“Dash…” I protest.
“What? It worked like a charm last time. And if he doesn’t take the bait, well, you could do worse.” He grins, chocolate smeared all over his chin.
“Who could refuse an offer like that?” I laugh, grabbing a napkin and dabbing at his face. “But no thanks.”
Dash and Sophie look at me, not convinced.
“I mean it,” I say. “I’m through with games and plans, trying to snare him like some kind of animal. Besides, I’ve got a hot date with Netflix and next door’s cat. You two go to your fancy premiere. I’ll be just fine!”
***
We get down to work for the rest of the afternoon, until Sophie and Dash have to head out to get ready for the premiere. I drive home alone, enjoying the skyline of palm trees waving overhead and the green lush rise of the Hollywood Hills. My apartment is in a 1920s building just below the Sunset Strip. I moved in a month ago, and now I have a place to call my own on the third floor, with bare wooden floorboards, sun-drenched windows, and a fire escape out back for the tabby next door to come sneaking in in search of kibble.
I let myself in and check my phone for messages.
“Hey babe, our flight just landed,” Tegan’s voice comes excitedly in my voicemail. “We’re heading straight for the hotel, so, umm, we can get ready. But I’ll see you tomorrow for brunch, OK? Can’t wait to catch up!”
I feel a pang of guilt that she’s stuck in the middle here: it would be so much easier to turn the clock back to before New Year’s, when I could hang out with all the Callahans together and nobody felt weird about excluding me.
Except back then, I was the one keeping everything locked inside. I have to believe that it’s better now: I tried everything I could, I was true to myself, and if it didn’t work out…
Well, sometimes that happens.
Even with love.
I call to order some takeout, trying to forget the fact that Blake is back here in town. He’s probably already walking the red carpet, giving interviews and basking in the spotlight.
I wish I could be mad at him, maybe it would be easier that way. But instead, I feel proud. I know how hard he’s worked for this moment, and part of me wishes I could be there tonight to support him, despite everything.
There’s a noise from outside, coming from near the fire escape.
“Is that you, Ginger?” I call, expecting the tabby cat to be squeezing through the window. I grab a bowl and some kibble and cross the living room. “Here, kitty, kitty!”
But there’s no sign of her.
I lean out further, and that’s when the music starts. An old ’80s song I recognize from somewhere, playing in the alleyway below.
“Hello?”
I yank the window up and scramble onto the fire escape. I look down into the alley, and I swear, my heart stops right there in my chest.
It’s Blake.
He’s standing beneath my window in a tux, with an old-fashioned boom-box held up over his head. And then I realize what the music is: “In Your Eyes” from that old movie Say Anything.
He’s copying the scene for me right now, where John Cusack’s character waits under her bedroom window, blasting this same song to tell his love how he feels.
My heart races. Our eyes lock. “What are you doing here?” I call down, my head spinning. Damn, he looks good, even better than my dreams, if it was possible. I fight to keep it together, battling the whirlwind of emotions raging in my heart. “Blake, you’re supposed to be at the premiere now. Everyone will be waiting for you!”
“Let them wait,” Blake calls back. “I had to see you, Zoey. I have to show you how I feel.”
He turns the volume up and holds the boombox high. “I remember, you watched this movie a dozen times,” he yells over the song blasting. “You said you always wanted someone to love you like that. Well, I do, Zoey. I’m here because I can’t do this without you. It doesn’t mean anything without you by my side.”
Someone yanks their window up a couple of floors above me. “Will you shut that noise off!” an angry yell echoes.
“Blake, please—”
“Not until you talk to me,” he insists, turning the music even louder. “I’ll stand here all night, if that’s what it takes!”
He smiles up at me, that movie star grin, and he’s right: this is like a scene from a movie. The moment when the hero comes to my window, and promises that everything’s going to be OK.
Except this is real life, right here. I’m not sitting in the back row eating popcorn, there’s no director standing just out of sight. And big romantic gestures aren’t what my dreams are made of anymore: I know now that real love is something far deeper and more precious than saying the right line at the right time; all the costumes and lighting in the world can’t build me something solid, something real.
My heart aches. He still doesn’t understand.
I grab my keys and scramble down the fire escape ladder until I reach the alleyway below. I’m hit all over again with the sheer force of his presence. Blake, right in front of me, flesh and blood and a body I know by heart.
I have to fight to keep from reaching for him, but I take a breath of air. “Forget about your props and soundtrack,” I tell him, sounding calmer than I feel. “I don’t need any of this. I just need you to be real with me.”
He shuts off the music and slowly sets the boombox down. The charming grin fades, and in its place, a nervous smile. Our eyes meet, and God, I can feel the emotion igniting between us, a force almost too much to control.