall correctly.”
“Okay.”
“Is that all right?” Zooey asked, knowing that was the very least of her offenses. “If it’s inappropriate, I certainly won’t do it again. I’m retarded when it comes to coworker etiquette and such.”
“No, no, no, it’s fine. I’m… just… being weird.”
“All right. Well, if you need someone to be weird with a little later, I will hopefully be out of work around seven.”
“Really?”
“Sure.” She made an odd face to herself as she turned onto the lot where her television show was filmed. “Feel free.”
“Okay.” Scarlett’s tension seemed to disperse. “Thanks.”
“Okay. Umm… take care.”
“You, too.”
As they ended their call and Zooey triple-checked to make sure that Scarlett was, in fact, gone, she exhaled very heavily and said to herself, “Holy fucking shit.”
Before she could even gather her thoughts, one of her coworkers was knocking on her window, urging her inside. “Out of the car, kiddo!”
Thankful that he’d interrupted her impending panic attack, she quickly shuffled out of her SUV to catch up with him, scripts and junk food in tow. “John!” she called after him. “Wait up!”
As requested, he paused at the entrance to wait for her, smiling at her frazzled state. “What up, Levin,” he greeted evenly.
“Krasinski.”
“You look like you wanna vomit, you know.”
“I kind of do, actually.”
“Do tell,” he smirked, holding the door open for her. “Don’t leave anything out.”
“You absolutely must keep your mouth shut about this.”
“Oooh, a secret!”
“Top secret secret,” she confirmed, looking around to ensure that no one else was around.
John pretended to zip his lips and throw away the proverbial key.
“I… okay.” In frustration, she ran her hands over her face and through her hair, looking on guiltily. And while she knew she could trust John, she hated having to explain the whole situation to anyone outside of it. “So… I like this guy. And he’s married--.”
“And his name is Justin Timberlake,” he inserted knowingly.
“I need you to not do that.”
“Okay.”
“Okay. So I like him. And… I’m not sure I should be telling you this.”
“I am deeply offended.”
“John.”
“Okay, sorry. Go ahead.”
“His wife just called me,” she blurted out excitedly. “And I’m so scared of why she would do that.”
“Hmm.”
“We’ve never met before, never had any kind of exchange. She called from his number. Why would she do that?”
“I… dunno, kid.”
“Think, man!”
“Well what did she say?”
“Nothing, really. She was really weird and sort of cryptic and cagey. It was all very odd.”
“And what did you say?” he questioned as if he could really figure this out.
“I mean, I didn’t know what to say. I told her she could call me later, but I had to go to work.”
“This is really disturbing.”
“I know!”
“I honestly have no idea what to tell you.”
“Awesome. I’m so glad I wasted this information on you.”
“I’m glad we had this talk,” he proclaimed, pressing the elevator button. “Do me a favor, don’t tell anyone we spoke?”
“Like I would.”
“Hey. Since you’re openly discussing it, is it possible for you to get Justin on the show?”
She narrowed her eyes at the suggestion, and then at him. “What reason could he possibly have to be at the office of a paper company?”
“You’re right. This conversation never happened.”
“What I can do is write you off of the show,” she grinned, stepping onto the elevator ahead of him.
“I’d like to see you try, Levin.”
“Oh, I could do it.”
“No, seriously, I’d like to be in some tragic paper accident if you can swing it.”
“Oh, so the entire internet could come after me for splitting up Jim and Pam? Why do I feel like you’re trying to have me killed?”
“Hey, then your problem would be solved.”
“That’s true.”
“See, I’m helpful.”
“You took a roundabout way, but I like the initiative,” she nodded. “Thanks, bud.”
“My pleasure,” he retorted. Then, the elevators opened to their floor, where they would be shooting for much of the day and wouldn’t have much time to talk at all. He knew that this would be his last opportunity to calm her fears. “But honestly, Levin, it’s not like you’re screwing her husband, so what could she possibly have to say? She probably just wants to plan some weirdo surprise for him and wants your help. Don’t sweat this, aight?”
“You right, you right.” Of course, he was so absurdly wrong that it was almost funny. She needed to switch subjects. Quickly. “So you ready to have a baby, Jim Halpert?”
“I am ready.”
“Awesome. Let’s do this.”
“Do this, we shall.” And as they prepared to part ways, so that he could head to wardrobe and she could eat some unhealthy breakfast, he made sure to add, “Glad I could help.”
Little did he know, he’d just helped her into feeling a lot worse.
____________________
When Zooey finally returned home from a tumultuous day of shooting and worrying, she was somewhat happy to see her sister waiting for her on her couch.
“Honey, you’re home,” Emile greeted her younger sibling, already knowing that she’d had a long day from the texts she’d been sending for the past few hours.
“Kill me. Kill me now,” she frowned, falling into her couch beside Em.
“Spill. Why has it been such a bad day?”
“I don’t wanna talk about it.” She moved up on the couch so that her head rested in her sister’s lap and looked up at her, seeing that she appeared especially glamorous to be sitting around doing nothing. Her makeup was fly, her hair was straightened, and her silk DVG top with its floral print was adorable on her. “You look cute.”
“Ugh. I look like an open umbrella,” she noted, commenting on her six-months-pregnant figure. “Who made you mad, Zo?”
“No one.”
“You told me you were having a bad day, slut. Speak on it.”
“Okay. You’re gonna kill me when I explain all of this to you, but whatever.”
“What did you do,” she already knew.
“I slept with Justin,” she admitted cautiously. But before she knew it, Emile had slapped her forehead harshly. “What the fuck, Em?”
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying what I said!”
“When?”
“Like… wow, it was about two weeks ago.”
Emile immediately slapped her again. “What the fuck, Zooey. Why are you just now telling me this?”
“I dunno. I dunno.”
“Well what’s your malfunction?”
“Well obviously I’m having a moral dilemma because I really, really like him,” she went on, making sure to protect her forehead in the process. “But today. This morning. Scarlett called me.”
“Scarlett is his wife?”
“Yes. Scarlett Johansson.”
“Whoa. Did I know that?”
“I’m pretty sure you did. But that’s kind of beside the point, isn’t it?”
“She called you.”
“She called me.”
“What did she say?”
Sighing heavily, she tried to recall their weird conversation and anything useful Scarlett might have said. “I mean… nothing, really. She was very odd throughout the entire thing.”
“What does that mean?” she questioned, running her fingers through her sister’s long brown locks.
“It means what I said! She didn’t say much, really. She was just kind of like… ‘Is this Zooey?’, and ‘I’m sorry, I don’t really know why I’m calling. Sorry about this.’” It was so fucking weird, Em.”
“Shit, Zooey.”
“This is bad, isn’t it?”
“You’re really too smart to be this stupid, you know.”
“I know.”
“Why did you even answer the phone?”
“She called from Justin’s phone! How was I supposed to know it was gonna be her?”
“Oh really?”
“Yeah…”
“That’s interesting.”
“Why is that interesting,” Zooey pressed, still baffled by the entire exchange.
“Because she probably just happened to see your name in his phone and was feeling impulsive.”
“Okay.”
“And she probably gets the vibe that he’s steppin’ out, but she has no idea who with.”
“How is this interesting? This sounds ridiculous and terrible!”
“Calm down, Zooey.”
“Maybe you can’t tell, but I’m pretty mortified.”
“I can tell, which is why you need to chill,” she reprimanded her. “If you have the balls to screw someone’s husband, you should have the balls to handle his wife.”
“I really need you to not be a bitch about this.”
“I’m trying to work through this with you, but you can’t act like a psycho while I’m trying to think.”
“Fine.” Zooey sat up from her sister’s lap and turned to face her, sitting cross-legged and curious as she contemplated the situation.
“How did the conversation end?”
“Umm. I told her I had to go into work, but that she could call me later if she needed to. And she seemed to light up a little when I said that.”
“Interesting.”
“Stop saying that!”
“It is!”
“I don’t know what to do with that.”
“I mean, it sounds like she’s hoping to confide in you. Maybe she thinks he’s cheating with someone else and she’s hoping that you can provide some insight.”
“But how does she even know who I am?” Zooey shouted.
“Ooh, or maybe she saw that one story about y’all from a few months ago.”
“What?”
“That story you called me about? When you were spotted at Lucky Strike?”
“Oh fuck,” Zooey finally recalled, thinking about her argument that ensued with Justin once that story came out.
“Of course, it’s unlikely that she’s just now discovering that. That was, what? Back in October?”
“I think so, yeah.”
“So… I dunno, kid. What did Justin say?”
“I haven’t told him yet.”
“Why not?”
“I’ve been working! I haven’t talked to him yet.”
“Interesting.”
“I’m gonna punch you if you say that again, Em.”
“Well it is!”
“You’re not helping.”
“You just need to gain her trust, I think. Become friends with her.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“Not even a little bit. I think you need to befriend her, find out what’s going on in her head, keep that bitch close to the vest.”
“Hmm.”
“It’s for your own good.”
“It sounds ridiculous, you know.”
Emile rolled her eyes at her sister as she teased, “Not any more ridiculous than you fucking her husband…”
“Touché.”
“Do you feel bad?”
“Horrible.”
“But you’re gonna keep doing it, right?”
“I dunno what I’m gonna do, Em. I mean… I kind of adore him. That’s not my fault, is it?”
“Well… I fell in love with a douchebag, so I certainly understand that the heart wants what it wants. And I’m not gonna judge. I just don’t want you to get hurt.”
Zooey nodded. “You know you give me different advice on this subject every time we discuss it, right?”
“I know.”
“And you know I’m gonna listen to it always, because you’re my sister, right?”
“I know.”
“Okay.”
“You know I’ll never purposely steer you wrong, right?” Em had to confirm.
“Of course.”
“So we’re good?”
“Always.”
“When are you gonna call her?”
“Call… who?” Zooey frowned.
“Your new B-F-F, obviously.”
“Oh, we’re really doing that?”
“Yes, Zooey! Call her. Now.”
“Now?”
“Now.”
“Now?” Zooey repeated timidly.
“Now, bitch!”
“Okay!” she grimaced, hopping off the couch to grab her purse. She pulled out her phone for the first time in hours, seeing that she’d missed two calls “ one from a number she didn’t recognize, and one from Justin. Figuring that Scarlett had probably been both, she took a deep breath and redialed Justin.
“Hello,” Justin eventually answered, seemingly contented.
“Hey,” Zooey replied tentatively. “Everything all right over there?”
“Yeah?” he seemed oblivious. “What’s up.”
“Is Scarlett there?”
“Mmhmm. Why?”
“You mind if I talk to her?”
He nearly choked on his water when her words hit him. “Say what now?”
“Listen, she called me earlier, and I’d like to push past any kind of reservations or suspicions she may have, so just let me talk to her, all right?”
“Dude.”
“Dude.”
“Are you joking?”
“No, not at all. In fact, I’m starting to think that I’m actually on some alternate version of Punk’d, where completely uninteresting people get played by celebrities, but I’m gonna fucking play along as long as I have to. Let me speak to your wife.”
Justin was stunned, being blindsided by this information, and unsure of how exactly to react. But he figured if push came to shove, Zooey would have his best interests at heart. “All right,” he sighed. “Babe!” he called out, waiting for Scarlett to appear in their bedroom.
Zooey waited nervously, listening in as he explained to his wife that his ‘friend’ wanted to speak to her. She glanced over at Emile, who was signaling for her to put the call on speakerphone.
“Hello?” Scarlett finally came on the line, her famously raspy voice in full swing.
“Heyyy, it’s Zooey,” she greeted, feigning affability. “I just wanted to check on you, see if you were all right.”
“Oh, hi! I called you not too long ago, actually.”
“I saw. Sorry, I was driving home from work.”
“You were still at work? Wow.”
“Yeah, well… Working in television is definitely not a nine-to-five. More like a nine-to-nine.”
“Oh, so you’re not just working on the movie?”
“I’m not, actually. My regular job, I guess Justin didn’t tell you, but I write for The Office.”
“Oh wow, no, Justin didn’t tell me anything. He’s never mentioned you, I don’t think.”
“Figures.”
“Well that’s pretty cool.”
“I like it.”
“Okay, so I guess that’s how you’re affiliated with Gene and Lee,” Scarlett began to put some pieces together.
“Right. Yes,” Zooey nodded, looking up to her sister, mouthing, “What the fuck?” as Scarlett went on.
“Interesting. Okay.”
“So is there something going on that I should know about? Is everything all right?”
Scarlett was trying to discreetly scurry out of the room with Justin so that she could continue their conversation in private. “Everything is fine,” she assured finally. “I was just thinking that... maybe you could help me with something.”
“Umm. Sure,” Zooey frowned, trying not to laugh at Emile’s matching expression. “What do you need?”
“Okay.” She took a deep breath before catapulting into her rampant thoughts. “Well I don’t know how often you and Justin speak or if you’re close at all, but I just saw your number in his phone under his recent calls, and you went to lunch together and all. And… I don’t know, it’s probably because you work together and you probably don’t know him that well at all, but… I’ve tried to talk to his best friends, I’ve tried talking to his mom, I’m out of options really, and I was just wondering, if maybe you could provide some insight… And I realize that this is insane, because you’re a complete stranger to me, and if you know little to nothing about me and Justin, that’s fine. In fact, it’s probably even better. But like I said, you were one of the few people he had recently called, and I was just wondering if you could help…”
Zooey and Emile sat there listening to her rant, bewildered as to what Zooey could possibly help with. “Scarlett, you gotta calm down, girl.”
“Sorry, I’m rambling,”
“It’s okay.”
“I’m just really nervous.”
“Why?”
“Are you married, Zooey?”
“Umm, no. I’m not. Not even close,” she chuckled.
“Okay. Well Justin and I got married recently, and I know it’s so ridiculous to ask you if you know anything about it, but I’m just gonna put it out there and hope for the best, but--.”
“Listen, you don’t have to feel weird. I’m here, I can listen, whatever you want,” Zooey encouraged earnestly. “Sometimes, a stranger can offer the best advice.”
“That’s true,” Scarlett nodded.
“Just think of me as your therapist.”
“Do I have to pay you?” she loosened up enough to laugh at herself.
“Consider this your free trial.”
“You’re sweet,” she exhaled softly, eased by her calm tone. “I’m probably just, like, paranoid, but I’ve known Justin for a long time now and he’s never acted like this before.”
“Acted like what, exactly?”
“I mean… he’s not terribly different, but he’s not the guy I know. It’s like he flipped a switch after we got married and now he’s just… not the same.”
Zooey was clearly going to have to employ her limited acting skills to pull off this conversation. “Really? What makes you say that?”
There had been a quiet transfer of power between he and Scarlett and she knew it. Suddenly, she felt as though their feelings had become lopsided. And even though it was slight, in a marriage, any type of imbalance is readily apparent, marked by small but irrefutable changes in behavior. Suddenly, he was constantly checking his messages when they were together, yet when they were apart, he rarely called her back. He closed the door to use the bathroom and washed his own clothes now. All harmless actions, really, but definite warning signs for someone like Justin, who had been an open book to her through much of their six years together.
“I don't know, there's nothing truly concrete," she admitted, "but, like, when I came to visit him for his birthday, he seemed completely uninterested and actually a little… annoyed that I was there.”
“Hmm…”
“So I’ve been wracking my brain for the past couple of weeks, wondering what I could have done to make him want to distance himself from me. Because we’ve been closer than ever for as long as I can remember, and suddenly, we’re barely communicating. I mean, has he said anything to you?”
“He… hasn’t,” Zooey croaked out, hating that this woman was desperately pouring her heart out, completely unknowingly, to the one reason that her husband had been acting strangely. She wanted to confess everything right then and there, but instead, she just held back tears and tried to rationalize Justin’s actions for his wife. “Umm, wow. I mean, I know this can’t be easy for either of you, having to be married from opposite ends of the country…”
“It’s not easy, but we’ve been doing it for so long. I really didn’t think it would affect either of us this much.”
“Right.”
“I mean, superficially speaking, the only thing that’s changed is that we have rings on our fingers now. I’m not sure why his whole demeanor has shifted.”
“Well, I don’t know a ton about Justin, but the little I’ve seen of him working, I know he works hard. And he’s doing a lot right now, you know, rehearsing for this movie while he’s shooting a freaking David Fincher film. I can only imagine that that’s a really harrowing process.”
“That’s true,” Scarlett realized, knowing how difficult it is to do one film, much less, two at a time.
“Have you asked him what’s going on?”
“I’ve tried, to no avail.”
“Mmm.”
“But you’re right, he does act a little odd when he’s stressed out.”
“I can imagine.”
“So… you may have something there. I guess I’m just reaching for something more dramatic.”
“It’s to be expected. I’m sure the last thing you want to hear as a newlywed is that your husband values his work more than you.” Before she knew it, Zooey had been knocked in the forehead with a bottle cap. Courtesy of Emile, of course. “What?” she hissed.
“Why would you say that to her?” she whispered.
“I-I didn’t mean that the way it came out,” she stammered back to Scarlett. “I mean… I’m sorry. That was retarded.”
“No, you’re right,” she grinned sadly. “That’s just the name of the game, I guess.”
“Not that I know anything about love or marriage, or anything like that,” Zooey went on, trying to conjure up something to comfort her. “But… my sister is getting married in a little while, and I’ve definitely been a close observer of her relationship. And to me, from what it seems, when you’re in a relationship, you have to fall in love with that person over and over again. Which means that there will be some points where you fall out of love. And… that’s probably okay.”
Scarlett nodded to herself as she digested Zooey’s words, and even though it hurt like hell to accept, she figured that this was probably more than likely true. “Zooey, you are a lifesaver.”
“I am?”
“I was freaking out,” she chuckled hoarsely. “I mean, clearly, I’m calling a complete stranger for marriage advice.”
“I told you, I’m your therapist.”
“Well this has been a very valuable session.”
“I’m glad.”
“Thank you so much for… listening. “
“Hey, I’m a writer. If I didn’t listen to other people, I’d have nothing to say.”
“I appreciate it, Zooey. Seriously.”
“Seriously, it was nothing. If you ever need another sesh, just give me a call, okay?”
“Really?”
“Really, really,” Zooey insisted. “You have my number, feel free to use it.”
“Okay,” Scarlett smiled into Justin’s phone. “Cool.”
“Cool. I’ll hopefully talk to you later.”
“You will.”
And with that, the two of them ended their call, Zooey looking up to her sister in complete astonishment. “What. The. Fuck.”
“Right?” Emile grimaced, staring at her sister’s phone. “Is she serious with that shit?”
“I guess so?”
“You did good, sis.”
“Did I? I don’t even know what I said.”
“Besides the part where he cared about his job more than her, you were pretty fuckin’ helpful.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Especially that shit about falling in love and out of love and whatever. That was gold, kid.”
“I hope so.”
“You think she’s gonna call you again?”
“I… don’t know. Maybe?”
“Can you imagine? What if you became, like, best friends? And you were still screwing her husband… Oh, my god!”
“Shut up.”
“Do you know how diabolical that is?” she cackled, sitting back in the sofa cushions. “Oh, my god.”
“Em, shut up.”
“You are eeevil, Zooey.”
“Shut the fuck up!” she shouted back, chucking the same bottle cap back at her. “I can’t believe this is happening.”
“I can’t believe you told her to call you back. I think you have some kind of bad seed gene, Zo.”
“What?!”
“Seriously, that is some gangster shit.”
“You told me to befriend her!”
“I know, I know. I’m fucking with you, obviously," she was almost smiling. "I think you’re doing the right thing here.”
“There is absolutely nothing right about this.”
“In terms of the right thing for you. Yes.”
“Why am I getting advice about this from the most self-involved person on the planet?”
“Because you love me,” she grinned. “And I think you recognize as well as I do that living life is a dicey proposal. Even if you look like you have everything under control. There’s nothing wrong with advice.”
Just then, Zooey’s phone began to vibrate in her hand, almost causing her to jump in surprise. It was Justin’s number again, but it scared her that she couldn’t be sure who would be on the other end. Cautiously, she answered. “Hello?”
“Hey. I don’t have long, but… what’d she say?” It was Justin.
“I can’t say.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“No, I’m not,” she smiled, as she usually did when she heard his voice. “She entrusted me with something and I don’t want to betray that, so I can’t tell you.”
“Now’s a great time to get moral, Zooey.”
“I don’t care, I’m not telling you “ at least right now “ so let it go. Just know that everything’s cool and… I think she likes me. We're friendly.”
“You’re friendly,” he stated disbelievingly.
“Yes. So... go enjoy your wife, enjoy your time in New York, and… I’ll see you in a couple of days?”
This whole thing was clearly spiraling out of control, which he hated, but he didn’t know what to fight, so he didn’t bother trying to fight it. “All right,” he sighed.
“All right.”
Puzzling Pieces by Ashley
Author's Notes:
This one's a little boring, but... necessary. My apologies. And just to clarify, this is not the last chapter! I am currently working on writing the last chapter, but I am a few ahead of you guys, so don't worry. The story is not ending today! I talk a lot, and I know that gets confusing, so sorry for anyone that was thinking I was bringing this to an abrupt end lol. -Ash
14: Puzzling Pieces
“So thanks for breakfast, sir.”
Justin looked up from his meal companion, watching as she gathered her plate and half full glass of orange juice, moving towards his sink. “Stop cleaning up, weirdo, you’re a guest.”
“I don’t wanna be a guest,” Zooey smirked, turning on the water to wash her dishes. As many times as he’d been to her house, it sometimes felt like he belonged there, and she wanted the feeling to be mutual. “Even if you do share this house with your wife.”
“Barely,” he noted, commenting on he fact that Scarlett had been gone for much of their nearly 4-month-old marriage. “I think you’ve been here more than she has.”
“Sad.”
“But true.”
“You resent her for that?”
He shook his head, absently watching as Zooey dried and racked her dishes in the second sink. “How else would I be able to spend all this time with you?”
“True dat.”
He grinned in response. “What are you doing today?”
“Ummm. Well I have to be on set, we shoot the last scenes of our season finale today.”
“Exciting,” his eyes deliberately widened.
“Titillating shit,” she confirmed. “And then after that, provided we finish everything in time, I have to go to a Q and A at the Paley Center.”
“That place on Rodeo?”
“It’s on Beverly, but… yeah, in that area. I’m sure you’ve passed it like a billion times.”
He nodded thoughtfully and brought his own dishes to the sink. “Is it open to the public?”
“What, the Q and A?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s not,” she smirked, “but… it’s open to you.”
“Yeah?”
“If you want to come, yeah. That’d be awesome.”
“I think it’d be awesome to see you at work. Get a better picture of what you do.”
“I think you’re just convinced that I don’t really have a job,” she chuckled. “But that’s fine, I’d love to see you there.”
“Then I’ll be there.”
“And just so you know, we are all super dorky and talk about things that no one in the world would actually be interested in.”
“Well obviously someone is.”
“They think they are. Until we start talking, and then they realize we, as writers, are all complete geeks.”
“I like geeks,” he promised with a genuine smile.
“Clearly.”
“So what time is this shindig?”
“My agent said it starts at… four, I believe. So be there on time, if you can, and I’ll try to do the same.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
____________________
“So it would appear that you’re kindasorta important,” Justin greeted Zooey as she came off stage from her Question and Answer session. He was admittedly fascinated with how many people were fans of her work, and knew exactly what she contributed to the show. In fact, it made him feel bad to know that he paid such little attention to what the writers brought to the table. “I like it.”
“Oh gosh, I wish. I’m just known as a bit of a recluse amongst the writing staff, so when they do see me, they tend to pounce.”
“You did well,” he grinned proudly. “I’m impressed.”
“Oh okay, I see what attracts you. You like women with power.”
“I like women with purpose,” he appended, following her towards the backstage area. There, they were met with Zooey’s colleagues “ most of whom seemed disinterested or put off when she spoke during the session. Now, they were suddenly very chummy.
“Zooey,” one of her bosses, Paul Lieberstein, approached the duo. “You do plan to introduce us to your friend, yes?”
“Umm. I hadn’t planned on it,” she retorted honestly. “But okay. This is Justin. Justin, this is Paul. He’s one of the head honchos.”
“Hi,” Paul offered a handshake to the superstar before him with a big smile. “Good to meet you.”
“You play Toby, right?” Justin recognized, returning the greeting.
“I do, yeah. Among other things.”
Justin nodded, realizing that many of the writers seemed to be onscreen talent as well. “Cool, cool. Nice to meet you.”
“What brings you here?”
“Well, Zooey told me about it, and I’m a big fan of the show, so I thought I’d stop by. I had literally nothing else going on today, I figured why not.”
“Very cool,” Paul beamed. “We’re all psyched that you’re here. If you ever wanna come by the set, or hang out for a table read, feel free.”
“I thought we weren’t allowed to bring guests,” Zooey inserted, confused by the invitation. When her dad was in town, she wanted to bring him by, but was told in no uncertain terms that he could not visit while they were shooting. “Besides,” she went on, “he has better things to do than sit around distracting everyone, don’t you?”
“No, no, that would be awesome,” Justin accepted eagerly. “If that’s all right with you, of course.”
“That would be fine with me,” she grinned awkwardly. “Whatever you want.”
“You could come see Zooey really at work,” Paul submitted tonelessly, as he tended to do. “By the way, Zooey, I got a chance to look at your script for next season’s premiere. Greg and I discussed it, we both liked it a lot.”
“A-a-are you serious?” she stuttered, stunned by this information. She thought for sure that Greg had her on his shit list ever since she’d asked for a producer credit. And Paul never seemed to really like her or her presence on the show, so to hear that they both liked her episode was a complete shock.
“Yeah, yeah, we talked over a few rewrites and a couple of line tweaks, but we thought you did a great job. It was fun, you had good character development, which, as you know, we’ve felt has been your main weakness lately, but yeah.”
“That’s… awesome,” she smiled genuinely, glancing at Justin, who looked on like a proud father. “Thank you.”
“Your work is good, Zooey,” he assured her with a nod. “I see a lot of potential, a lot of similarities between you and Mindy. Maybe you two can work on the Christmas episode, see what you come up with.”
“Is this… is this for real?”
“You know it’ll be Steve’s last one,” Paul reminded painfully.
At this point, her mind was blown. “You’re fucking with me.”
“I’m not,” he laughed, “I promise. We just believe you deserve this.”
That would be the first time she heard anything resembling praise come out of Paul’s mouth, but she took it at face value. “Thank you, Paul.”
“You’re welcome.” He offered a quick rub on her back and then turned back to Justin, who still looked on. “Justin, it was great to meet you, man.”
“You, as well.”
“Seriously, stop by anytime.”
“I will,” he nodded. “I will.”
“All right. Zooey, see you tomorrow? Six thirty?”
“Right. I’ll be there bright and early.”
“Good,” he finished with a smile.
And as he disappeared from their conversation, Zooey stared at Justin, absolutely amused. “He’s never been that nice to me before.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Not even close. Like, he just said more nice things to me in four minutes than he has in an entire two and a half years.”
“Well that’s not transparent at all,” Justin smirked sarcastically.
“Right.”
“But hey, you just got yourself a season premiere.”
“I think you just got myself a season premiere,” she appended, almost irritated at the notion. “But I’ll take it.”
“You better take it and you better kill it,” he encouraged. “The truth is, very few things are fair about this town. Enjoy what little is handed to you.”
“Even if it’s through you?”
“Child, please,” he smiled, mocking the one and only Chad Ochocinco. “Especially if it’s through me.”
_____________________
A few hours later, Justin and Zooey were back at her house, drinking wine and putting together a puzzle, as Zooey so often liked to do. She loved being able to share that with him.
“Have you talked to Scarlett today?” Justin opened up the conversation to ask.
Sometimes, Zooey hated when Scarlett’s name was brought up. It ruined moments that shouldn’t have existed in the first place, and she felt as though she didn’t need the reminder. “Are you being a smart ass?”
“No, I’m genuinely curious,” he smiled innocently, pushing his glasses further on his nose. “Is that okay to ask?”
“It’s okay to ask.”
“It’s so weird that that’s even a question.”
“It is,” she agreed, taking a sip of her Merlot. “It just makes me feel… odd.”
“In what way?”
“I dunno. Maybe a better word is cruel.”
He tilted his head to glance at her curiously and then went back to the pieces he’d been examining. “What is this supposed to be a picture of?”
“It’s a duplicate of a Banksy painting called, ‘Grannies.’”
“’Grannies,’” Justin confirmed dully. “That sounds so interesting.”
“It’s a fun painting! It’s these two old ladies sitting in their chairs, they’re knitting these sweaters, and one of them says ‘Punk’s Not Dead,’ the other reads, ‘Thug For Life.’ I assure you, it’s awesome.”
“That does sound kind of awesome.”
“Trust me, dude. I will never lead you astray.”
“Where do you find these things?” he chuckled in amusement.
“I pay attention to the world,” she pretended to boast. “I could teach you… but I’d have to charge.”
“Figures. Nothing good is free.”
“I’m free!”
“You’re costing me more than I can afford, to be honest,” he replied cryptically. “But some things are worth the risk, I guess.”
Zooey got the message loud and clear, and she hated that he was in this position. She hated that she was in it with him. “I’m sorry, Justin.”
“Don’t be sorry. I’m choosing to be here. I’m happy.”
“Really?”
“I mean, as happy as can be expected, I guess. I dunno.”
“To answer your question, no. I haven’t talked to Scarlett today. She texted me yesterday, and I told her I was on set, so I couldn’t really talk.”
“What do you guys talk about?” This had been the fourth time he’d asked this question, and he’d yet to get a satisfactory response. It was unnerving for him to know that his wife and his… friend were forging a relationship that he wasn’t a part of.
“Do you think that if you ask the question several different ways that you’ll trick me into answering you?”
“But why won’t you answer me? You’re my friend, not hers.”
“Justin.”
“What?”
“You sound twelve. And… we’re not friends.”
“You keep saying that.”
“You keep not getting it,” she tried to smile through her irritation. “You don’t fuck your friends. And certainly not when you’re married. So get over that whole… word.”
“Fine.”
“And we don’t talk about anything that you need to concern yourself with. She likes to vent, apparently, and I’m a good listener.”
“Yeah, but what is she venting about? Is it about me?”
“Some of it is. Some of it is about her job. Her upcoming commitments. You know she’s hosting SNL in May?”
“Of course I know that.”
“Well… she’s nervous. She thinks people are gonna compare her to you, and that scares her.”
“Are you serious?”
Zooey nodded as she pulled together an entire corner of the 1000-piece puzzle. “She has insecurities, and if she feels like she can trust me with them, then… so be it.”
“Does she say why she doesn’t wanna tell me these things?”
“Yep.”
He stared at her, waiting for the rest of her answer. “Okay, why?”
“Why are you trying to make me betray her?”
“Why is your loyalty not to me?” he shouted jokingly.
“Because I feel bad! I’m a terrible person “ we are terrible people “ and maybe this can, like, make up for some of the horrible karma we have coming her way. If I can help her in any way, and not add to the fact that I’m such a terrible person, then… that’s what I’m gonna do.”
He nodded softly, understanding that their relationship was surely taking its toll on Zooey. “Sorry.”
“You don’t have to apologize. Just… please. Stop asking me about your wife.”
“Okay.”
“The fact that I have her phone number is weird enough to me. I don’t need you constantly analyzing it. Or making me analyze it.”
“Okay,” he repeated forcefully, finally seeing her point. “I won’t bring it up again.”
“Thank you.” As she took another sip of wine, her phone began to vibrate against the table, startling her. “Please tell me that’s not who I think it is,” she held up her phone for Justin to see the caller ID. “Please.”
“Ummm… it says, ‘Danny Chun.’”
“Oh, thank god,” she sighed, picking up the call. “Hey, dude.”
“Uhh, hey, Zooey.” Danny was one of Zooey’s coworkers. One of few that ever called her outside of work.
“Whattt up?”
“So I’m sitting here with Jen, she tells me Paul assigned you the Season Seven premiere. Is that right?”
“That’s right,” she remembered excitedly. “Apropos of basically nothing, too. I thought Paul hated me.”
“I did too,” he retorted dryly.
She wasn’t sure if that was a joke, but her happy tone remained in tact. “I’m super excited. He said me and Mindy could have at it on next season’s Christmas episode, as well. I’m seriously kvelling!”
“Wow, that’s… a lot of responsibility all of a sudden.”
“I know. But I’ve been submitting episodes repeatedly and never a bite, a word of encouragement from Paul. Nothing. So… this has me really optimistic for next season.”
“Right. That’s… interesting.”
Suddenly, Jennifer Celotta, another one of Zooey’s colleagues, came on the line. “Hey, Zooey, it’s Jen.”
“Hey, Jen.”
“So when exactly did Paul tell you this? Because he had been doing a lot of heavy edits on my draft for the premiere and all of a sudden…”
“Umm, it was… today. At Paley, right after the Q and A.”
“I see. When you guys were talking with Justin, I presume.”
“Yup.” Zooey’s happy mood had suddenly deflated, and she was getting pissed at all the saltiness and innuendo being thrown around.
“That’s… wow.”
“I mean… I don’t know what to tell you, Jen. He picked me. Get over it.”
“He picked you because he thinks you can get your ‘friend’ on board for the show.”
“I don’t give a shit why he picked me,” she spat back, standing up to her seniors for the first time… ever. “The fact is, he did. And if he didn’t think my script worked, he wouldn’t have bothered, so please, please get over yourself. Because I’ve been over you for a while now.”
“Zooey, you know you basically--.”
“I have to go,” she interrupted coolly. “Me and my friend are busy.”
“Zooe”.”
She hung up before either of them could say anything else, looking Justin square in the eye as she did so.
“What was that about?” he wondered cautiously.
“I don't like this savory smell of cooking wafting from the house next door,” she commented, hoping to change the ugly subject at hand. “It's cocky. Like, ‘Oh, look at me, I buy groceries and have a family.’"
“What?” he chuckled.
“I’m being random and awesome right now.”
“Oh. Okay.”
Unable to get it off of her mind, she just let it out. “Two of my coworkers are a pair of bitches.”
“I assume that’s why you just went off,” he chuckled nervously. “What happened?”
“They’re fucking mad because Paul gave me the season premiere, of course. They hate me, they always have, and now, they probably always will.”
“Some people just can’t handle others’ success.”
“That’s true,” she noted quietly, throwing her phone back to the table. “I mean… god. I love my job, but some of them make it so. hard.”
“That’s what she said,” he joked with a childlike grin.
“Good one.”
“I know that wasn’t appropriate, but… “
“’That’s what she said’ jokes are always appropriate.”
“You don’t ever get sick of them?”
“I do,” she admitted, “but only because so many people don’t use it correctly. It’ll be like, ‘Oh hey, your girlfriend looks hot tonight,’ and then some dumbass will reply with ‘That’s what she said!’ And they’ll look at me like they just made the greatest joke in the world, and I’m just like… No. That doesn’t work at all. No.”
“That’s pretty hilarious, actually,” Justin cackled loudly. “Like, they totally missed the point of the joke.”
“Right. That’s when it gets irritating. But otherwise, I still find them funny.”
“That’s good. I’m always scared you guys are gonna retire them, but they always find their way back.”
“You should see how many hours we waste sitting around thinking of ‘That’s what she said’s. It’s sad, really.”
“Are you serious?”
“We waste a lot of time on a lot of things, but that’s probably one of the things we’ve spent the most time on,” she confirmed for him. “It used to be Steve’s many malapropisms in a given episode, but now, it’s probably ‘That’s what she said’s and our favorite characters on Sesame Street.”
“Wow.”
“Exciting shit, I know.”
“What else, what else?” he seemed excited by the idea.
“Dude. I have to do commentary for the DVDs in a few weeks, I can’t give you all the secrets and behind-the-scenes info.”
“Rude.”
“Yeah, well.”
“You’re such a tease,” he insisted.
And then her phone was ringing again, halting their conversation once more. “Hold that thought.”
“God,” he sighed at the incessant interruption.
“Sorry, sorry. It’s my dad,” she noted, picking up the phone quickly. “Hi, daddy!”
“Zooey. Hi,” he answered, seemingly cheerful. “How are you, dear?”
“I’m good. I’m really good, actually.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I just got greenlit for another episode and a half. And they’re big ones, dad.”
“That’s fantastic, Zo. Really, really proud of you.”
She smiled in reply. “Thank you.”
“And everything else is good? Your friends, your finances…”
“Yes, yes. I’m good on all fronts. How about you? I haven’t heard from you in a few weeks.”
“I’m good, I’m good.” He was obviously grinning as well. “Guess what.”
“Ummm… I have no idea. You got a promotion?”
“No… not quite.”
“You got a new car.”
“Nope.”
“In the interest of time, can you just tell me?”
“You’re no fun,” he chuckled gleefully. “But all right. I’m getting married!”
“What!” she shrieked happily. “Oh, my god… wow. Is it Dianne? I wasn’t even sure you guys were still dating, she was noticeably absent when I was home…”
“No, no, this is someone new. We met just six weeks ago, but I’m certain that she’s the one, Zo. Her name is Kathryn, she’s a teacher over at Belmont, you’re gonna love her.”
“Oh! Well… wow. Okay.” Zooey wasn’t used to her dad doing anything impromptu, but she was certainly happy if he was. “Umm… when do I get to meet her?”
“At the wedding, I hope. April eleventh, right here at the house.”
“That’s in a month!”
“I know.”
“Dad, are you serious?”
“Very much so. I know it’s sudden, but… it’s what we want.”
“I see…” Her excitement for him quickly deflated into wariness.
“Don’t worry about me, kid.” He could read her tone like a book. “This is the right decision, okay?”
She nodded to herself and then answered him. “Okay.”
“So you’ll be here, right?”
“I will. Of course I will.”
“Good.”
“April eleventh.”
“April eleventh,” he confirmed. “It’s a Sunday, so… bring some friends, make a weekend out of it, all right?”
“Okay, dad.”
“All right, Zooey. I’m glad I got to hear your voice.”
“Me, too.”
“I’ll talk to you soon.”
“Hey, dad.”
“Yeah, babe?”
“I love you.”
“Oh god, I love you, too. So much.”
She smiled at his sincerity. “Congrats.”
“Thanks, Zo.”
She ended the call with a quiet longing for home and the comfort her father could always provide. And then she realized Justin was sitting there. “My dad.”
“I noticed.”
“He’s getting married.”
“Nice.”
“To someone he met six weeks ago.”
“Interesting.”
“Welrd.”
“You all right?”
“Yeah, yeah. It’s fine. As long as he’s happy, y’know?”
Justin nodded. “At the end of the day, happiness is a choice, so…”
“Well… I choose to be happy for him.”
“That’s good.”
“I can’t wait to hear what Em says about this.”
“If anyone, Emile should understand,” he prophesized, finishing what was left of his wine. “Free spirits get each other.”
“That’s true. She’s probably the reason he’s doing this.”
“Or maybe he just met a lovely lady and wants to spend his life with her.”
Zooey looked down at the table, studying the many scattered puzzle pieces adorning it, wondering if and when they’d ever finish. And then wondered if and how she could put the pieces of her own life together. Sometimes, life just baffled her.
“Hey,” she began, looking at him tiredly.
“Hey.”
“How… do you like… Boston in April?”
He grinned, knowing that she was asking him to be her date to the wedding. “I like it if you’re there.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
Boston In April by Ashley
Author's Notes:
Happy Valentine's Day, babes! -Ash
15: Boston in April
Against Justin’s better judgment, he agreed to accompany Zooey to her father’s wedding, and though there weren’t a ton of paparazzi in Boston, he still found himself hiding behind the guise of BU caps and hoodies so as to keep people off of his trail.
They arrived at Zooey’s father’s house in the Neighborhood Nine area of Cambridge, and Justin was elated to be met with a hugeish Mansard Victorian home. Typical of everything one would expect of Boston, he could only smile at it as they got out of their rental car.
“So this is where Zooey Levin grew up, huh?”
“Sort of,” she shrugged, popping the trunk so that he could pull out their luggage. “I was yanked out of here after the divorce.”
“Right,” he nodded, grabbing both of their small bags.
“It still feels like my home, though. This is where I come every Christmas.”
“It looks like home,” he decided, following her up the walkway to the front door. “Who’s here?”
“I’m not sure. I haven’t talked to anyone but my dad.”
“And he knows I’m coming, right?”
“Stop worrying, dude. You know I wouldn’t put you in any uncomfortable situation.” Finding her keys, she let them into the house and yelled for anyone that would answer. “It’s Zooey!”
After a few seconds, there was a faint call back. “Zooey?”
“Dad?”
And not long thereafter, Zooey’s father appeared from behind the staircase, his thin face adorning a smile wide as ever. “Zooey!”
“Dad!” she jumped over to him, offering a big bear hug. She knocked his glasses off in the process, displaying just how much she had been yearning for the comfort of his embrace. “I’ve missed you,” she whispered.
“I’ve missed you too,” he answered, beaming.
When she finally pulled away, she made sure to immediately introduce him to her companion. “I want you to meet someone.”
“Okay,” he picked up his frames from the wood floor and then approached Justin with a warm grin.
“Dad, this is Justin. Justin, this is my dad, Paul.”
“Nice to meet you,” Paul offered a handshake.
“My dad’s name is Paul too,” Justin noted returning the greeting. “Good to meet you, sir.”
“So my other daughter tells me you have this one completely smitten,” Paul proclaimed proudly, causing Justin to blush. “That’s a feat, if I know my Zooey.”
“Dad.”
“It’s true.”
“Is Em here already?” she wanted to clearly switch subjects.
“She and Kanye left to check into their hotel, but yes.”
“Oh, are we “ should we be staying in a hotel?” Justin asked Zooey. “I didn’t even think--.”
“Nonsense,” Paul intervened before Zooey could answer. “You’re staying here, and I won’t take No for an answer.”
“Thank you, sir. As much as I love Boston, and as many times as I’ve been here, I’ve never had the chance to stay in a real Boston home, so…”
“You make it here often?”
“I have. I’ve been here on tour several times, and just to visit. It’s honestly my favorite city in the States.”
“I see, I see. Very nice,” Paul clearly admired. “What kind of tours do you do?”
“Dad, he’s one of the biggest music artists on the planet,” she told her father as if it was common knowledge. And while it was to most people, Paul Levin was not one to keep up with popular culture. When Emile started dating Kanye, inimitably, the most infamous rapper in the world, Paul was equally as ignorant to his notoriety. He just didn’t pay attention to many of those things. He watched The Office regularly because of his baby girl, of course, but many of their references were lost on him, so she often had to fill him in. “He does concert tours.”
“Impressive,” he marveled, not really caring one way or another, so long as his daughter was happy. “Emile’s fiancé is a music artist as well. Do you know him? His name is Kanye West?”
“I think I’ve heard of him,” Justin grinned, a bit relieved to be in a place where he was absolutely unknown. “We might’ve crossed paths a few times.”
“I don’t know much about the rap music and popular music, but he is very, very talented.”
“He is,” he agreed.
“A bit of a loose cannon, I hear, but in my house, he is very nice. Very respectful.”
“That’s good to hear, dad,” Zooey inserted, bored. She knew her dad could go on and on if you let him. “So hey, where’s the new future Mrs. Levin?”
“She actually went out with her daughter for a spell, but they should be back soon.” He began to lead them towards the back rooms, offering to get them settled. “You guys wanna put your bags down and get settled in?”
“Yes, we do,” she answered for them. “I’m gonna show Justin around and stuff. All right?”
“That’s fine, that’s fine. If you need more room, you two can have the guest room and Kathryn’s daughter can take you or Em’s room,” he suggested, figuring the happy couple would want some extra space. “Whatever you want.”
“Thank you,” Justin supplied, picking up their bags again. “Again, I really, really appreciate it.”
“I thank you for being here,” Paul answered genuinely. “If you need anything, I’m down here, all right?”
“Thanks,” Zooey called back, already leading Justin up the carpeted steps towards the bedrooms.
They passed several family photos, some of which were beautifully done in black and white, and Justin couldn’t help but comment. “You guys looked happy.”
“What?” she turned back, oblivious to what he could have been referring to.
“This picture.” A much younger version of the Levin family “ their mom, Andrea, included “ was pictured on their front stoop, all seated on the steps, leaning against one another. Big smiles went all around. “You all looked happy.”
“We were,” she confirmed, but quickly moved on. “Come.”
They headed through and then settled into the guest room “ large master-bedroom-sized quarters, nicely open with bay windows and a king-sized bed for them. The pictures were all of places Paul had gone, including Sydney, Australia, and Moscow, Russia.
“Your dad seems cool as hell,” Justin proclaimed once they’d made it fully inside the room. “You’re lucky.”
“He is,” she agreed. “I am.”
“You think you’re gonna like this new wife?”
“I think so, yeah,” she sighed, plopping into the bed tiredly. “I hope so.”
“What will you do if you don’t?”
“Nothing,” she shrugged. She watched him take a seat next to her and motioned to pull off his cap. “No more hiding.”
He smirked at the thought. “I’m exhausted.”
“Me, too. I always am when I fly east.”
“Well that’s weird since it’d only be like four back home.”
“Listen, I can’t tell my body how to feel.”
“Your body is retarded.”
“I never said it wasn’t,” she chuckled, leaning on his shoulder. “But thanks for noticing.”
____________________
The Levin family “ Paul and Kathryn, as well as her 20-year-old daughter, Alicia; Emile and Kanye; and Zooey and Justin “ convened for dinner at the house in order for everyone to get acquainted. Throughout the dinner, Zooey decided that she liked Kathryn. For her father, anyway. She was a mild-mannered woman, pleasant and intelligent, and seemed genuine enough. She and her daughter seemed enthralled with Justin more than anything, but Zooey figured they couldn’t help it. It’s not everyday you end up eating dinner with a superstar. Add to that, Justin was devilishly charming, which she knew, firsthand, was impossible to resist.
And while Emile and Kanye seemed to be in their own world, as they usually were, they were nice enough to inform everyone that their nuptials would be taking place in November and that they were expecting a baby boy in May.
It was once plates were empty and being cleared from the table that Emile finally acknowledged the other guests and felt the need to address one in particular. “Justin.”
He turned to her, prepared for some breezy exchange, as usual. “Emile.”
“Come outside with me?”
He glanced at her fiancé for approval and then back at her. “Is everything okay?”
“Mhmm,” she nodded, attempting to stand. The two men on either side of her motioned to help her up, Justin wrapping his arm around her. “I’ll be back, babe,” she told Kanye.
“Don’t hurt ‘em,” he retorted ominously.
“Excuse us,” Justin told the remainder of the table, assisting Emile as she waddled towards the back door.
Zooey, who had been scraping plates in the kitchen, noticed them approaching and asked, “Where are you guys going?”
“For a walk,” Em called back, already halfway out the door. “He wants to see the neighborhood.”
It was fairly dark outside and the neighborhood wasn’t all that picturesque, but she didn’t question it. “Have him back by nine!”
“I’ll try!” she yelled back to her younger sister with a mischievous smile. Once they were outside, she interlocked her fingers with his and led him out of their backyard. She noted Justin’s apprehension and told him, “Don’t act like I’m trying to seduce you. I’m not.”
“I-I-I didn’t think you were.”
“Y-y-yes you did,” she retorted knowingly. “It’s fine. You’re not my type, though.”
“No shit,” he chuckled, still wary of where this was leading.
“So listen.”
“Listening.”
“You’re married.”
He smiled in spite of himself, already knowing where this was going. He hated that he seemed to constantly be having this discussion, but he deserved it, he figured. “I am.”
“And my sister is fragile.”
“You sure about that?” he chuckled, wondering if there was some other sister he was unaware of.
“I am,” she replied sadly, knowing her sister better than anyone. “She’s amazing, I know, and she puts up a strong front, but… she’s been through a lot, and I don’t think she knows how much you mean to her. I don’t think she’ll know how much you mean to her until you’re gone--.”
“I don’t plan to be gone…”
“Oh, so you do have a plan here. Is it to leave your bangin’ ass wife at some point?”
“No. Not… quite.”
“Is it to make my sister your mistress for the rest of her life?”
“No,” he frowned, never even considering that a possibility. “Of course not.”
“So then… you’re gonna have to get gone at some point,” Em rationalized for him, since he didn’t seem to want to think about it himself. “And as much as I know she likes you, I need you to not prolong this whole thing. Because I’m watching you hurt her, and… I can’t.”
“She’s a big girl, Em. I don’t think she needs you to protect her.”
“She does.”
They turned a corner where a group of teenagers were collected at the end of the block. “Can we… go this way?” he suggested the emptier end of the street.
“See what I mean? You’re afraid to even be seen here. With her.”
“That’s not because I don’t adore her completely, though.”
“I know this, man. But she needs someone “ she deserves someone “ that can be present. That can be there without conditions or reservations. Or the threat of a wife looming in the background.”
“You think I don’t know that?” he looked down to the ground, watching their feet as he strolled and she waddled down the sidewalk. “Emile, I wish I could give Zooey… everything. But… we both entered this knowing the risks involved. We came in knowing that we’d never be a hundred percent happy, or even fifty percent happy with the circumstances. And the outcome may be something that we end up hating, but right now? Today, this minute, and the next one? That’s all we know we’re guaranteed. And… we’re good with that.”
“She’s not.”
“She is!”
“She’s doing it because it’s you, dude.” She stopped in her tracks to look him in the eye, to plead with him not to hurt her sister. “She wouldn’t do this for anyone else, so I need you to not take advantage of whatever weakness you bring out in her. Just walk away, man.”
“You don’t think that would hurt a hell of a lot more than if we just let this play out.”
“What plays out is that you go back to your wife and she ends up alone.”
“What if that’s okay with her?”
“Zooey doesn’t always know what’s best for her.”
“And you do?” he smirked. “I know it’s not ideal, and I wish the circumstances were different, I really do. But they’re not. Even so, nothing you say will change the fact that right now? We’re all right. That’s all we have.”
Emile couldn’t resist rolling her eyes, as it seemed there was no getting through to him. “I can’t believe you came here,” she shook her head.
“If I’m being honest, I can’t either. But that tells you just how much I like her.”
“Or how stupid you are.”
“That, too.”
As she resumed their walk, she tried to think through all possible outcomes of her sister’s relationship. “Fine, I guess this conversation was pointless,” she conceded. “But… do me a favor?”
“Okay.”
“Protect her, okay?”
“I’ll do my best.”
____________________
Saturday morning, Zooey made sure to awake bright and early so that she could prepare for the day. She wanted to show Justin her city, the way she knew it, even if there was a forecast for rain, and there was a long list of places she wanted to take him. First on her list, mainly out of a guilty sense of obligation, was to her mom’s house.
“I have to confess, I’m kind of using you,” Zooey admitted as the two of them made their way into her mom’s swanky building.
“How so?” he smiled curiously.
“I’ve been avoiding facing my mom for a year now because she’s such a basic bitch. So I’m kind of hoping that you being here will soften the blow of all her bullshit.”
He’d heard stories from both Zooey and Emile about how bad their mother was, but he had to play devil’s advocate. “She cannot be that bad.”
“We shall soon see,” she shrugged, ringing the bell for her mother’s penthouse.
“Who is it?” she eventually came over the intercom, sounding annoyed, though she had to know that it was her daughter.
“Ma, it’s Zooey. And I have a guest, so don’t say anything ridiculous.”
Without any other words, she buzzed the two of them inside, where everything looked more like a posh hotel than an apartment building.
“What does your mom do again?” Justin asked, obviously commenting on the luxe surroundings.
“She spouts a bunch of bullshit.”
“Well shit. I take it she’s good at it.”
“Nobody better,” she confirmed, the two of them entering the elevator. They headed for the top floor and were greeted by Sam the doorman.
“Miss Levin,” he greeted her, “it’s been a long time.”
“Hi, Sam,” she grinned happily, greatly contrasting her actual mood. “I’ll try to stop by more often,” she promised.
“Hope so, hope so.”
“He used to walk me to my door when I came home from school,” she recalled for her companion. “My mom was never home, so he kinda looked out for me.”
“Aww, you were like a latchkey kid.”
“Something like that.” After heading down a long hallway, they found themselves at the last possible apartment on the floor. Zooey was annoyed that she still had to ring the bell when her mother obviously knew that they were on their way up. “Typical.”
“Be nice,” he reminded her, just as the door swung open.
“Good morning,” Zooey’s mother greeted the two of them rather professionally.
‘Andrea Emerson-Levin, PhD’ was the name that adorned her door, and she made sure to always look and play the part. She was an attractive woman, short in stature, milky brown skin, and curly black and gray hair, cut short. She was dressed to the nines for a Saturday morning, donning a cardigan and Capri pants, along with an expensive pair of loafers on her feet. By looking at her, you would never think she would be the type to have an affair, and certainly not with a younger man. But alas, she did, so many years ago, which was the beginning of the strain between her and her daughters.
“Hi,” Zooey greeted her squarely, making a weak attempt at offering a hug.
“Good to see you,” Andrea nodded, accepting the embrace.
“I want you to meet my friend, Justin,” she went on to introduce him before they even entered the apartment. “Justin, this is my mom, Andrea.”
“You can call me Ms. Emerson,” she nodded towards him.
“Uh… nice to meet you,” he tried to smile in reply, almost taken aback by her rigidity. “Umm. Zooey’s told me a lot about you.”
“Funny, she’s told me nothing about you. But I know who you are, young man. It’s a bit peculiar to see you here with my daughter, of all people,” she finally cracked a hint of a smile, “but I’m glad to have you.”
Zooey was frowning already. “Umm. Can we come in?”
“Of course,” she stepped back to allow them inside. “Make yourself at home.”
The place was done up just as one would expect, with neutral tones and expensive furniture, never feeling like much of a home in Zooey’s opinion. “So how have you been, ma?”
“I’ve been well,” she nodded, gesturing for them to take a seat on the pristine cream-colored couch. “What brings you two to Boston?”
Apparently, no one had bothered to tell Andrea about Paul’s impending wedding, as they had no idea how she would react, but it appeared that Zooey would have to be the one to break the news. “Well… ummm.”
“Stop saying, ‘Umm’,” she directed tersely. “I didn’t raise you to say, ‘Umm.’”
“Dad’s getting married,” she spat back at her, annoyed. “Tomorrow.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. To a woman he met six weeks ago.”
Andrea was obviously put off by the notion, her brown cheeks clearly flushing to a shade of pink. “Is that so?”
“Yeah. She’s a very nice woman, very personable. Nothing like you at all.”
“Zooey,” she snapped.
She shrugged in reply.
“Well. I’m certainly happy for him, I know he’s not someone that can stand to be alone for very long.”
“He was alone for seven years after the divorce.”
“Only due to his own pitiful coercion and feeling like he needed to wait until you girls were both out of the house.”
“Imagine that, putting your children before yourself.”
“Zooey, I never neglected you or anything you needed.”
“Yeah, it really mattered that I was dropped off at school in a Porsche. I didn’t need love or attention or anything like that.”
“Are you not living out your dreams right now? You’re a successful writer on a popular television show. I mean, you have your own Wikipedia page. Clearly, I did something right.”
“Because that’s the gauge for a healthy and happy human being, right? It’s all about accolades with you, never affection.”
“Success is certainly a good start,” she maintained. “I’m not going to let you convince me that being good at your job has been detrimental to you in any way.”
“Oh, now I’m good at my job? Let’s be clear about this “ you wanted me to do anything but be a writer,” Zooey reminded her heatedly. “In fact, I’m pretty sure I am who I am in spite of you.”
“Whatever the case may be…”
“You are fucking amazing.”
“Do not speak to me that way in my home.”
“Oh, is this a home? It looks like a furniture museum.” She turned to Justin and said, “Doesn’t it remind you of the MOCA Pacific Design Center?”
He tried his best not to react, but a small smile managed to escape.
“Your sarcasm isn’t necessary,” Andrea berated her. “And I don’t appreciate you coming here, dissecting my choices, when you’re sitting here with a married man.”
Justin, who’d been staring at the floor for much of their exchange, looked back up, his straight eyebrows raised, clearly shocked that she knew.
“Yes, I watch Entertainment Tonight,” she confirmed, reading his expression. “Not that I know your wife or your situation, but faithfully married men don’t tend to go on weekend getaways with other women.”
“Mom!”
“I’m just saying that people in cracked glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.”
She rose from the couch angrily, grabbing Justin’s arm to take him with her. “We’re leaving.”
“You’ve barely been here five minutes.”
“Right, you can’t hold your fucking tongue and be civil for five minutes. There is something appallingly wrong with you.”
“Zooey, you will not speak to me that way in my home,” she repeated more forcefully this time.
“Don’t worry, I’m leaving!” she assured her, storming towards the door. Justin, ever the Southern gentleman, wanted to at least say goodbye, but Zooey wouldn’t allow him. They were both in the hallway before either of them knew it, but she made sure to shout, “You selfish cunt!” before the door completely slammed.
He could feel her hand shaking in his as they headed for the elevators, and she was obviously on the verge of tears. “Hey.”
“I’m fine,” she wiped her face with her other hand. “I’m fine.”
“Stop,” he demanded, forcing her to pause and look at him. “It’s okay to cry if your mom pisses you off.”
“I’m fine,” she insisted, trying to keep walking. He wouldn’t allow it. “Justin, she’s not worth the time or the tears.”
Ignoring her denial, he pulled her into his arms and held on tightly, rubbing her back to console what she didn’t want to acknowledge was hurting. “Let your guard down.”
She tried so hard to hold them back, to not let her mother break her, but before she knew it, tears were flooding her face and she was sobbing. “I hate her,” she whispered to him sadly. “I hate her.”
He squeezed her a little tighter and assured her, “That’s okay, too.”
____________________
We’ll do it all, everything, on our own
We don’t need anything or anyone
Late that night, long after everyone had gone to bed in the Levin household, Zooey urged Justin to sneak out of the quiet house to take a walk with her. In their pajamas, comprised of sweats and t-shirts, the two of them scurried through the damp night and headed for Zooey’s old stomping grounds at Harvard.
“This is weird,” Justin chuckled, as they approached one of the main entrances to the majestic university.
“Why is this weird?”
“As much as I love this city, I’ve never been to this campus.”
“That’s not weird.”
“And I just finished shooting a movie where Harvard is basically the entire backdrop, and I still haven’t been here.”
“That’s a little weirder.”
“And Scarlett was honored last year as the Hasty Pudding Woman of the Year,” he went on, “and I still haven’t been here.”
“Yeah, why didn’t you come to that?”
“Before we knew she got it, I had already agreed to do a concert in Manila, so…”
“Priorities,” she nodded slowly, interlocking her arm with his.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to bring her up,” he suddenly recalled, knowing that it made her feel uncomfortable. “Force of habit.”
“It’s all right,” she shrugged sadly. “It’s not like I don’t know.”
“Yeah.”
“I mean, I know it looks weird to other people for you to be here, for us to be… together, but as long as I get to spend this time with you… I just don’t give a shit. Whatever, y’know?”
“I know.” He placed a quick kiss on her lips, probably the first time since they’d been in Boston, and he felt a bit of a calm wash over him. “I know.”
If I lay here, if I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
She led him down a series of walkways until they reached a gate with an opening just wide enough for them to squeeze through. “Come.”
“Is this legal?”
“Well it’s not illegal,” she figured, not really knowing one way or another. “This is how me and my roommates used to sneak back onto campus after curfew.”
“You had a curfew?”
“Not, like, an official one. But when we had certain upcoming events at my dorm, it was ‘strongly encouraged’ by our house masters that we be in by a certain time.”
“That sounds like torture.”
“The price you pay for a good education.”
“This campus is huge,” he marveled as they came to a large yard that would eventually lead to the Eliot House, where Zooey resided for the better part of four years.
“This is a very small fraction of it.”
“I’m jealous.”
“Trust me, your experiences on the road are much more unique and inspiring.”
“To you, maybe. To me, this is… wow.”
When they reached the front of the house, she stopped to look up at the immense building, feeling very nostalgic in the moment. “I was the only black chick in this house for a looong time.”
“Half black,” he winked.
She took a seat on the cool, wet pavement and waited for him to join her. “I vehemently identify myself as black, actually.”
“Do you?”
She nodded. “I think, subconsciously, most of us just go by the one-drop rule. Or maybe society has molded that in us. I don’t know.”
“How Barack Obama of you.”
“It really is! I mean, we both grew up with our white parents “ well I grew up liking my white parent better,” she appended with a chuckle, “but I still call myself black when I’m filling out a form.”
“You want that affirmative action action,” he teased with a smile. “I peeped your game long ago, chick.”
“You’re an idiot,” she grinned, loving that she could have this conversation with him without even the slightest hint of discomfort.
I don’t quite know how to say how I feel
Those three words are said too much
They’re not enough
“Is it fun being black?” he wondered out loud.
“The funnest.”
“I bet.”
“Except when it’s difficult,” she noted. “Which is usually.”
“How so?”
“I mean, just being at this school, which is really a microcosm of this country, I learned a lot about exactly how far we haven’t come.”
“Was it bad?”
“Not bad,” she reasoned with herself. “And let me preface this by saying that I’m probably harder on myself than I should be as a black woman because I kind of do have the option to ‘pass.’ But… I mean, I know you could never understand this, but being a double minority, we definitely have it the hardest in this country.”
“You really don’t feel like there are advantages to being a black woman?”
“No. Obstacles a plenty, but advantages? Absolutely not. I have to work twice as hard as you do to prove myself equally as competent.” She leaned back so that her elbows propped her up against the ground and sighed. “You know, there’s like this poll online, with all these dating sites or whatever, and apparently, black women are the lowest on the totem poll for relationships.”
If I lay here, if I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
He thought about this sentiment for a long, long time and then finally looked over to her with a bit of sadness to him. “Well, in my opinion, you are the most beautiful creatures on the planet.”
Forget what we’re told before we get too old
Show me a garden that’s bursting into life
She had to resist the strong urge she had to start bawling. “You said that with such honesty…”
“I mean it.”
“It makes it all right that most of the world doesn’t agree with you.”
“They’re idiots.”
“You’re killing me.”
Let’s waste time chasing cars around our heads
I need your grace to remind me to find my own
“You have the greatest face in the entire world.” He said it as though it were fact. No emotion to it, no heft. It was completely unsentimental in tone, but that was what made it all the more impactful. It was a fact to him. “Those eyes. And your cute little freckles. And these lips…”
All that I am, all that I ever was
Is here is in your perfect eyes, they’re all I can see
“I’m gonna cry.”
“Let’s laugh instead.”
I don’t know where, confused about how as well
Just know that these things will never change for us at all
She smiled a big smile, still in disbelief that it had been about six months since they met and he was still just as interesting to her as the first day. “I’m really, really happy you came with me.”
“So am I.”
If I lay here, if I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
Lyrics: “Chasing Cars” “ Snow Patrol (Eyes Open)
Elephant In The Room by Ashley
16: Elephant In The Room
With Zooey and Justin’s trip to Boston being mostly a success, it seemed that their affair was showing no signs of slowing down. In fact, he had a nagging, sinking feeling that he was more himself on that trip to Boston with Zooey than he had been in a long, long time. It scared him to know that he married someone he hadn’t been himself with.
In the simplest sense, he wasn’t so different, but underneath all those layers of the lighthearted guy that didn’t take himself too seriously, there was a man that yearned for more than a perfect relationship. Sometimes, he wanted something sad and complex. He needed something to go wrong so that he could appreciate when it was right. His life was turning into a fairytale, when most people’s lives were a documentary.
And perhaps that’s why Zooey intrigued him so much. Being able to see her at home, where she came from, he kind of enjoyed that things weren’t so easy. And while it wasn’t necessarily difficult, it certainly wasn’t the cakewalk that he was accustomed to. Her mother was cold and hardhearted, while her father was attentive and loving. He realized that it must have been quite the contradiction to grow up in. How do you find yourself when the two people that mold you are polar opposites?
Things like that were what amazed him about Zooey Levin. She was a mess, a mystery, a movement that he could never quite figure out. And while he knew how insanely wrong their relationship was, he just wasn’t ready to give her up. And so, they kept it going.
“Dinner was fantastic,” Justin sighed, reentering Zooey’s living room after washing her kitchen full of dishes. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” she grinned, watching him take a seat next to her. “Thank you for not leaving any leftovers.”
“I know how you hate leftovers,” he contended, as she’d told him many a time that she did not like old food in her refrigerator.
“Just because I know I’ll never eat it. I like fresh crappy food.”
“Day-old potstickers just don’t do it for you, huh?”
“Not quite,” she grimaced at the thought.
“What are we watching tonight?” he questioned, noticing that she had a Netflix package sitting on the end table next to her. “Please tell me it’s not Avatar.”
“I have some weird aversion to James Cameron, so no. Never.”
“Thank god.”
“You don’t like him either?”
“He’s an asshole,” Justin stated as though he had confirmed it as fact. “And Titanic sucks.”
She offered him a spirited high five and pulled the actual movie they’d be viewing into view. “How do you feel about ‘It’s Complicated?’”
“A chick flick? Really?”
“It’s Meryl Streep. And Alec Baldwin. And Steve Martin.”
“And John Krasinski. In a chick flick,” he maintained.
Looking at him with feigned disappointment, she asked, “Are you really gonna ruin movie night?”
“I’m not.”
“It’s a good movie.”
“You’ve already seen it?”
“I did. I support my coworkers in everything they do.”
“The ones that are nice to you, you mean.”
“Clearly.”
“Do any of the nice ones know about us?”
“John does,” she nodded, remembering their conversation a couple of months prior. “He’s very perceptive.”
“Awesome.”
“He likes you, though, don’t worry.”
“I like him, too.”
“You want me to set you guys up?” she joked with raised eyebrows. “Maybe you guys can do a man-date?”
With a matching expression, he offered, “Maybe you can put the movie in.”
“Aye, aye, capteen,” she agreed, pulling herself from her couch. Just as she pressed the Eject button on her Blu-ray player, the sound of her doorbell rang throughout the house, startling both of them. “Who the hell,” she wondered, peeking towards the front windows to see if she could get a glimpse of a car.
“Maybe it’s the police.”
“Don’t even joke about that. You know I have a fear of the po-po.”
“My apologies.”
“I’ll be back,” she promised, scurrying to her foyer to see who the visitor could possibly be. She was pleasantly surprised to see her friends, Tennile and Lacey, standing in her doorway. “Wowwww,” she greeted them, giving her best impersonation of Flavor Flav.
“Oh, so you are alive,” Lacey scolded, annoyed that Zooey never seemed to answer her phone anymore. “We were positive that you’d been kidnapped.”
“Bitch, whatever. You disappear when you want to, too,” she reminded, pulling her inside with a huge hug. “I miss you.”
“I miss you, too.”
“Hey you,” she glanced over to Tennile, whose perfect smile lit up at the sight of Zooey. “Where the fuck have you been?”
“I’ve been around,” she nodded as they motioned to embrace one another. “Just finished my stint on Top Chef.”
“What!” Zooey marveled, not even realizing that her friend was a contender. “That’s fantastic.”
“I was the second to go home, but... it was fun,” she shrugged.
Figuring Justin wouldn’t mind the interruption, she directed them towards the living room. “Okay, come on in, you guys. You have to tell me all about what you’ve been up to and what not.”
As soon as Justin heard the several voices approaching, he rose from the couch nervously, unsure of who was about to walk in on him.
“Oh wow, hey,” Tennile greeted him, a bit stunned to see him there. They’d only met once, and he seemed nice enough, but she certainly did not think they would meet again, as uncomfortable as he appeared the first time.
“Hey,” he waved to her from where he stood. “Tennile, right?”
She nodded. “Sorry to intrude. We didn’t know Zooey had company.”
She was soon followed by Lacey and Zooey. “Hey, Lacey,” he appended, suddenly feeling very ambushed. “Good to see you again.”
“Same to you,” she grinned coolly, avoiding his gaze. Lacey didn’t necessarily like Justin, but she couldn’t figure out why. By any measure, he should have been intolerably smug with his list of “I’m perfect” attributes, but he was shockingly humble, even-tempered, and thoughtful, from the little she knew of him. Even so, Lacey just didn’t feel comfortable around him. Perhaps because he was making a play for her best friend when he had a ring on his finger. And while she wasn’t traditional or prudish in many senses, she did have a grasp on right and wrong. She knew that Zooey’s relationship with Justin was wrong, and it made her look at him “ or not look at him “ oddly. “Didn’t expect to see you here,” she eventually added.
“It’s movie night,” Zooey inserted, seeing the tension mounting on both of their faces. “We’re just chillin’.”
“Nice,” Tennile smiled, her eyes darting back and forth between the two of them. “What were you watching?”
“’It’s Complicated.’”
“Fitting,” Lacey commented, taking it upon herself to sit down on the loveseat beside her.
“Yes, everyone should sit,” Zooey took her lead, trying to navigate through the awkwardness. “Justin, sit down.”
“Actually, I’m gonna go,” he decided suddenly, already feeling like this visit was a bad idea. “I should let you ladies enjoy your time together.”
“What? No, sit down.”
“Yeah. I’m gonna go.”
“Why?”
“You guys should spend some time together,” he decided with a small smile. “You got your chick flick, you got your chicks. Enjoy.”
“Well okay,” she hopped up once again, prepared to walk him to the door.
“Ladies, it was good to see you again.”
“Same here,” they replied in unison, smiles to match.
Zooey caught up with him as he headed for the front, taking his hand into hers before he could leave. “You all right?”
“Yeah.” He stopped to look at her comfortingly, but let go of her hand. “I’ll call you later.”
She nodded and held the door for him once he opened it. “Later, Levin.”
With a sigh, she turned back into her home, ready to entertain her two buddies. When she reentered the living room, she found them both staring at her knowingly. “What?” she grinned.
“He sure knows how to make an exit,” Tennile noticed, chuckling mirthlessly.
“He’s just private.”
“He’s arrogant,” she countered, popping a few kernels of leftover popcorn in her mouth. “He didn’t appreciate us stopping by and intruding. His plans were interrupted.”
“He’s not like that.”
“Does his wife know he was here?” Lacey wondered tersely, annoyed that her friend had clearly ignored her advice.
“No.”
“What the hell, Zo?”
“Listen, I like him, all right? I can’t help it.”
“You gotta be kidding me.”
“I’m not.”
“He’s married!”
“I fucking know that,” she shouted as loudly as her voice would allow. People kept saying that, as if it were brand new information, and it was driving her crazy.
“Then what are you doing?”
“I’m not in love with the tragedy of this whole thing, Lace. If I could make him leave her, I would,” she admitted, looking down sadly. “I can’t.”
“Zo, he is the most dangerous kind of guy to be in a relationship with.”
“I know that!”
“And not just because it is completely lacking in propriety,” she made sure to add. “He’s gonna flip out when you least expect it,” she prophesized.
“What?”
“She’s right,” Tennile finally jumped in, already knowing exactly what she was referring to. “He’s a quote-unquote nice guy, and nice guys are scary.”
“You guys sound ridiculous.”
“Nice guys are infuriating. Men who don’t think about meaning well, they’re predictable. They’re assholes through and through.”
“But mean-well-men?” Lacey went on to explain. “They’re the most destructive types. They’re in the business of making others happy before their own needs.”
“That’s clearly not Justin,” Zooey smirked.
“No, let’s go with that.”
“The problem is,” Tennile began to finish, “those needs never surface until they explode in a seemingly out-of-nowhere burst of selfishness.”
“Okay…”
“So I’m sure he’s been the mean-well-man to his wife all this time.”
“Probably.”
“And now, all of a sudden, he’s cheating on her.”
“The same thing is gonna happen to you,” Lacey nodded. “And we don’t wanna see that.”
“Okay,” Zooey chuckled uneasily. “And I appreciate your concern, but I’m well aware that this is a so-called ‘burst of selfishness.’ On both our parts. I’m okay with that.”
“Are you really?”
She nodded silently, sick to death of having different versions of this conversation repeatedly. And while she wasn’t really okay with it, she didn’t have many other options, so she accepted it. “You know what they say. If you can’t have a happy home… wreck one.” She winced at the feeling it gave her to even utter those words.
“Nobody says that,” Lacey deadpanned.
She rolled her eyes at her best friend and grabbed the remote from her coffee table, ready to turn on the movie. “Let’s just leave it at… it’s complicated.”
_____________________
After Justin’s awkward run-in with Zooey’s friends, he had been comforted to come home and see that Scarlett had returned from her Iron Man promotional duties in Europe. They hadn’t seen one another in almost a month, since the closing weekend of her play, and he’d missed her a little more than usual. However, he was a disappointed to find that she was in no mood to be bothered.
“Lucy, I’m home!” he put on his best version of a Cuban accent to greet her when he entered the house.
Unamused, she only stared at him from her usual spot at the kitchen table. “Desi was a terrible husband,” she returned sullenly. “An alcoholic, a drug addict, a womanizer. And he was inanely jealous of Lucy’s success.”
Avoiding her glare, he looked down to the floor. “O…kay.”
“Don’t be a Desi.”
“I was just being dorky and cute,” his expression dropped. He motioned to place a kiss on her forehead before heading to the refrigerator. “You all right?”
“I’m fine.”
“You look exhausted.”
“I just flew across the country,” she reminded him. “I am.”
“Well why are you sitting here? Why don’t you go get some sleep?”
“I can’t sleep.”
“Take an Ambien,” he suggested, finally deciding on a bottle of water and joining her back at the table. “No use sitting here miserable.”
She smirked at the notion. “I need a cigarette.”
“Scarlett.”
“Where did you put them?”
“No,” he maintained, beginning to frown at her. “What is wrong with you?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re acting… strange.”
“I don’t know why that’s so unheard of. Smokers relapse all the time.” She sat back in her chair, indignant, pulled her hair from its lopsided ponytail, and stared at the wood of the table. “I want a cigarette.”
“No. Take an Ambien and go to bed. It’s late.”
“It’s nine o’clock.”
“But you just came from New York, where it’s midnight,” he offered. “You should go on to bed.”
“I’m fine, daddy.”
“Scar.”
“Are you going to tell me where the cigarettes are, or do I have to go out and get some?”
He sighed in disappointment, resting his hand over hers that sat on the tabletop. “Why are you doing this?”
“Why are you being so dramatic?”
“Because you’ve done so well with quitting. Why are you suddenly going back to this disgusting, not to mention deadly, habit?”
“Because I fucking want to!” she shouted abruptly.
Justin almost jumped out of his seat due to her outburst, as he was not at all used to her yelling outside of a film set. He was stunned. “Umm… okay. They’re out in the guest bathroom, beneath the sink.”
Silently, she rose from the table and left the house through the back door while Justin watched her cross the backyard, barefoot, to retrieve her death in a box. He didn’t know why it bothered him so much that Scarlett wanted a cigarette when he knew that Zooey easily smoked a few a day, and he didn’t even bat an eye. He had different standards for the two women in his life, it seemed.
She returned a few minutes later, cigarette already in her mouth, and headed for the stove to light it. Without any other words, she sat back down.
“Tess, are you sure you’re all right?”
A stream of smoke escaped her lips before she answered. “I’m fine.”
_____________________
Justin was lost as to what might have been wrong with his wife, and he hated that maybe he’d been missing some kind of lingering signs due to all the time he’d been spending with Zooey. Maybe she was attention-starved, or maybe she really was just tired, but he felt like he owed her more than just passing worry. He thought it important to whisk her away for a bit, so they could get back to the two of them. And what better place to do that than the city of love?
“Paris is gorgeous when you’re not racing through it for a promo tour,” Scarlett commented happily, admiring their extraordinary view of the gorgeous city.
Justin joined her at the window, inhaling the sight of La Tour Eiffel at night. “What do you wanna do tonight?”
She took his arm into hers and leaned into him with a contented sigh. “Everything.”
“Let’s get dressed, we’ll go out to dinner.”
“Can we eat downstairs?” she asked with a childlike hopefulness. “We’re at the best hotel in the city, we have to eat here.”
Hotel Le Bristol Paris was definitely deemed the finest of the fine. Their prestigious suite was so decorative and classically regal, it would’ve been fit for French royalty. Or in this case, American royalty. It only made sense to dine in such a nice place.
“Yeah, of course.”
“All right, well you get dressed first. I wanna surprise you.”
“Surprise me?”
“Yeah,” she grinned. “We never go all out for each other. I wanna go all out.”
“Okay,” he nodded encouragingly. “Let’s go all out. But… I did wanna talk to you first.”
She immediately began to snore loudly to signify her boredom. “Justin, please.”
“You don’t even know what I wanna talk about.”
“I’m pretty sure I do, and I’m not in the mood for it.”
For two days, he’d kept quiet about her apparent desire for cancer and/or emphysema, but he would only be able to suppress his feelings for so long. And while he knew the whole smoking thing was most likely stemming from something deeper, what troubled him most of all was that she wasn’t even willing to talk to him about it.
“When will you be in the mood for it?”
“Not tonight,” she subtly pleaded. “I’m not in the mood for serious, I can’t do heavy shit tonight. Let’s just have fun and be happy and we don’t even have to be ourselves if that would make you feel better about it, but I just… don’t wanna do serious, okay?”
He searched her blue-green eyes for some sort of sign that this was nothing grave, but they seemed to tell him the exact opposite. They appeared so empty… so sad. He didn’t know what to do but relent. “Okay.”
____________________
About an hour later, Justin was sitting alone in the breathtaking Restaurant Gastronomique, waiting for his wife’s arrival. The wonderfully large dining room, oval in shape, like a private theater, was almost excessively beautiful, made up of gorgeous oak, floor-to-ceiling floral tapestries, and crystal chandeliers. He was so busy taking in his surroundings that he didn’t notice Scarlett enter the room.
She was dressed to the nines in a bold black cocktail dress, highlighting her legs and the loveliness of her porcelain skin. Her hair, back to blonde, was swept up from her face in a complicated updo, which successfully showed off her most important feature “ her face. Made up with dramatic smoky eyes and a light pink lip color, she was flawless.
With a mischievous smirk on her face, she approached Justin, their eyes finally locking, and she stood above him. “May I join you?”
“I wish you would,” he offered, standing up to assist in seating her.
She was pleasantly impressed with his look “ a well-fitted black suit, white shirt, skinny black tie; his curly hair was tamed but not too groomed, as was his facial hair “ he looked chic and sexy. Their friends, and even strangers on occasion, tended to jokingly ask if the two of them were sold separately, and on nights like this, it was clear why. They looked like they belonged to one another.
As a waiter came to serve Justin his second glass of Pinot Noir, he made sure to ask Scarlett what she would like.
“I’ll have a Pinot Grigio,” she nodded, adding, “billed to the Suite Paris.”
“Bien sur, madame.”
“That’s right near my room,” Justin offered, unable to stop staring at her.
“Really? I haven’t seen you up there…”
“I just got in today.”
“Ah, and when do you leave?”
“Tomorrow.”
She narrowed her eyes at him in disbelief. “You’re only in Paris for one night?”
“It’s safer that way.”
“Is that so?” she wondered, watching her white wine being served. “Merci.”
“I won’t have my heart broken.”
With a small smirk, she raised her glass for a toast to her dashing husband. “To no broken hearts.”
“I’ll drink to that.” Rapt, he took a short sip from his glass, still staring at her as if he’d never seen her before. “So what do you do?”
“I’m a singer,” she decided, eyeing him for his reaction. “I like to sing.”
“Is that right?”
“That is right,” she nodded. “That’s not to say I’m any good at it, but… I like it.”
“There’s no way you’re bad at anything,” he grinned.
“You’d be surprised.”
“Would you sing me something?”
“Right now?”
“Yeah, why not.”
Her eyes studied him, trying to figure out if he was serious, or just testing her. But she was in character and certainly didn’t need any other excuse to make a fool of herself, so she thought of one of her favorite songs, and began to sing.
“This is our last goodbye. I hate to feel the love between us die. But it’s over,” she sang quietly, the unique tone of her voice enriched by its faint gravely-ness. She sang like an old school jazz artist, reminiscent of Billie Holliday or Anita O’Day. It was a lovely thing to witness. “Just hear this and then I’ll go. You gave me more to live for, more than you’ll ever know.”
Justin closed his eyes, listening to his wife sing a sad goodbye to him, and it made him ache in places he didn’t even know he had.
“This is our last embrace. Must I dream and always see your face,” she went on, unknowingly killing him. “Why can’t we overcome this wall? Baby, maybe it’s just because I didn’t know you at all. Kiss me, please. Kiss me…”
He got up from his side of the table, full of more emotion than he knew how to handle, and did exactly that.
____________________
Scarlett and Justin’s roleplay ended with her song, and they spent the rest of the night being happily married. They enjoyed exquisite cuisine, light conversation, as she’d requested, and then took their party back upstairs, where the sex was inexorable, the two of them completely in sync and insatiable. For Justin, things finally felt right between them for the first time in a long time.
Now, they laid in bed together, silent, but not asleep, as the sun began to rise over the city, sending a warm glow through their room, almost angelic in feeling. Sometimes, he couldn’t believe his life and how indecently lucky he was.
Scarlett, on the other hand, felt an odd detachment from her husband, and she feared that her instincts had led her to a sad, sad conclusion.
Lying next to you, wishing I could disappear
Afraid “ or perhaps, unwilling “ to look at him, she broke the silence to find out if he was still awake. “Justin?”
“Yeah?”
Let you fall asleep, and vanish out into thin air
“I’m gonna ask you something. And no matter what the answer is, I want you to be honest with me, okay?”
It’s the elephant in the room and we pretend that we don’t see it
It’s an avalanche that looms above our heads, but we don’t believe it
He took a deep breath, almost knowing what was coming. He wasn’t ready to have this conversation, he hadn’t prepared for the heavy shit. The demons he’d created, he couldn’t face them yet. But the fact was that he had created this. This was his doing; he made a conscious decision to cheat on his wife, and whatever came next, he would have to deal with. “Okay.”
“Are you cheating on me?”
Even though he was expecting some rendering of that exact question, his breath caught in his throat when he heard it. “What?”
Trying to be perfect, trying not to let you down
Honesty is honestly the hardest thing for me right now
“Christmas.”
“Wwwhat about Christmas?” He nervously wondered if she somehow found out that he’d held hands with Zooey on his heartbreakingly wonderful flight to New York on Christmas Eve.
“Christmas day… you came home a little happier,” she recalled. “And at the time, I thought maybe it was just because you hadn’t seen me in a few weeks and you were sweet enough to be excited. But after a while,” she sniffled as tears ran down the sides of her face, falling into her hair, “after thinking about it, I don’t think that’s what it was at all. From that day to this one, you’ve been in better moods and worse ones than I’ve ever seen. You take better care of yourself, put more thought into your clothing, you wear different cologne. You’ve started locking your phone and closing the door to use the bathroom. Since Christmas, you’ve turned into a slightly different person, slowly, but obviously. So I have to ask, are you cheating on me?”
While the floors underneath our feet are crumbling
The walls we built together are tumbling
I still stand here holding up the roof
Was there any way to deny it? He turned his head away from her, sad for his wife, and his marriage, and for what he’d let it come to. This was the kind of mistake that made your heart ache. Still, he knew he had to answer her. “Yeah.”
‘Cause it’s easier than telling the truth
Lyrics: “Last Goodbye” “ Jeff Buckley (Grace)
“The Truth” “ Kris Allen (Kris Allen)
Just Gonna Stand There And Watch Me Burn by Ashley
17: Just Gonna Stand There And Watch Me Burn
Perhaps it was because she loved him too much. Or maybe it was because she’d already had the ominous feeling in the pit of her stomach before she got confirmation, but when Justin told Scarlett that he’d cheated, she wasn’t angry. Anger, it seemed to her, would’ve been present if his admission had sent some kind of shock coursing through her veins. But instead, he just substantiated her fears. And in that regard, all it did was hurt. As if to pour salt on an open gash or to love someone that didn’t love you back. It hurt like hell.
Even worse, she couldn’t bring herself to leave him. At least, not yet. She hadn’t ruled out the possibility, nor did she want to make it her go-to option, but she knew she had a lot of thinking to do. A lot of thinking, a lot of evaluating, and a lot of crying.
They took separate flights home from Paris that day. Not wanting to be in the same house with him for a while, she went to New York while he headed back to Los Angeles, confused and contrite. They didn’t speak for days. In fact, for a week, Scarlett didn’t speak to anyone save for whoever answered the phone when she got hungry enough to order take-out.
In fact, if she hadn’t received a few dozen texts congratulating her on the Tony nomination she was unaware she had received, she probably would have become a hermit. But that put a little light at the end of her tunnel, and pushed her to begin her search for clarity.
“Hello?”
Scarlett clutched her cell nervously when Zooey finally answered the phone, unsure of how to ask a relative stranger for the utmost advice. “Hey,” she attempted to reply with lightness to her tone, but failed miserably. “Are you busy?”
Zooey was terrified as to why Scarlett would be calling. And having not spoken to Justin in over a week, she feared that this was The Call she’d had nightmares about. “Umm. Not terribly busy, but I am on set, so…”
“Oh, well. I can… I mean I’ll let you go.”
“Is everything all right?”
She shook her head, resisting the urge to start bawling, but found the capacity to croak out, “Are you on the set of the movie?”
“Uh huh.”
“Is Justin there?”
“He’s not,” Zooey could only assume, having not seen him there in a couple of weeks. “I’m pretty sure he’s done, our last day to shoot is day after tomorrow and I don’t think his character is in any of those scenes.”
“I see.”
“Are you looking for him? Is he all right?” she had to wonder.
“No, I’m not looking for him,” she made sure to assert. Last thing she wanted was him trying to get in touch with her. “I just wanted to make sure he wasn’t around.”
“Oh. Okay.”
“If you’re busy, I don’t have to have this conversation…”
From the sound of her voice, Zooey could tell she was in some brand of pain, and she didn’t want to make her work whatever it was out on her own. “It sounds like you do need to.”
“He slept with someone,” she blurted out, feeling as though she’d just stabbed herself in the process.
Zooey felt her stomach drop to her feet. “Oh...”
“Yeah.”
“Are you all right?”
“I’m… I don’t know what I am,” she sighed. “I’m lost.”
“I don’t know what to say.” Zooey began to cry silently. Not just for Scarlett and her pain, but because it was then and there that she knew, for certain, that she was a terrible person.
“I don’t either. I don’t know what to say to him… what to say to anyone.”
“Did he… I mean, what did he say?”
“Short of confirming it, he said nothing. We said nothing.”
“That… sucks.”
“I feel so helpless and… just… dead,” she sniffled, wishing she could erase the moment she asked him. “And I knew. I knew he was acting weird for a reason, but I tried to ignore it.”
“The worst thing to do is ignore your problems,” Zooey knew from experience with her mother. “It sounds like an easier option, but it just festers, it doesn’t go away. True endurance doesn’t begin until the moment you find carrying on to be completely unfathomable.”
“It’s unfathomable to me right now.”
“And this is where you have to rise to the occasion. This is where you have to stand inside yourself and ask, truly, ‘How am I gonna get through this?’”
“I… I don’t think I can,” she supplied in defeat. “I wasn’t ready for this.”
“No one’s ever ready to be devastated. But…” She sighed heavily, so sad for what she was putting this woman through. “I don’t know. I guess… this is adulthood. Real problems, real consequences. You wake from the nightmare and realize there’s no bigger bed to climb into.”
“You wake from the nightmare and realize that it’s not a nightmare. It’s… real.”
“I’m so sorry,” Zooey told her earnestly, though Scarlett wouldn’t know what the apology was actually for.
“It’s not your fault.”
“I’m sorry that it sucks. That this has hurt you.”
She nodded to the quiet room in acknowledgement. “I appreciate that.”
“Do you… know… Like, have you decided whether you’re going to stay?”
“With him? I have no idea. I really can’t imagine my life without him, but…”
“Listen,” Zooey offered, “if you think that this is something you might want, you have to fight for it. Be willing to… to go down in flames for it. Because in the end, you’ll be much happier knowing you did everything you could.” This advice stemmed straight from her parents’ marital woes. And even though it took time, even though her dad scratched and clawed for her mother’s heart and she still left, Zooey knew that her father was the one that ended up all right. And she wanted that for Scarlett.
“I don’t know that that will work…”
“It will.”
“You can’t fight with someone if they’re not even willing to get in the ring with you.”
“I’m sure he will. If you want him. Even if you have to drag him in.”
Scarlett went silent, trying to think of what she wanted at the end of the day. Inherently, she knew that Justin wasn’t a bad guy. She was sure that he hadn’t set out to maliciously hurt her. And the fact that she’d been gone for the better part of five months probably didn’t help the situation. Not to make excuses for him, but it wasn’t an incomprehensible act. Just a selfish one. Maybe she could get past this.
“Hey, Scarlett, I hate to vamp on you, but they’re calling me back to the set, so… I have to run.”
“Oh. Okay, yeah,” she nodded, being shaken from her thoughts. “That’s fine. Thank you, Zooey.”
“I hope I helped.”
“Tremendously,” she assured, almost willing to smile. “I can’t tell you how much.”
“It’ll be all right,” she offered, coming to the realization that this was the beginning of her end. “I say, if you love something, set it in a small cage and pester and smother it with love until it either loves you back or dies.”
Before Scarlett knew it, she had laughed. “You’re funny.”
“That’s why they pay me the big bucks.”
“Thank you, again.”
“I hope everything works out.” And Zooey meant that.
____________________
A few days later and Scarlett was back in Los Angeles. Her main reason for going was because of the Iron Man 2 premiere, which she had been obligated to attend. But instead of staying in a hotel and sneaking back to New York in the middle of the night, she made the conscious decision to go back home.
She still hadn’t decided what to do with Justin or whether she would stick it out, but she knew that ignoring him wouldn’t help anyone. She figured that maybe if she could coexist with him for a while, she could consider forgiveness and fighting for her marriage.
“I appreciate you coming with me to this party,” Justin told his wife as they pulled up to the Cat & Fiddle Pub. It was the wrap party for his latest film, Bad Teacher, and the paparazzi had gathered on Sunset, apparently itching to see if the newlyweds would finally show up in public together since neither of them were currently working.
This was more a test than anything, but she knew she would have to be cordial, so before getting out of the car, she gave him a fake smile and told him, “You’re welcome.”
I remember when you filled my heart with joy
Was I blind to the truth?
He came around to her side and took her hand into his as the photographers began to snap pictures of them. They ignored them, as usual, but as they went inside, he did kiss the palm of her hand, and for once, Scarlett wasn’t sure whether that was genuine affection or a photo op.
Just there to fill the space
Inside, the party was well under way, with food and drink being passed amongst the patrons, while most of the cast was already congregated outside on the warm patio.
“Justin, come on outside, buddy.” It was one of the writers, Lee Eisenberg, who’d spotted Justin’s arrival as he came out from the bathroom. He grabbed Justin by the arm, already pulling him outside. “Everyone’s here.”
“I’m the last to arrive?” he wondered, taking Scarlett with him.
“You are, superstar. Even Cameron’s here.”
From the beginning, Scarlett greatly suspected that Cameron Diaz was ‘the other woman’ in question, and she really, really didn’t want to have to go out there and be courteous to the woman that had most likely had sex with her husband.
I’ve allowed you to make me feel…
I feel so dumb
What kind of fool am I?
“Justin, can we stay inside?” she requested, halting all three of them.
“You all right?” he turned back to her.
“I just… don’t wanna go outside.”
“Scarlett, it’s not too hot anymore,” Lee promised, assuming that that would be the only possible problem. “There’s a nice breeze, everyone’s got their drinks…”
“I’d really rather stay here,” she maintained, trying to smile at him.
Justin nodded to her reassuringly. He was in a perpetual dog house, so he would have done anything she wanted at that point. “We can stay in. You wanna get a table?”
Just then, Zooey was coming through the door, completely unaware that Justin and Scarlett had arrived. She hadn’t talked to Justin in over a week, and when she spoke with Scarlett three days prior, she seemed to have no interest in being near Justin, so she was quite surprised to see the two of them standing there. Together.
“Zooey,” Lee called out to her, blowing her cover of pretending not to notice them. “Look who made it!”
“Look who made it!” she grinned, approaching the three of them hesitantly. “Hi!”
Justin was visibly shaken by her presence, but he knocked it away quickly, placing his hand on Scarlett’s back to introduce her. “Hey. I want you to meet my wife, Scarlett. Scarlett, this is Zooey. She was one of the supervising producers on our film.”
“We’ve talked a few times,” Zooey reminded him, offering her outstretched hand to the woman she knew she had hurt so deeply. “Good to finally meet you.”
Scarlett only stared at her for a moment, in disbelief that this was the wonderfully helpful Zooey that she only knew from the phone. She was shocked as shit to find that the woman she’d been talking to was quite attractive. In her experience, most of the female writers she met were… frumpy. All the time they’d been talking, she imagined Zooey as a less attractive version of Tina Fey on 30 Rock. Clearly, it was her small-minded mistake to assume that Zooey would be all brains, no beauty.
“Wow, hi,” Scarlett finally blinked, returning the handshake. “It’s good to meet you, too.”
“Scarlett doesn’t wanna come outside with us,” Lee inserted into their exchange, still trying to goad the couple onto the patio. “She wants to be alone with her man, apparently.”
That wasn’t it at all. “I’ll come out,” she agreed, glancing at Zooey. She felt as though she was her only ally at the moment.
“Yeah?”
“Why not.”
Justin sighed lightly, trying to avoid Zooey’s gaze as he rubbed his wife’s hand with his thumb. “You sure?”
“Yeah, sure. I might as well meet the whole gang.”
“Okay, well I’m refilling on drinks,” Zooey proclaimed, wanting to get away from the whole encounter. “Scarlett, you want anything?”
“I’ll take a beer,” she nodded at her new friend. “Heineken’s good.”
“Right. Lee?”
“I’ve got a drink outside, I believe.”
“Justin? Cuba Libre?”
“Umm. Yeah,” he answered with raised eyebrows. He managed to miss the look that Scarlett gave the two of them, and commenced guiding her towards the back patio. “We’ll be outside.”
You made a fool of me, tell me why
____________________
Once she got inside the party, and had the chance to down a few beers, Scarlett loosened up a bit. She didn’t have to stop herself from scowling at everyone, it seemed to just fade away on its own. And while Justin’s costars were very outgoing and engaging, she found herself more interested in observing him with them. She felt like she didn’t really know him the way she thought, and maybe studying him would help.
He noticed her quietness, but didn’t make a big deal out of it, considering everything that was going on. Instead, he picked up the slack and made sure to be extra sociable for the two of them. He joked and laughed and told stories, as he usually did, and made everyone feel like his close, personal friend.
And Scarlett realized that that was what she loved about him. He made her laugh like no one else, and she never got tired of watching him be “him.” When he was on, he was so infectious. She smiled genuinely at the thought that he belonged to her. Maybe some other woman didn’t really matter.
“I’m gonna head to the restroom,” he told his wife when there was a lull in the conversation. “You need anything?”
“From the restroom? I think I’m good,” she joked for the first time that night.
It felt good to hear that out of her. He smiled sweetly and kissed her forehead. “I’ll be back.”
He went inside, planning to do his business as quickly as possible and get back to everyone, but when he spotted Zooey outside in front, alone, he thought it only fair that he say a word or two after essentially ambushing her with his wife in tow.
“Hey,” he approached cautiously, wondering what her reaction would be.
She was smoking a cigarette and gazing out to Sunset Boulevard when he startled her. “Umm. Hey.”
“You all right?”
“I’m good,” she nodded, blowing smoke away from him. “You?”
“Not bad, I guess,” he shrugged offhandedly. “A little surprised to see Andy here,” he commented, referring to her infamously obnoxious friend who seemed to hate everything Hollywood.
“He insisted on coming.”
“He wanted a gander at the good life, huh.”
“I suppose,” she sighed.
“I’ve missed you.”
“Let’s not do that,” she suggested, doing her best to avoid his sad blue eyes. “Now’s not the time or place.”
“Are you angry at me?”
“Not at all. I just…” she shook her head dolefully. “Your wife is in there.”
I want to kiss you
Does she want you with the pain that I do?
“I know.”
“She told me that you told her about an affair.”
His eyebrows raised in surprise and he almost choked on the air. “She told you.”
“Yeah.”
“I didn’t… I didn’t wanna lie.”
“You owe me no explanations, dude.”
But now when we’re face to face, you won’t look me in the eye
No time, no friendship, no love
“I’m sorry I didn’t warn you or… anything.”
“I’m good,” she promised, looking down to the ground. She wasn’t good. In fact, she was miserable and frustrated, but… it seemed that her time in Hollywood was paying off. She was learning how to hide it. “I’m having a good time.”
“It’s a good party,” he agreed. “I enjoyed your spiel about the Old Navy mannequins and how they followed you to the movies.”
“My improvisational skills,” she half smiled, referring to her entertainment portion of the party. “It was either that or my informational improv, where I list state capitols. People don’t like that one as much.”
He chuckled at the thought. “I can’t imagine why.”
“People are surprising,” she reasoned, glancing back inside to the party she’d been gone from for a while. “I should go back inside.”
He wasn’t ready for her to go yet. “Zooey…”
She finally looked up at him, her green eyes boring into him, waiting for some kind of resolve.
“I…” He had nothing to say that was appropriate in that moment. The whole moment was inappropriate, actually.
Can’t touch you anymore…
Back in the party, Andy found Scarlett sitting by herself, and he couldn’t help but approach the solemn star. “I would never leave you alone in a room full of strangers,” he greeted her without an ounce of hesitation or humility.
She looked up at him, somewhat flattered, somewhat annoyed. “Excuse me?”
“What is wrong with him?”
“I’m sorry?”
“That guy you came in with. He’s an idiot to leave you alone.”
“He went to the restroom,” she innately defended her husband.
“I’m Andy. Zooey’s date.”
She nodded and took a sip of her beer. “I’m Scarlett.”
“You’re alone.”
“Not anymore, apparently.”
“I’m not bothering you, am I?”
“It’s fine.”
“Nice to have some company at the kids table, huh?” he smirked, watching the rest of the cast and crew mingle with one another as if they’d known each other for years.
She glanced at him curiously. “What do you mean?”
“Look at all of them all. It’s like we’re not even here.”
“Well… I don’t know about you, but I’m choosing to sit here.”
“Sure you are. But your guy and my girl are somewhere not in here. And here we are, in a room full of strangers, fending for ourselves.”
Scarlett could only frown at him, somehow offended by what he was implying. “Let’s not talk anymore.”
“You’re in denial,” he realized, rising from his seat. “That’s fine. It was nice to meet you.”
Just then, Zooey and her cigarette reentered the patio, and when her eyes locked with Scarlett, who had been staring at the door, she felt very self-conscious about the conversation she’d just had with Justin. She immediately put out her smoke and tried to put everyone else’s attention on her as well. “You guys, I’m feelin’ generous right now. Drinks on me!”
But that didn’t distract Scarlett at all. The moment she saw Zooey with the cigarette, everything seemed to click into place. While Cameron Diaz seemed like the logical answer to her question at first glance, the more she thought about it, the more obvious it became. There was a reason Zooey knew Justin’s favorite drink. There was a reason Zooey had been at the top of his Recent Calls. And then she thought of the morning that Justin had come home from his birthday party, tasting like an ashtray. Zooey had been the reason. Andy was right “ Justin and Zooey were having an affair.
You made a fool of me, tell me why
Once Scarlett came to this epiphany, she felt sick to her stomach. For what she’d trusted this woman with, for what this woman was knowingly taking away from her, and for how much of a fool her husband had allowed her to be. It took every shred of strength she had not to completely lose her mind right then and there.
You made a fool of me, tell me why
When Justin returned to the evening garden, he quickly noticed the look of anguish painted on his wife’s face. “Are you all right?”
She wiped herself out of her trance to smile up at him phonily. “Yeah. Fine.”
“What’d I miss?” he asked, taking a seat beside her.
She was clearly still dazed. “What?”
“I heard cheering on my way back from the restroom. What happened?”
“Oh. Umm… Zooey. She’s buying everyone drinks.”
“Nice. I could use another round,” he decided, popping back up from his chair. “You want?”
Of course he found it nice that Zooey was buying him yet another drink, she thought. “I’m good.”
“Levin!” he called her over as she finished up her conversation with two of their film’s producers.
“You rang?” she smiled at the unhappy couple.
“You’re buying drinks, I hear?”
“Pretty sure I already bought you a drank,” she forced out a joke. “Scarlett, you want anything?”
“I’m fine,” she declined a little more tensely than she intended. The fact was, she absolutely hated sitting there, between the two of them, all of them now aware of the hugely ugly secret that connected them. She was on the verge of combusting. “Justin, where’s the bathroom?”
“Umm. When you go in, go past the bar and make a left. You’ll see it right there.”
“I’ll be right back,” she attempted to smile, leaving the two of them to cheat some more.
“Is she all right?” Zooey wanted to know, seeing how quickly she was moving.
“I think so.”
“On a scale of one to ten,” she leaned in to speak quietly, “how scared are you right now?”
He smiled at the question and then looked down to the ground as he answered, “Probably a good eight and a half.”
“Do you think she’s gonna leave you?”
“I don’t know what I think,” he nodded sullenly. “A part of me feels like she’s already gone. Another part of me feels like the fact that she’s here is a little glimmer of hope.”
Zooey nodded as well.
“Do you?”
“Do I think she’s gonna leave you? Umm… wow. I… I dunno.” She tried to recall anything from their conversation that she could reference to help. “If it helps, she said she couldn’t imagine her life without you.”
That made him smile, too.
Suddenly feeling awkward about the course of their conversation, she sarcastically inserted, “So glad the two of you feel comfortable coming to me for marriage advice.”
“I’m sorry. I just feel dangerously at ease with you, apparently.”
“Clearly.”
“Do you want me to leave you alone?”
“Please,” she declined with a dismissive wave. “I’ll inform you when I’m bored with you.”
As one of his costars passed by with a tray full of shots, Justin seemed to recall a funny anecdote. “Hey, did Eric tell you the story about how his dog tried to kill him?” he laughed.
She smiled in reply, having heard the story from his girlfriend. “Katherine told me, actually. Though I’d imagine Eric’s retelling was slightly more hilarious.”
“Who’s Katherine?” he frowned curiously.
“Eric’s girlfriend.”
“Girlfriend.”
“…Yes?”
“Is that what he calls his boyfriend?” he made a scrunched up face as he whispered.
“No!” she almost cackled, turning to look for the aforementioned lady. Spotting the svelte brunette, she pointed her out for Justin. “The one in the gray top with her hair pulled back?”
“Shut the fuck up, Zooey.”
“I’m so serious. That’s his girlfriend.”
“You’re kidding,” he marveled, as he would have sworn that Eric Stonestreet was gay, and basically a real life version of his character on Modern Family.
“Do not judge books by their covers,” she reminded him, knocking him in the back so that he would stop staring. “Or actors by the roles they play.”
“Lesson learned,” he held up his hands in surrender. “Shocked the hell outta me.”
“Honestly, I thought he was gay too, until I met Katherine, so…”
“And I knew this,” he shook his head just in time to spot Scarlett returning to the scene of their crimes. “Hey, you.”
“Hello.”
“We were just talking about who’s not gay,” Zooey informed her as if that would break the palpable tension.
Scarlett smiled in her direction, but didn’t respond. She just turned to Justin and said, “I’m ready to go.”
“O-okay. Umm… let me just say a few goodbyes.”
“I’ll be in the car.”
“Okay.” As she stalked out of the patio without so much as a parting glance, Justin looked back at Zooey. “I guess it’s time to go.”
“You should really not make her wait.”
“But it would be rude--.”
“I’ll be sure to tell everyone you left. Just in case they don’t figure it out when they don’t see you anymore.”
With a smirk, he bid her goodbye and headed out of the party to meet his wife in the parking lot. Not surprised to see that the paparazzi were still waiting, he silently opened Scarlett’s door and then let himself into his pristine black Audi.
Once they were on Sunset and headed back towards their home in The Hills, he looked over to his wife, who was staring out of the window plaintively.
“So that was fun…”
“Was it?”
Unsure of whether to respond to that, he decided to just shut up and drive.
Scarlett had watched Zooey and Justin for a bit before she returned from the restroom, as painful as it was, and in her study, she discovered something even more disturbing than just his partner in infidelity. Justin’s interaction with Zooey was very genuine and deliberate. Even when he thought no one was watching, he was attentive and clearly amused by her. He looked at her is if he were trying to savor every moment. Scarlett searched for some sign of wanton lust, where he licked his lips repeatedly or found some reason to touch her. But instead he looked her in the eye often, and smiled earnestly when she spoke. Way to twist the knife that had already been dug so deep.
You made a fool of me, tell me why
I feel like such a fool
You made a fool of me, tell me why
“It’s Zooey, isn’t it?” she eventually found the wherewithal to ask out loud.
To protect Zooey, Justin wanted to play dumb and act like he had no idea what she was talking about, but he knew that that would only add insult to Scarlett’s injury. So he was honest. “Yeah.”
“You like her a lot, I can tell.”
“Yeah…”
“Are you in love with her?”
“I’m in love with you,” he answered quickly. Confidently.
“Are you in love with her?”
He’d avoided asking himself that very question for a long time, primarily because he was scared of the answer. Liking Zooey was daunting enough, but the thought that he could possibly be in love with her, when for the last six and a half years, all he’d known was that he loved Scarlett, was too much to try and rationalize. But the question had been asked, out loud, and he began to nod as he came to the heartbreaking realization. “…I think I am.”
Lyrics: “Fool of Me” - Me'Shell Ndegeocello (Bitter)
Author's Notes:
I honestly don't even have an excuse lol. If you're still here, all I can say is that I truly, truly appreciate it.
18: You Lost You
I am done
Smoking gun
“Scarlett, you haven’t spoken to me all week. You have to say something.”
Turning from the beautiful bouquet of flowers she’d just received as she returned from dress rehearsal, she found Justin standing in the threshold of her dressing room. He looked the same as always “ his short brown hair and beard trimmed just less than to perfection, his red and blue plaid shirt clung to his thin but muscular torso, jeans just the right amount of loose versus tight “ but still, to her, he looked like a complete stranger. Immediately, she wanted to run out of there.
But he was right, aside from a few Thank You’s and You’re Welcomes when their paths crossed there at 30 Rock, where they were required to be courteous to one another in front of others, Scarlett had said nothing to him. Mainly because she had nothing to say.
We’ve lost it all
The love is gone
“What do you want me to say, Justin?”
“Anything.” He came further into the room, closing the door behind him. “Yell, scream, cry, whatever. But anything is better than nothing.”
“I have nothing.”
“You don’t feel anything.”
“I feel a lot of things. But you really don’t want to hear them right now.”
“I do,” he beseeched, moving closer to her.
She backed away, not wanting him to touch her. “Neither one of us have time for this right now, and you are not about to ambush me half an hour before I have to do an hour and a half of live television. Get out.”
“I’ll go. Just talk to me and I’ll go.”
“I just did!” she tried not to shout. “And the fact that, not only did you cheat on me, but you are now trying to make me discuss it, is completely unbelievable. The least I should get is the timeline to deal with this on my own terms.”
“Keep going.”
“Get out, Justin.” She stalked over to the door, opening it for him. “Please.”
“You have to--.”
“I don’t have to do shit,” she barked. “If I have to say it again, I’m calling security.”
“They’re not gonna kick me out of here, come on.”
“They will if their host threatens to walk.”
“Fine,” he held up his hands, defeated. “I wanted to clear some air between us before we go on national TV, but that’s fine. We’ll just…”
“We don’t have to like each other to do a few scenes together,” she cut him off. “That’s why it’s called acting.”
“You’re right.”
“Get out.”
“I’m sorry, Scarlett.”
“Noted.”
Once he finally left the room, she shut the door behind him and leaned against it, feeling like she actually needed it for support. Having to spend the last portion of the week with him was inescapably difficult, but it seemed that he knew she needed a bit of space and kept his distance. So she couldn’t understand why he suddenly felt so compelled to make her talk to him on the most inconvenient day of them all.
SNL was no light commitment. It took a steady stream of focus to belt out a live show with only a few days to pull it off, but she was getting through it. Even with Justin scheduled to guest star, the chaos of live sketch comedy had actually been a welcome distraction. Until that moment, of course, where Justin just had to walk in there with his flowers and follies on display, causing her to actually think about their looming situation.
And even though she had promised herself she wouldn’t cry that day, much less, just a few minutes before show time, she just couldn’t help it. Seeing him made her think of him with Zooey, and, well… that hurt.
She has won
Now it’s no fun
We’ve lost it all
The love is gone
“Ladies and gentlemen, Scarlett Johansson!”
As the audience cheered loudly, Scarlett took the stage in a hip-hugging black cocktail dress, a beautiful contrast to her shoulder length blonde hair, curled and coiffed to perfection. All smiles, she stood before the live studio audience and waited for the music and applause to die down.
“Thank you, thank you so much. Hello, everyone! Hello,” she was grinning from ear to ear. “I have to say I am so excited to be here! I’m so glad to be back in New York,” she began to another round of audience cheers. “I mean, I’m from New York, I grew up in the city, and this is my fourth time hosting SNL, so I really feel like this is, like, this is home, you know?
I mean, I’ve been all over the world, people answering to my every whim and treating me like royalty left and right, but here? I really, really feel comfortable here. It’s like that place where you can come and everybody knows your name. They treat me like… just like everyone else, and I really enjoy that.”
Just then, one of the SNL players, Jason Sudeikis entered the scene, stage left. “Scarlett!” he ran up to her happily. “Hi.”
“Hi, James! H-h-how’s it going?”
“Umm. It’s actually… it’s Jason,” he corrected her timidly.
“Huh?”
“No, nothing. I am James. Hello.”
“Hi,” she grinned politely. “What can I, can I help you with something?”
“Well the umm, they just told us you have a package waiting downstairs. Apparently your new bed is here?”
“Oh, my god. They got it here so quickly!” As an aside to the audience, she informed them, “I just ordered this gorgeous California king for my dressing room. I mean, there was no way I would’ve felt at home without it.”
“Well, the delivery guys were trying to get it on the elevator, but it didn’t fit, so they just left it downstairs.”
“Oh. Well… wow. I have no idea how I’m gonna get it up here.”
“I was just gonna ask, do you mind if I haul it up the steps for you? Would that be okay?” He was smiling at her, clearly very wildly infatuated and willing to do anything for her. “Would you be willing to let me do that?”
“Umm… I guess so,” she nodded, looking out to the crowd. “But be careful, I do not want any dirty footprints rubbing off on my mattress, you know?”
“Yeah, yeah, I won’t even let it touch the floor.”
“Well thanks, James! I really appreciate that.”
The audience laughed as Jason enthusiastically ran off, and then Andy Samberg came up next. “Hey, Scarlett,” he greeted, his childlike grin displaying his adoration.
“Hey, Danny, how are you?”
“I’m Danny,” he confirmed with a giggle.
“You’re Danny. Danny… Arenberg, right?”
“That is totally right.”
“So what’s up? You ready for the show tonight?”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course. But just one thing.”
“Okay.”
“Well you know how our dressing rooms were next to each other and everything, right?”
“Oh, was that you who had to give up their room so I could have a kitchen added to mine?”
“That’s me,” he nodded goofily. “Which is totttally fine, I was just wondering, would you mind if I used that space behind your new refrigerator for my wardrobe? I promise I won’t be any trouble.”
“Well…I don’t know. I mean, do you really need it?”
“I do. It was in the hallway, but when you got that big flat screen installed, they told me it was a safety hazard for me and my clothes to stay out there.”
“Oh. Well if you really need it, you can move your clothes in there. But just the clothes.”
“Just the clothes. Of course.”
More laughter ensued as he skipped off the stage, and Scarlett went on with her monologue. “As I was saying, this place is just great. I don’t get any of that ‘star treatment,’ I’m just one of the crew, and it’s just like a second home to me.”
“Yo, Scarlett!”
Big cheers and applause erupted when the camera panned to Justin at the back of the studio, dressed as a homely version of himself in torn jeans and a shirt with dirty handprints all over it, while toting a mostly empty package of bread.
“J-J-Justin,” she frowned, watching him walk towards her. “What are you doing here, babe?”
He made it to the front of the crowd, taking the stage with her and holding up what was left of his bread loaf. “I’ve got a better question for ya. When are you coming home?!”
“What is that?”
“It’s what I’ve been eating since you’ve been gone!”
“All you’ve eaten is bread?”
“Yes. No one has been home to cook for me in I don’t know how long. I’m going to die, Scarlett. I’m going to die on bread and beer.”
“Well I’m sorry! I’ve been here working, I haven’t had time to do much else, I guess.” She moved in closer, prepared to hug him, until she got a whiff of his clothing. “God, Justin, what is that smell?”
“Oh, I… umm…” he looked down at the floor in embarrassment. “Well you’re the one that hasn’t done laundry in ages! Your disgust is not needed or appreciated.”
“I’m sorry, babe. I am so sorry. I guess I didn’t realize how long I’ve been gone.”
“Our dog has a dressing room here!”
As the audience finished laughing, she apologized seriously as her monologue came to a close. “I’m sorry. I promise, I’m gonna come home as soon as all of this is over.”
“You will?”
“I will,” she nodded. “But just… move over there? I don’t wanna smell like you the rest of the night.” She watched him move out of the frame before finishing up to more laughter and applause. “You guys, we have a great show tonight! Christina Aguilera is here! So stick around, we’ll be right back!”
______________________
They were halfway through the show and things had gone off without any major glitches to report. People were still laughing, Scarlett hadn’t flubbed any of her lines, and she was much too busy hosting to think about the fact that she had to share the stage with her philandering husband not once, but twice.
But now, she had a bit of a lull in her hosting duties as Christina Aguilera took the stage for the first time, which would then be followed by Weekend Update. Exhausted from the day, she returned to her dressing room, hoping to get some quiet time, but when she walked in to see Justin on her couch, she knew that wouldn’t happen.
“What are you doing here,” she demanded, slamming the door behind her. “I know you’re not this stupid.”
“Scarlett, we have to get past this. We can’t be around all these people, faking our marriage forever.”
“You’ve sure as hell been doing a pretty good job at it.”
“I wasn’t faking it.”
“You lied. Repeatedly. You fell in love with someone else, Justin!”
And we had magic
And this is tragic
You couldn’t keep your hands to yourself
“I didn’t mean to, I swear to god.”
“So you accidentally fell in love with her. That makes a lot of sense,” she nodded angrily. “I’m not sure how that happens, but knowing you, I am not at all surprised that you could find a way.”
“I’m saying… I mean, we met, and… we talked a few times, and suddenly, I found myself thinking about her when I shouldn’t have been. And…”
“Spare me, Justin.”
“I’m trying to help you understand this. I’m trying to help me understand this, I guess.”
“You embarrassed me,” she noted sadly. “You let me speak to her over and over again. The two of you probably laughing at me behind my back. Why would you… I thought you had more respect for me than that.”
I feel like our world’s been infected
And somehow you left me neglected
“I didn’t know she was talking to you. I mean…. I knew you had talked, but I didn’t know what was said. I still don’t.”
“That makes it better.”
“I’m sorry, Scarlett.”
She only stared at him for what felt like forever before she felt the need to shout at him. “SIX MONTHS, JUSTIN! You couldn’t even do this for six months!”
“It’s not because I don’t love you, though. I am completely in love with you,” he made an attempt to defend his senselessness. “I just… I mean, we clicked. And I know I shouldn’t have even put myself in a position where we had the chance to, but… I did.”
“And I’ve been wracking my brain, trying to figure out what the fuck I did to push you away. You had me thinking there was something wrong with ME.”
“I never meant to do that.”
“You fucked up.”
“I fucked up,” he agreed sullenly. “I wish I hadn’t.”
“I wish you hadn’t, but you did, and now, I just feel so… so violated. I fucking hate you right now, Justin.”
It killed him to hear her say that. “I’m so sorry.”
“I am so sick of hearing you apologize. Just stop it, just stop it,” she frowned as tears went crashing down her face. “I can’t do this with you.”
“I don’t know what else to say.”
“Which is why you should stop trying to make me talk to you! I don’t want to talk to you!”
“You have to talk to me, Scar. We have to make this right.”
“WE don’t have to do anything, because you did this. YOU did it,” she was almost sobbing. “YOU met that girl, YOU decided to pursue whatever the fuck you were feeling, YOU ruined our marriage. Our fucking six-month-old marriage, our seven years together, YOU ruined it.”
We found our lives been changed
Babe, you lost me
“I know you’re angry,” he began to tear up as well. “And I--.”
“I am not angry, I am in pain!” she cried, clutching her heart. “And it’s because of YOU! You, who were supposed to love me more than anything. You were supposed to protect me from this kind of shit! You were supposed to be better than this.”
“I’m not,” he shook his head, “as much as I wish I was. I’m not. I’m just as confused and fucked up as anyone. I’m not perfect, Scarlett.”“
“But you expect me to be.”
“Never.”
“You do, Justin. It’s like you want me to be your arm candy, you want me because it looks right.”
“Scarlett, I never wanted anything perfect. Sometimes, I want to yell and scream, I want you to feel like punching me in the face--.”
“I feel like you punched me in the face,” she countered.
“But it was never ever my intent to get caught up in this. I never wanted to hurt you.” He took a deep breath and stared at her as if he’d never see her again. “I just… I stumbled. I did something I never thought I would ever even be tempted to do. But… this is my first time through this life and I’m not gonna do everything right. I wasn’t equipped with the tools to handle this. I mean, at first glance, it was something that seemed better to me than what I already had. And I was thinking too much of myself and too little of anyone else. Especially you. And for that, I am sorry.”
Now I know you’re sorry and we were sweet
But you chose lust when you deceived me
And you’ll regret it, but it’s too late
How can I ever trust you again?
“Maybe I was gone too long. Maybe I wasn’t quirky enough or exciting enough to hold your attention--.”
“No.”
“Do you hate me?”
“Oh my god, of course not, Scarlett. I love you.”
“It doesn’t feel like it…”
He made a motion to take her hand into his, but she stopped him.
“Don’t touch me.”
“Scarlett”.”
“Listen, when we got married, you told me that you would be honest with me, no matter how much it hurt, and so, I’m gonna do the same for you.” She inhaled sharply and wiped her eyes of all the makeup that had run with her tears. “What sucks most about this is that you took away my best friend. When something bad happens, you’re the one I wanna talk to, and now… God, I can’t even look at you.”
And we had magic
And this is tragic
You couldn’t keep your hands to yourself
“Please. Don’t say that.”
“I’m being honest. I can’t look at you. I need… you to go,” she whispered, her hands perched on her stomach, feeling a dull, aching pain there. “This hurts. It hurts too much.”
I feel like our world’s been infected
And somehow you left me neglected
We found our life’s been changed
“But how can I make it better? What can I do?”
“You can’t do anything, Justin.”
Babe, you lost me
______________________
“Em, look at this,” Zooey proclaimed suddenly, passing her computer to her bedridden sister. “Read that story.”
“Scarlett and Justin on the rocks?” she read the headline of the news story out loud and then rolled her eyes at her younger sibling. “Zooey, what the fuck is this?”
“Read it!”
Rumors have been swirling around one of Hollywood’s biggest couples over a couple of tiny little things. The very talented and beautiful Scarlett Johansson hosted the Saturday night institution, Saturday Night Live this weekend with musical guest Christina Aguilera. But it was who did and then did not appear that’s got everyone buzzing.
Pop superstar Justin Timberlake, Scarlett’s husband of approximately six months, made not one, but two appearances on the show, including a cameo in the opening monologue, as well as a hilarious skit where the duo sold porcelain fountains. But just an hour later, at the end of the show, Scarlett seemed to purposely leave out her husband’s name when thanking the special guests. On top of that, Mrs. Timberlake’s wedding ring had been noticeably absent. Of course, she could have just taken it off after the monologue for acting purposes, but the fact that Mr. Timberlake was also missing from the end credits lineup was pretty glaring.
Sources say that the couple was heard shouting while the show was in progress and that he was a no-show for the After Party as well. No one knows exactly what might have caused this rift, but it may be big if they couldn’t even put up a front for the cameras. As we all know, time will soon tell.
As Emile finished reading the article, she shut the computer and glanced back at Zooey. “What the hell is this?”
“That’s crazy, isn’t it?”
“Who knows if it’s true.”
“Well she clearly didn’t thank him at the end of the show,” Zooey rationalized. “And she wasn’t wearing her ring.”
“Why do you seem giddy about this?”
“I’m not giddy. I’m just... anxious, I guess. It’s weird.”
“You fucking bitch, you are hoping they broke up!”
“I am not!”
“Why else would you be scouring the internet for stories about them when you’re sitting here waiting to meet your nephew?”
“Well what would you rather me do, Em? Just sit here and stare at the walls? You’re the one who doesn’t want them to wake him, so when they finally bring him from the nursery, I will be all over him,” she smiled.
Emile only shook her head, as she was already annoyed at Zooey for missing the entire birth. “Priorities. You have none.”
“I resent that!”
“Resent it all the fuck you want, bitch. I tell you I’m in labor and you tell me you have a meeting with Judd Apatow. Who does that!”
“You said you didn’t mind!”
“I’ve always been there for you, Zooey.”
“And I’ve always been there for you! I’m here!”
“Yesterday was when it mattered.”
“I was all the way across the country! What was I supposed to do? Cancel what could have possibly been the biggest meeting of my professional life so I could hop on a plane in the very off chance that I would arrive before the baby got here? Come on, Em.”
“That is precisely what you were supposed to do, you selfish cunt. You were supposed to climb out of your married boyfriend’s bed to come see your nephew being born. I don’t care if you were in Transyl-fucking-vania. You should have been willing to move mountains to get here.”
“I wasn’t with Justin! Clearly, he’s here in New York, so…”
“So the fuck what. If he had been in LA, I’m sure he would’ve been the reason.”
Defeated, she looked at her sister guiltily. “I’m sorry.”
“I thought this relationship with a pop star was gonna be good for you, but it’s not. You’re losing yourself, Zooey, and I don’t like it.”
“What do you want me to say?” Zooey began to yell. “I fucked up! I’m sorry. I don’t need a lecture.”
“When you act like a child, you deserve a lecture.”
“I didn’t come here for this.”
“I know. And I didn’t want you here for this, but I’m sitting here looking at you and I’m realizing that I have no fucking clue who you are anymore.”
“You’re being dramatic.”
“You’re being petulant,” she shot back. “Be my sister again, Zo. I miss you.”
Rolling her eyes at Emile’s antics, she ignored the fact that she had yet to see her nephew and began to gather her things.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m leaving until you decide to stop being a psycho.” Throwing her laptop bag over her shoulder, and clutching her clutch, she started to walk away as quickly as her Louboutins would carry her.
“Zooey, get back here!” Emile yelled. When she saw that she was ignored, she snatched the IV out of her hand, and waddled over to her bathroom, in pain, in order to grab her robe and run after her immature sister. Finding her a few yards down the hallway, she called her name again. “Zooey, don’t make me start embarrassing you.”
“Take some meds and calm down,” Zooey called back dismissively. “I’ll come by tomorrow.”
“You going to see your boyfriend, Justin Timberlake?” she shouted.
“Emile, stop it,” she pleaded quietly, walking back towards her and her humiliating statement. “We obviously can’t talk right now, why are you doing this?”
“You leave now, I will never speak to you again.”
“Come on.”
“I’m so serious. You walking around acting like hot shit is not working for me. Not when you’re fuckin’ someone else’s husband and getting more money and job opportunities because the someone else’s husband you’re fuckin’ is famous. You fuckin’ prostitute. “
“You’re being evil,” Zooey inserted when her sister’s words began to hit a little too close to home.
“No, I’m introducing you to some honesty, because clearly, your ass is in dire need of some. And for the record, I cannot tell you how much I looked forward to you being here when my son was born. Yeah, he came a little early, but you didn’t even TRY, Zooey. You didn’t even fuckin’ try to get here in time, and that hurt. You cut me deep, bitch.”
A lone tear slid down Emile’s face, which shocked the hell out of Zooey, because she was quite sure that her sister hadn’t shed a tear since their parents announced their divorce over a decade before. “I don’t know what to tell you. I didn’t know.”
“Well you know now, and you’re still being a bitch,” she shook her head. “So if you walk out of here, it’ll be a long, long time before I forgive you. I’ve ALWAYS had your back, and I’m gonna be the only one there for you when he goes back to his wife “ which he inevitably will do “ so you think about what the fuck you’re walking out on.”
The two of them stared at one another for what felt like forever. Probably the most powerful, most intense, most honest moment of their relationship, and they’d had plenty of them before. In that moment, Zooey loved and hated her sister.
“You don’t mean this, Em. At least, I hope you don’t mean any of it. So… I’m gonna go,” she decided, much to Emile’s disappointment. “And please know that I’m going because I really can’t even look at you right now, and I don’t want to meet my nephew this way.” She turned to walk away, but not before Emile could get in one more dig.
“Enjoy going home alone, you homewrecking bitch.”
“Fuck you,” Zooey shouted back.
I feel like our world’s been infected
And somehow you left me neglected
We found our lives been changed
Babe, you lost me
Lyrics: “You Lost Me” “ Christina Aguilera (Bionic)
The Last Day of Our Acquaintance by Ashley
Author's Notes:
It's been a year since I started this story, which is crazy to me, considering how easy it's been to write. But work life has been hectic, and I just haven't had as much time as I'd like to do this, so please know that I appreciate the hell out of your patience. And here's another chapter to commemorate our time together lol! LOVE you guys.
19: The Last Day of Our Acquaintance
“Do you feel as horrible as I do?” Zooey wondered when Justin answered his phone after their two weeks of non-communication.
“That depends. What do you feel horrible about?”
“Me and my sister are fighting and… I wanna kill myself.”
“Well, I kinda wanna kill myself too, so I guess so,” he let out a forced chuckle.
“That sucks.”
“That’s life.”
“I guess things with Scarlett haven’t gotten any better…”
“They’re at a fever pitch,” he admitted quietly. “She said she needed space, so I’m giving her space.”
“Hmm.”
“I told her I was in love with you.”
Zooey immediately choked on her own saliva and almost dropped her phone. “You did what?”
“She asked me and I didn’t wanna lie.”
“That’s… wow.”
“What’s wow about that?”
“You’re in love with me?” she nearly shouted into the phone. “I thought we were just, like, liking each other.”
“I thought so too. But then I really thought about it and I realized that… it’s definitely something deeper than that. And trust me, the last thing I needed was to have fallen in love, but it’s the truth. You stop my heart.”
“That sounds detrimental to your health,” she smiled wistfully. “I don’t know how I feel about that.”
“It pretty much has been detrimental, but… what can you do.”
“So what are you doing for Memorial Day,” she abruptly switched subjects. She needed to be able to discuss something less uncomfortable.
He shrugged as if she could see him. “Umm… Nothing special. Probably go golfing and hang out with my dogs.”
“Now would that be your actual dogs, or are you referring to your friends?”
He laughed tiredly at her question and its validity. “My actual dogs.”
“Aww, that’s so pitiful.”
“That would be me...”
“I have nothing to do either. I’ll probably call Em another hundred times and get a little more acquainted with her voicemail.”
He smirked at the thought. “You’re just as pitiful as me, apparently.”
“Weren’t we happy as hell just a couple of months ago?” she mourned for their past. “What happened?”
“I guess life can underwhelm you that way.”
She nodded to herself. “Well. I just wanted to check up on you since I haven’t heard a peep in a while.”
“Much appreciated.”
“Call me when you get lonely, all right?”
“Will do.”
They ended their call on a solemn note and Justin stared at his phone for a long moment. He recalled the day Zooey had been added to his phone, immediately under a pseudonym. It was right then that he should have known his world would be turned upside down. He’d known her only a matter of hours and he was already planning to deceive his wife… and himself, if he was finally being honest.
He tried to analyze their situation and ask himself, truthfully, how he would react if given the opportunity to do it all over. Would he not have given Zooey that fifty-five cents? Would he have erased her number as soon as he got home? Would he have still married Scarlett? Would he have slept with her on his birthday?
He had so many opportunities to do the right thing, and he’d made so many wrong decisions with a completely clear conscience. He was of sound mind when he was courting her. And even worse, after everything that had happened, he still didn’t feel regretful. He hated that he’d hurt his wife, of course, but he didn’t regret a second of his time with Zooey. What an odd feeling, he thought. And then he finally stopped staring at his phone and decided to call Zooey back.
“Hey,” she answered, surprised to hear from him so quickly. “Everything all right?”
An ironic smile tugged the corners of his mouth. “I’m feeling lonely.”
____________________
When the weekend of Memorial Day arrived, Zooey and Justin were both feeling very estranged from their own lives. Zooey, whose sister had yet to speak to her, didn’t feel comfortable going to her friends for any help or advice, because they all had the same thing to say about Justin. And Justin, whose wife was still in New York ignoring him, didn’t want to entertain all the questions from friends and family about exactly what was going on. So they leaned on one another.
“You ready to do this?” she greeted him as they met at the elevators in the parking lot of LAX Airport. She laughed at his conspicuous disguise of a Dodgers cap, sunglasses, and a hood pulled over his head.
“What are you laughing at?”
“It’s ninety degrees and you’re dressed for a winter day in LA. I dig it.”
“I look stupid?” he smiled.
“Only slightly.”
He decided to take off his hat and put it on her head, leaving him in sunglasses and a hoodie. “Better?”
“Except I’m a Red Sox fan, and if you ever put a Dodgers cap on my head again, I will fuckin’ strangle you.” She took the dark blue thing off and stuffed it in his backpack for him.
“So how are we gonna do this?” he wondered, as they stepped off of the elevator and headed for the crosswalk.
“We said we would pick a place and just go, so…”
“I know, but I mean, how does one just ‘pick a place?’”
“We’ll look at the departure board,” she suggested, “and… whatever city is right in the middle, that’s where we’re going.”
“What if there’s an even number of cities?” he wondered with a grin.
“Well then we’ll go with whatever city starts with the first letter of one of our first names.”
“Okay, but whose name?”
She was trying to make this as random as possible, but he was making it rather difficult. “Umm. We’ll put our iPods on shuffle, and we’ll go with whoever has a better song come up.”
“Fair enough.”
“This will be fun,” she decided for them, pulling her long locks into a sloppy ponytail before they had to cross the street. “Right?”
“I think we need this,” he nodded. “Maybe to get a little sanity back.”
“Who needs sanity?”
With matching grins, the two of them walked into the American Airlines area of LAX, side by side, and headed straight for the Departure board. Sure enough, there was an even amount of cities staring back at them, so they pulled out their iPods. Following Zooey’s made up rules, they put their libraries on random and waited for the results.
“I have an awesome onnne,” Justin teased with raised eyebrows, looking down at his device.
“I guarantee you it is not awesomer than mine.”
“I’m sorry, but it’s hard to beat ‘House of Cards’ by Radiohead.”
“That is a strong contender,” she agreed. “Very strong. But…” She pulled the earphones from her iPod Touch so that he could hear what she did. “All I wanna do is zoom-a-zoom-zoom-zoom and a boom-boom. Just shake ya rump!”
“You did not just bust out with ‘Rump Shaker,’” he was cracking up.
“The iPod wants what it wants,” she shrugged. “And I think we can both agree that I win.”
“Tough call, but I’ll allow it,” he sighed. “I’m just interested to see what city you could find that starts with a Z.”
She looked up at the board proudly and found one in less than a minute. “How does Zihuatanejo sound?”
“It sounds like you don’t know what the hell that is.”
“I honestly doubt that I even pronounced that correctly, but I do know it’s in Mexico. And that’s where we’re going.”
“Mexico?” His apprehension was glaringly obvious. “Do we really wanna experiment with Mexico?”
“Why wouldn’t we?”
“Because… it’s Mexico.”
“You racist son of a bitch. I picked Zih… whatever. And that’s where we’re gonna go.”
____________________
As it turned out, Zooey’s choice ended up being pretty spectacular, because apparently, Zihuatanejo was an absolutely beautiful region of Mexico, right off of the Pacific coast. After asking around, they were told that the best resort in the town was La Casa Que Canta, and they were not led astray. A unique little village, it was perched on a cliff and surrounded by the sea of Zihuatanejo Bay, boasting breathtaking views of the water.
Zooey hadn’t really been privy to the more glamorous side of Justin’s life, but she certainly got it that weekend. With only an hour’s notice, they were offered their own private villa with its own fresh-water pools, private access to the beach, and a full golf course as a back yard. The two of them were in precisely what one would call paradise.
“God, I could get used to this,” Zooey proclaimed, coming in from her midnight swim. Running a towel through her wet hair and throwing on a robe over her bikini-clad body, she took a seat beside Justin.
He looked up from his new iPad with a contented expression. “I could, too.”
“You should be used to this. You’ve been rich for… ever.”
“I’m not referring to a lavish lifestyle here.”
She looked down seriously before her eyes darted back up to him. “I know.”
“Does that scare you?”
“A little bit.”
“Why?”
“Because there would always be this sinking feeling “ this fear “ that you’ll just up and leave one day. That… I dunno…”
“You don’t trust me.”
“I don’t trust your heart,” she confirmed for herself just as much as him. “But I don’t trust mine either, so don’t feel bad.”
“Zooey, if I say that I’m in love with you, shouldn’t that reassure you that I’m not going anywhere?”
“I mean, I’m sure you said that to Scarlett, too, so… no,” she chuckled uneasily. “And I know you mean well, but… that doesn’t do much to reassure me of anything either.”
“You’re so cynical,” he smiled sarcastically. “I don’t know how you function that way.”
She smiled sadly in response. “I thought you liked that about me.”
“Not so much.”
She stood up from the couch, her robe open and showing peeks of her dampened, tanned skin, and she ran her fingers over Justin’s soft short hair. “I’m gonna get ready for bed.”
Before she could walk away, he grabbed her hand and pulled her back towards him. He wrapped his arms around her tiny waist and pulled her close, letting his face feel the flesh of her stomach.
Slightly alarmed, she continued to let her fingers tenderly graze his head. “Are you all right?”
He nodded, but refused to let go, and soon, he found himself crying softly.
When she heard him sniffling, her heart sank. “Hey,” she called out to him worriedly, receiving no response but more tears. “Hey.”
He held onto her waist even tighter and continued to cry. “What did we do?”
She could feel herself tearing up as well, because this moment, though she hadn’t pictured it exactly this way, seemed inevitable. The moment where regret smacked him in the face and realization punched him in the stomach. The beginning of the end. “Hey,” she softly comforted him, still rubbing his head. “This is fixable. Everything will be fine.”
“How do you know that?”
“I don’t. I guess. But I know that your wife loves you,” she admitted quietly to his sobs. “I know that you love her. Completely. Even if you maybe got bored for a bit, or you saw something in me that lit a different fire for a while. She’s who you’re supposed to be with, and so… that means something. That has to.”
“I do love you, Zooey.”
“I know.”
“I can’t just… leave you.”
“I don’t want you to,” she came to realize. “But… you have to do whatever it is you have to do.”
“What’s that supposed to be?”
She sighed with a heavy heart. “I don’t know.”
____________________
The next morning, Justin awoke to an empty bed, which he thought odd, because Zooey still hadn’t come to bed when he fell asleep. He immediately got up to look for her, eventually finding her sitting by their pool, yet again. “Hey,” he greeted as cheerfully as he could. “Have you been out here all night?”
All I can ever be to you is a darkness that we knew
And this regret I got accustomed to
“Yeah,” she replied hoarsely, putting out her cigarette in the ashtray next to her. Next to that was an empty bottle of wine and her cell phone.
He took a seat next to her, rolling up his pajama pants so that he could dangle his feet in the water as well. “You all right?”
“You can’t be in love with me, Justin.”
He laughed, thinking this was another one of her weird statements. “I don’t think it works that way.”
“I’m serious. I wasn’t in this for… love. This was supposed to be fun, carefree, a break from the monotony of reality.”
Once it was so right, when we were at our height
Waiting for you in the hotel at night
“What are you talking about?” his eyebrows knitted in confusion. “You can’t help who you fall for.”
“Did you try?”
“I didn’t know I would have to.”
She shook her head at the whole situation, trying to find it in herself to be angry with him for managing to fall in love with her. “You were supposed to be a parenthesis,” she finally stated seriously. “This wasn’t supposed to be a real anything.”
“A parenthesis?”
“Yes! You suck the fun out of it when you start to attach these intense feelings to everything.”
I knew I hadn’t met my match
But every moment we could snatch
I don’t know why I got so attached
“I guess I didn’t get the memo.”
“What were you expecting to get out of this?” Her irritation was obvious, and it was like she was barking at him all of a sudden.
He was silent in response, because that was one thing he never knew in the first place.
“You don’t even know,” she scoffed.
“Where is this coming from?”
“It’s coming from the fact that you say you’re in love with me one minute and then the next minute, you’re crying into my hip, lamenting over your wife. I mean, you feel regretful, fine, but you have to pick a fucking feeling and stick to it!”
“Why are you yelling?” he frowned.
“Because this is frustrating as fuck! And you don’t seem to get that shit. You don’t know what the fuck you want, which is just completely unfair to both of us. To all three of us.”
“I-I-I’m sorry. I thought I was just… venting. I didn’t mean to make this harder on you or whatever,” he supplied genuinely. “I certainly didn’t mean to hurt you, Zo.”
“You didn’t hurt me. You’re pissing me off.” Which wasn’t true, of course. She was deeply hurt. And confused. And she hated doing this to him, but she didn’t know what other way to make him to move on but to break his heart.
It’s my responsibility, and you don’t owe nothing to me
But to walk away, I have no capacity
Justin was staring at her, trying to read her emotions, trying to gauge the enormity of what he’d done, not only to himself and his marriage, but to her as well. “I’m just, like, stunned by all of this. You seemed fine last night.”
“I’m tired, Justin,” she exhaled as if on cue. “You have exhausted me with all your indecisiveness, all your contradictory emotions. I don’t have it in me to do this anymore. This isn’t fun anymore.”
“I thought we were in this together,” he looked down into the water. “I didn’t know… I mean… I thought you were just as excited about us.”
“There is no us, Justin! There’s you and Scarlett, and then there’s me! And I can’t be the second plus in this equation anymore.”
We could’ve never had it all, we had to hit a wall
So this is inevitable withdrawal
He watched her get up and begin to storm off, but he quickly went after her. “Hey,” he grabbed her arm, still baffled by everything. “Where are you going?”
“I can’t pretend to be okay with this anymore. I have to go.”
“Zooey, stop it.”
“Let go of me,” she demanded tensely.
“You cannot just run away from this.”
“This is nothing, Justin!” she shouted trying to wrestle out of his grasp. “There is nothing here for you!”
“Stop fucking screaming!” he yelled back.
“Let go of me!” She began to punch and slap him in the chest with her free arm, still screaming. “Let me go!”
“Stop it, stop it,” he was hissing at her. “Stop it, Zooey. You’re mad because you’re hurt.”
“I’m mad because I’m mad, you fucking pretentious asshole! Let me go!”
“Calm down,” he demanded. “Stop it.”
“Let me go,” she finally whispered as tears streamed down her face and she melted into his embrace. “You have to let it go.”
“I don’t wanna let you go.”
“We don’t have a choice.”
So we are history, your shadow covers me
The sky above ablaze
Feeling completely torn and defeated, and unsure of whether he wanted her to be right or wrong, he relented. She clearly did not want him this way “ not that he could blame her “ and there wasn’t anything he could say to change her mind. So he went inside to begin repacking, preparing to go back home. Alone.
Zooey sat outside for another hour, wanting to give Justin enough time to get his things together, but also, so that she could really think about what she was doing. This man, who had come into her life and made her genuinely happy, would leave it thinking that he did exactly the opposite. She hated knowing that that was the only way for him to move on.
Reentering the house for the first time since the previous night, still in a bikini and a robe, she found him upstairs in the bedroom, sitting on the bed. “You all right?” she asked, standing in the doorway.
He nodded and looked up at her. “I kept… going a lot of places and ending up somewhere I’d already been,” he proclaimed sullenly. “Until I met you. And I thought… ‘Wow, I’ve never been here before.’ And being somewhere new, well… I liked it. I loved that feeling.”
“I liked it, too.”
“But I guess you’re right. And we have to go home at some point.”
She nodded. “You gotta be able to explain things to yourself when the lights go out and you get into bed. You gotta deal with you at the end of the day.”
“Yeah. And I haven’t done that.”
“You’re going back to LA?”
“I called Scarlett, actually,” he felt it necessary to admit. “And she didn’t hang up, she even spoke to me for thirty seconds. So I’m gonna go to New York, we’re gonna talk.”
“That’s good to hear. I think you two need each other.”
With his bag packed and his clothes on, there was nothing left for him to do but… leave. “So we just make a clean break for it, I guess?”
“That’s probably for the best.”
“You’re gonna be all right, right?”
“Of course,” she waved off as if this were no big deal. “To be honest, I think this was very uncharacteristic of both of us. I think… we were losing us, and one thing I never wanted to do when coming into this business was to lose sight of who I was. Who I am. So… before the people we once knew are gone, we should just… go.”
I wish I could say no regrets and no emotional debts
‘Cause as we kissed goodbye the sun sets
“And I just ignore you if we run into each other?”
“Come on, we’re not animals,” she smirked. “I’ll say something funny, and you’ll laugh, and we’ll go our separate ways. The way it should’ve been.”
He took a deep breath and held back tears as he took her hand into his. He kissed the palm of her hand and then closed it so that she could keep it forever, if she so chose.
She looked down at his hand, enfolded over hers, and it suddenly dawned on her how much she would miss this. How much she would miss him. “I hope I was worth it.”
So we are history, your shadow covers me
The sky above a blaze that only lovers see
“You were.”
Watching him leave the room, she smiled as brightly as she could, if only to hide how chokingly sad she was, and she began to think, maybe her agent had been right. Acting might have been right up her alley.
He walks away, the sun goes down
He takes the day, but I’m grown
And in your grey, in this blue shade
My tears dry on their own
Lyrics: “Tears Dry On Their Own” “ Amy Winehouse (Back to Black)
20: Fade To Black
It had been a month since that fateful day in Mexico when Zooey and Justin said their goodbyes to one another, but neither one of them saved for the fact that they would eventually have a movie premiere to attend and that they would see one another at least one more time, whether they liked it or not.
Zooey didn’t want to go, quite honestly. There was nothing there for her, nothing that she couldn’t get by watching Extra the next day. She wanted to stay home with a box of Uncrustables and Season Two of Breaking Bad, and act as if the rest of the world didn’t exist. But colleagues convinced her that she needed to be there, so she pulled herself out of her funk to get dressed up and go to the after party, at the very least.
She kept a close eye on the door, knowing that she would need to make a clean break if Justin showed up, and especially if he showed up with Scarlett. But somehow, she must have gotten distracted from the task at hand, because she looked away for what felt like just a moment, and suddenly, when she turned back around, there was the love of her life, followed closely by the love of his life. And she inwardly began to panic.
“Hold this for me,” she begged one of her coworkers, offering a shaky glass of wine while she searched her purse for her valet ticket.
“Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” she brushed her bangs from her face so that she could see into her purse better. “I have to go.”
“What?”
“I gotta go. I’ll see you soon, we’ll do lunch?” She pulled the colleague in for a quick hug and peck on the cheek, but managed to lock eyes with Scarlett at the exact wrong moment. A sinking feeling quickly washed over her.
Agitated by the mere sight of her, Scarlett stalked over to Zooey to confront her. “Why are you here?” she demanded.
“I was a part of the movie,” she returned confidently, a sharp contrast to the fast-paced beating of her heart. “Why wouldn’t I be here?”
“Movie premieres are for movie stars. You need to leave.”
“I don’t think so,” she chuckled uneasily. “I’ll stay out of your way, though.”
“You thought you’d get Justin to yourself tonight, didn’t you?”
“Excuse me?”
“Please,” she almost scoffed at the woman in front of her. “I laugh at you, Zooey. I go home at night and I laugh at you.”
“Scarlett, I am sorry,” she offered earnestly. “I really am. But I don’t think this is the place to discuss anything.”
“How do you sleep with someone else’s husband,” she ignored her plea. “And then you talk to me on the phone as if it’s nothing? Who does that?”
“I really am sorry.”
“You’re sorry you got caught.”
“I’m sorry that we hurt you.”
“Oh wow, you just used ‘We’ in reference to my husband.” She smiled in disbelief at her choice of words. “Listen, if you’re that desperate for a man, there are plenty of single men for you to choose from,” she leaned in quietly to say. “You don’t take someone’s husband and make him your boyfriend.”
“Scarlett--.”
“You’re garbage. And you know it.”
Zooey stared at her intensely, knowing that she didn’t have a leg to stand on, but still wanting to defend herself. Would it matter what she said in reply? Scarlett was certainly not wrong, so there was no reason to respond. But in the end, Scarlett won. She got her husband back, and everything would eventually go back to normal. Zooey was the one who’d ended up alone here.
“Listen, I’m really happy for you, and I’m gonna let you finish, but… I need you to know, as much as it doesn’t actually matter, that… I never intended for this to turn into what it did. I was standing on the sidewalk, and I needed some change for a meter, and your awesome husband walked into my life. And at the time, he wasn’t your husband… he was just someone that made me smile, and… I liked him. I liked the way he made me feel. And I know that sucks to hear, and it’s a shitty thing to say to his wife, of all people, but it’s out there, so I might as well say it all.” She looked down for a moment, trying to gather the rest of the words for her little spiel. “I wish the situation had been different. I wish I’d just had fifty-five cents that day. But… this happened. And people make mistakes. And I’m glad you can stand on your pedestal and pretend you’re perfect and if it makes you feel better to call me garbage, then that’s fine. I’ll be that for you. But I can’t do anything but apologize and mean it. And I hope you’re never put in a situation where your strength and your morals are tested the way mine were. And I hope that if you are, you don’t fail the way I did. And if you do, I hope that no one’s there to make you feel worse than you already do, just when you thought that that wasn’t actually possible. But most of all, I just hope that you’re able to move on, and be happy, and that your marriage makes it. Because if I gave him up for no reason, I’m gonna be really, really pissed.”
“What in god’s name did he see in you?” Scarlett wondered out loud.
“Probably everything he didn’t see in you.”
“You are a stone cold bitch.”
“You came over here to call me garbage,” she reminded her. “Now, I don’t know who you thought I was, but I was certainly not about to just let you talk to me however you want.”
“I only gave you what you deserve.”
“Maybe so. But I’ve walked away, you got the guy in the end, so this was just really unnecessary. All it does is show how small and insecure you are. But if it makes you feel better, then by all means…”
“You’re so sophisticated, huh? How do you get to pretend you’re the bigger person when you took MY husband?”
“You need to calm down.”
“You’re a selfish piece of shit,” she was beginning to yell louder. “You’re a whore!”
Zooey’s eyes darted across the room, as she knew people were beginning to stare at the two of them. And then she looked at Scarlett, whose eyes were welling up with tears, and she knew there was nothing else she could say. So she walked away.
“YOU’RE A WHORE!” she cried out as others moved in to comfort her.
As Zooey stormed through the party, prepared to leave, she walked by Justin, who had only caught the tail end of their exchange, much like everyone else. “Zooey,” he tried to grab her arm to stop her.
“I’m not who you’re looking for,” she barely stopped to tell him.
“Are you okay?” he called after her.
She was halfway out the door before she had a reply. “No.”
____________________
It was a late Sunday evening in July when Zooey arrived at the SoHo Mews condo building, bearing her heart in her hands and prepared to grovel. Not something she was at all accustomed to, but she knew she had to if she wanted any chance at salvaging the most important relationship in her life. After checking in at the front desk to inform the unwitting tenant of their visitor, she was granted access to the elevator that led to the penthouse.
When she stepped off of the elevator and onto the top floor, the only visible door swung open, and there stood her sister.
“What are you doing here?” Emile asked curtly. She still wasn’t over their debacle at the hospital, clearly.
“I fucked up,” Zooey admitted, hesitant to move any closer. “I’m sorry.”
“You fucked way up,” she corrected her. “So you better have a speech prepared, because I’m not letting you in here without some scene-from-a-movie shit that breaks my heart and physically forces me to allow you inside.”
“I don’t. There are no words that accurately express how sorry I am for being so stupid. For being so selfish. I forgot what was important, and I am so fucking sorry that I dared to not be there for you when you’ve always been there for me.” Her entire body clenched at the thought of what she’d done to her sister and her nephew. Emile was her best friend, but she treated her like a common stranger because she fell in like with another man. She hated herself for that.
“Why did you do this?” she had to know. “Why would you abandon me for some dude in a boyband?”
“I don’t fucking know! I lost my mind, I lost myself for a bit, but I would do anything to make it up to you, I swear to god, Em.”
“And what if you can’t?”
“I can.”
“What if there’s no turning back, though, Zooey?” She stepped into the hall and closed the door behind her so as not to disturb anything going on inside. “What if I said you ruined our relationship in one fell swoop and there’s nothing you can do to fix it?”
“I wouldn’t…” She began to tear up at the mere thought. “I wouldn’t believe you.”
“I told you if you walked out of that hospital, I wouldn’t forgive you.”
“I know. But you also said you would be the only one there for me when he went back to his wife.”
“So that’s why you here.” She scoffed at Zooey’s complete lack of self-awareness and turned to go back inside. “Go back to LA where you belong.”
“Emile, please!” she cried.
She opened the door to her condo and went inside, leaving Zooey to follow. “Get your dumb ass in here.”
She did as directed, timidly walking into the luxurious room while Em disappeared down a hallway. “I’ll just wait here then,” she said to herself, absolutely hating how distant she felt from the closest person to her.
It wasn’t long before Em returned, carrying her bundle of a baby boy. Smiling like she’d just discovered the secret to happiness, she approached her sister and handed him over. “This is Omari,” she was so proud to finally introduce him. “And we don’t know who he is or what he’s going to be… and that’s a fantastic thing.”
Carefully accepting her nephew into her arms, Zooey looked down at the light brown ball of beauty, studying his tiny eyes and nose and lips and fingers, and she smiled herself. “Hi, Omari. I’m your Aunt Zooey. And I’m so sorry that it took me so long to get here, but I’m honored to make your acquaintance.” She lifted his little blue hat to run her fingers through his curly black hair and she looked up to Emile. “He’s gorgeous.”
“He looks like me,” she agreed with a playful smug smile.
“You’re so modest!”
Her smile faded and she knew she needed to talk this out with her little sis. “Sit down,” she commanded, directing her towards the living room and its empty couch. Emile sat across from the two of them, watching her two best friends interact with one another. She had every intention of forgiving Zooey, even as much as it hurt to watch her walk away that day. But she knew that her sister was at a low, having fallen in love with someone who could never fully return the feelings. She knew it wouldn’t be easy once everything finally did break apart, and now, here they were. Hopefully, she thought, Omari could keep her spirits lifted. “So what happened?”
Zooey finally looked up from her nephew, oblivious. “What happened?”
“With Justin. What happened?”
“Oh… umm. I dunno, I guess we just figured it was for the best to go our separate ways.”
“You said he went back to Scarlett. What did he say to you? Was he an asshole about it?” Emile had specifically asked Justin to protect Zooey in all this, and if he didn’t, she was going to be pissed.
“Well, to be perfectly honest, I let him go.”
“You did.”
“Yeah. We, umm… we went to Mexico for a couple of days, to kind of get away from shit. And I don’t know what happened, really, or where the tables turned, but I realized that I was losing him. And I couldn’t bear the thought of drawing it out or making it any harder than it had to be, so I just told him I was over it. And… he left.”
“Just like that.”
“Just like that,” she recalled sadly.
“And how do you know he went back to Scarlett?”
“He told me. I saw them. She called me a whore,” she recounted from her disastrous night out in LA a few days prior. “And that was after revealing that she goes at home at night, to her husband, by the way, and she laughs at me. She also called me garbage.”
“Shut the fuck up,” Em replied in disbelief. “This happened in real life?”
“At a party for our movie, yeah.”
“That fucking bitch.”
“I deserved it,” she shrugged, sitting back into the couch to get comfortable. “And I called her out, don’t worry.”
“That doesn’t mean that my urge to knock her the fuck out will lessen.”
“Em, it’s fine. I’m just glad it’s all over.”
“No, you’re not.”
“I am. It was getting too painful, too messy.”
“You were happy, though,” Emile could tell.
“Until I wasn’t.”
She sighed and stared at her younger sibling for a long time, realizing that this person she tried so hard to protect for their entire lives was growing up. And there was nothing she could do anymore. She had someone else to watch over now, and Zooey would have to live her life for herself, no matter what bruises and bumps she encountered along the way.
“I’m proud of you, kid.”
“Me? Why?”
“Because you went for it. Knowing good and damn well you’d get your ass kicked, and you didn’t care. I respect the shit out of you for that.”
“Thanks, Em.”
“Do you regret it?”
“I regret that… I put myself in an avoidable situation. But I don’t regret a single moment of him and me,” she admitted as more tears came streaming down her face. “I can say I’ve been in love now.”
“It’s all it’s cracked up to be, isn’t it?”
“It is,” she sniffled.
“I heard he’s moving into this building.”
Zooey’s big sparkly green eyes almost popped out of her head. “WHO IS?”
“Justin. And Scarlett, I suppose. There have been rumblings that he was looking to sell his old place, he likes the security better here.”
“That’s a joke, right?”
Emile shook her head. “Something is drawing you two psychos together, apparently.”
“Oh my fucking god, no matter where I go, he always seems to follow!”
“Such is life, boo.”
“He had to know you and Kanye live here,” she concluded in her panic. “What a fucking stalker!”
Emile tried to keep the joke going for as long as possible, but she couldn’t contain her laughter anymore. “I’m fucking with you,” she finally inserted before Zooey could start to hyperventilate.
“You fucking trick ass whore!” she laughed with her, so relieved to have her sister back. “I missed you, Em.”
“I missed you too, bitch.”
Steadying her nephew in one hand, she wiped her face of any dampness she had left, smiling at the fact that her life had instantly returned to some form of normal with her sister back in it. And she knew she would eventually be okay with everything. “You’re the coolest chick I know, you know.”
“Yeah well… Yeezy taught me.”
____________________
“It’s so hard to look at you now,” Scarlett announced, walking into the bedroom behind her husband, who stood in his mirror, tying his tie. She wanted to gaze into his eyes, but just couldn’t bring herself to do it, so she stared at his moving fingers. “And now isn’t the time to have a fight, I’m aware, but I just need you to know. That I’m still hurting.”
He stopped what he was doing to look at her, stunned by what he saw. She was all dressed and ready to go, her glittery dark green dress making her eyes sparkle, makeup was simultaneously subtle and dramatic “ she was flawless as usual. “I know,” he nodded.
“I don’t want you to go tonight.”
“Scarlett.”
“I know I said I could handle it, but I was wrong. If you’re there, I’m gonna cry, and if I cry, people are gonna wonder what’s going on. And we already look suspicious enough as it is.”
“Won’t it look more suspicious if I’m not there? People already know I’ve been in the city the past few days.”
“Well I don’t care. It’s my night and I’d rather you not be there.”
“Scarlett, what if you win? Are you really saying you don’t want me to be there if you get your first Tony?”
“That’s what I’m saying,” she confirmed softly, turning to walk out of the door. “I will work on this with you, I promise, but it can’t be tonight.”
“Can I just be your friend then?” he called back before she could leave the room. “Just as part of your support system?”
“Justin…”
“I want to be there, Scar. I want to be there for you.”
“It’s not always about what you want.”
“Well I don’t believe that you really don’t want me there,” he maintained. “I know I’ve hurt you, I know that. I know that I fucked up, and I swear to god, there’s nothing I wouldn’t do to take this back, Tess. But I’m not giving up on you, and I’m not gonna let you give up on me. Life is about making running changes. You can’t stop to fix things, you have to mend the sail while you’re still at sea. So here I am, running and fixing shit. We made vows to one another, and yes, maybe I broke a couple, but I’m trying to find my way back. I’m trying to fight for you, I’m trying to be there when it hurts, so you have to do the same for me. You don’t have to forgive me right now, I know it’s gonna take time. But you’ve gotta let me start trying to fix this.”
She pursed her lips for a long time, obviously trying to come up with a response that would satisfy both of them. Truthfully, she wanted to want him there, but she wasn’t lying or exaggerating when she said that it hurt to look at him.
“Scarlett, it’s time to go!” they could both hear the sound of her mother, Melanie, calling from the front of their apartment.
“I gotta go,” she shrugged. “I’ll call you.”
Without another word, she rounded the corner to the hallway and headed towards the front, where her mom and her beauty team were getting ready to exit.
“You are perfect,” Melanie beamed, staring at her beautiful baby. “Love the dress, love the hair, love everything.”
“Thanks, mom,” she tried to smile, taking her clutch from her stylist. “Thank you.”
“You nervous?”
“Not really,” she shook her head slightly. “A little anxious, I guess, but I’m fine.”
“Yeah?”
“Yep.”
“Well all right. Where’s Justin?”
“He’s not--.”
“Right here,” Justin proclaimed, entering the room with his tie finally tied, a porkpie hat tilted over his curls, and stuffing his glasses into his pocket. “I’m ready.”
Scarlett’s expressionless face quickly turned to a frown as she watched him walk towards them. “Justin, I thought you weren’t coming.”
“I most certainly am coming,” he pretended as if he didn’t know what she was talking about. “What could I possibly have to do that’s more important than this?”
Melanie eyed them for just a moment, knowing they were in the midst of problems, but had made it very clear to Scarlett that she err on the side of saving her marriage. So anything she could do to help, she would. “Okay, kids, no time to discuss nonsense. Let’s go.”
“But”“
“No time,” she insisted, tapping her watch frantically. “Time to kiss and make up, all right?”
_______________
The night was going well, as far as anyone could tell. Scarlett felt a bit sullen, sure, but she could mask it with a strategically placed smile or glance in her husband’s direction. It wasn’t the first time she would have to fake something with him, most likely wouldn’t be the last, but she simply thought of it as an opportunity to hone her craft. She was an actor, after all, so as much as she hated it, she was able to find the wherewithal to put on a show for anyone watching.
But then, something happened. She wasn’t expecting it at all, and in fact, she hadn’t really been paying attention when it happened. Of course, she knew that her category was being announced, and she could see the camera in her face as her name was read along with the other nominees, but as Daniel Radcliffe and Katie Holmes stood at the front of the theater, opening the envelope, it took her more than a few seconds to realize that her name was written inside.
“And the Tony goes to… Scarlett Johansson, A View from the Bridge.”
And while she sat there, not really grasping that her name had been called, Justin watched her, not moving, and nudged her, trying to snap her out of her trance.
“Wow,” she said to herself, finally rising from her seat. Dazed, and somewhat confused, she didn’t stop to hug or kiss him, nor her mother, but headed straight for the stage to get her award.
“Is this real life?” she wondered with a sincerely stunned smile on her face. “My god. I… I honestly didn’t expect this. This is…” she paused for a bit, taking in the moment “ her moment “ and she began to cry. It had been an overwhelming half a year for her, and she wasn’t sure how to feel about it, with all the world watching. She was happy, of course, but she couldn’t help but wonder how much better all of this would have been if the love of her life hadn’t broken her heart. And while he sat there, beaming in pride for her, she still couldn’t bear to look at him. The rest of the audience, the rest of the world, sat there, gawking at her as she took all of it in, and they began to applaud. Tears continued to rush down her cheeks.
“I’m sorry, I’m just really astounded right now,” she croaked out, clutching her award. “I ummm… it’s been a really turbulent year for me. It’s been a rollercoaster. And as I stand before you, completely humbled, I feel… I can’t really even tell you how much this means to me. Thank you, thank you to the Tony voters. Thank you to my fellow cast mates, to the crew, thank you for inspiring me everyday. Thank you for pushing me to be better than I was the day before.
To my agents at CAA, thank you for having the foresight to see me in this. To say, while in the middle of shooting Iron Man 2, ‘Hey, why don’t you go do this play for a little while,’” she chuckled to herself. “What a rare thing.
Umm, to my mom. Thank you. For every. single. thing you do. Thank you for beating the pavement with me, day after day, year after year, and making my dreams your priority. Thank you for keeping all the most important doors open for me.
And umm, most importantly, I know I’m taking a lot of time here, but I have to get this out, because if I don’t, I’m not sure that I’ll ever say it. To my Tennessean, my husband. Justin… I love you,” she cried. As much as she’d tried to avoid showing all this emotion, it poured out of her. “I don’t understand a lot about the world, about life, a-a-about relationships or marriage, but I understand that you… you love me. And I know it’s been tough, me in New York, you in LA, we’ve been doing our own things since we got married, but… some things are necessary. Some things make you stronger. And we’ve made me stronger, and… I thank you. I vowed that no matter what, I would be there when you looked to your left, and I meant it. Every breath you take, man.”
“I love you,” he mouthed back to her, teary-eyed, knowing she couldn’t hear him.
"Hopefully, we'll be okay,” she pleaded with the future quietly, closing her eyes one more time in order to memorize the moment. “Umm, you are all witness to a little girl’s dreams coming true. To everyone, to anyone that helped me get here “ thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you.”
Removing his glasses to wipe his eyes, he stood to cheer for his wife. The love of his life. “We’ll be okay,” he repeated for himself.
____________________
A few months later…
After a long stint in New York City, escaping the confines of her shattered heart, Zooey returned to LA, hoping that her first night out in the City of Angels wouldn’t be as hellish as her last ordeal there.
She was dining with her new BFF and old colleague, Mindy, and for the first time in months, she felt a small dose of contentment that hadn’t been there before. And although they were supposed to head back to work the very next day, they made it a point to discuss anything but The Office.
“So,” Mindy began, once the conversation about wine with breakfast came to a standstill. “How many boys did you screw while you were in New York?”
Chuckling at her own answer before she said it out loud, Zooey revealed, “Honestly, not one.”
“For shame!”
“I know, right?” She took a big gulp from her glass of Merlot and nodded. “What a waste.”
“So much of a waste. Why was your hot ass not hooking up with sexies in the city?”
Zooey shrugged. “I wasn’t feeling hook-uppy, I suppose.” More of a deep depression, it was.
“Did you have a lot of sleepless nights, crying over Justin Timberlake?” she leaned in to whisper.
Yes. “Of course not! I was working.”
“That is not all you did, Zooey. Come on.”
“I spent time with my nephew,” she offered, not having much in the way of scandalous affairs anymore. “Who, by the way, is the cutest little person in the history of the world.”
“I’m about to start snoring!”
“Whataya want from me?” she shouted, in tune to the song of the same name. “It was a boring, self-discovery-existentialism-exploring-I’m-doing-me type of trip. It sucked.”
“So basically, you did Eat, Pray, Love in New York.”
“Pretty much. Although mine was more like Eat, Write, Cry.”
Mindy offered her warm smile, knowing that Zooey had certainly been through it over the past few months. “Do you regret it?”
“I don’t think I do,” she admitted after careful thought. “I regret that someone was hurt in the process, but… I feel like something was added to my life for a while. Something I never would have been able to get anywhere else.”
“Oh come on, like dudes aren’t knocking down your door.”
“That’s the thing, though. Sure, there are dudes that I can fuck with and have fun with for a while, but he felt… different. It felt like he ‘got’ me, from the minute we met,” she recalled wistfully. “And I am aware that I sound like a completely mindless teenager, but that’s what he did for me, Min. He made me say, ‘Fuck the world.’”
“And get a child out her.”
“Yeah, my life’s a bitch...”
“But you know nothin’ ‘bout her.”
Zooey smiled at the ease of their silly-slash-serious conversations but sighed woefully. “Where in god’s name am I gonna find another him?”
“You won’t,” Mindy prophesized bluntly. “But that doesn’t mean there’s not another somebody for you.”
“I miss him,” she confessed quietly. “So much.”
“You seem like a new person, Z. I’m not sure how I feel about that.”
And perhaps Mindy was right “ maybe she was a new person. And maybe her time in New York was exactly what she needed to recuperate from everything she’d put herself through. She needed to remove herself from the equation of Justin and Los Angeles for a bit, and just maybe she could find a way to get over him.
But then, as she headed for the front of the swanky restaurant, just wanting to take a quick cigarette break, there he was. Justin. He was just standing there, staring at the artwork adorning the lobby. He was holding a clutch, so she knew Scarlett must have been with him, and she found herself involuntarily gasping at the thought.
He left no time to regret
Kept his dick wet with his same old safe bet
There was something that seemed utterly inevitable about the moment. Not in any grand, destined sense “ just in the quiet stubborn way that unfinished business has of imposing its will on the unwilling.
Zooey wanted to be able to walk on by, as if she never saw him in the first place. But she did see him, and she wanted him to know that in spite of everything they’d been through, her thoughts of him didn’t waver. Planning to make a quick acknowledgement in passing, she proclaimed, “I wish you were waiting for me.”
Me and my head high, and my tears dry
Get on without my guy
Justin turned to the familiar voice, his eyes immediately brightening, as he was happily surprised to see Zooey standing there. “Wow, hey.”
“Hey. Good to see you.”
You went back to what you knew
So far removed from all that we went through
He watched as she continued toward the door, but he wasn’t ready for her to leave yet. “How are you?”
“Umm. I’m good,” she offered a half-shrug. “How about you?”
“Not bad,” he nodded thoughtfully. “Not bad. I haven’t seen you around lately, where’ve you been hiding?”
And I tread a troubled track, my odds are stacked
I go back to black
She smiled at the fact that he noticed. “Umm. I’ve been in New York for the past few months, actually.”
“Is that so? I never took you as the type to run away from anything.”
“No, I umm… I’ve been working on my first screenplay. It’s pretty awesome, to be honest. It’s a romcom about this woman with disastrously low self-confidence, but this unbelievably hot guy kind of pursues her and turns her life upside down. It’s gonna be called ‘The Low Self-Esteem of Lizzie Gillespie.’”
He eyed her for just a second too long, clearly wondering if this was some form of a biopic. Again, he asked, “Is that so?”
“Yeah,” she smirked. “But don’t worry, it’s not based on us.”
We only said goodbye with words
I died a hundred times
You go back to her, and I go back to us
“I didn’t think it was!”
“You did. But that’s fine,” she nudged him. “But yeah. Not to mention, Em is in New York, so I got to see my nephew a lot, hang out with them for a bit. It’s been fun.”
“New York is great,” he agreed. “We just got a new place in SoHo, I can’t wait until I can spend some time there again.”
“New York is great,” she repeated, distracted by the fact that Emile’s joke probably wasn’t a joke after all.
“So what brings you back to LA?” he shook her from her thoughts.
“Oh, umm… back to the grind.”
“Oh yeah, it’s Steve’s last season on The Office, huh?”
She nodded slowly, still saddened by the notion. “But hey, that’s life.”
And life is like a pipe
And I’m a tiny penny rolling up the walls inside
“That’s life,” he repeated softly, not even caring that Scarlett would probably be coming out of the restroom at any second. He had missed the woman in front of him so very much.
“Well… I should go. I was just heading out for a quick smoke.”
“Oh. Yeah,” he was knocked back into reality. “I guess… I’ll see you around.”
“You probably will,” she grinned sadly. He didn’t want her to leave, and she could tell, but their time was up for now. “Take care, okay?”
We only said goodbye with words
I died a hundred times
“Will do.” He wasn’t sure whether to offer a handshake or a hug or anything at all. He opted for an awkward pat on the back. “And I look forward to the day my agent gives me your script and says, ‘You must do this.’”
And then her smile brightened a little. “I look forward to the day my agent says, ‘Justin Timberlake is doing your movie.’”
“Later, Levin.”
Turning from him quickly as her eyes began to water, again, she had to come to terms with the fact that their story “ this beautiful story of true affection, true weakness, and true self-destruction “ had come to an end. The sad conclusion to their short-lived affair was that she had to choose between being able to live with herself or… being happy. Zooey chose to live with herself.
You go back to her
And I go back to black
End
Lyrics: “Back to Black” “ Amy Winehouse (Back to Black) [Rest In Peace, Amy]
End Notes:
Thank you so, so much for reading. You all have been so generous in your feedback and bearing with me through my inexcusable hiatuses. I can't thank you enough. I mean... a-mazing. Hope to see you on the next one!
Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters and settings are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. No money is being made from this work. No copyright infringement is intended.