“Oh, you mean this?” I laughed nervously, retrieving it by its edge, as though it were some foreign object I bore no attachment to. “Actually, why don’t you just keep it?” I said, holding my breath as she thrust it into her little blue bag and headed back up the aisle.
And the moment she was finally seated, I leaned against the beverage carts and sighed. A softer, friendlier supervisor? Doubtful. But clearly, she had her price.
I was standing in front of my closet, trying to pack for my bipolar three-day trip with long layovers in both Miami and Missoula (bikinis and cowboy boots, anyone?) when my cell phone rang.
“Hailey Lane, please,” said a deep, masculine voice I didn’t recognize.
“This is,” I said, tossing a bottle of sunscreen along with a pair of thick cotton socks into my bag.
“Hi. My name is Dane Richards. We were on the same flight recently.”
I held the phone away from my ear and stared at it, wondering what he could possibly want. Was this some sort of new Atlas Airlines customer-satisfaction initiative? Were the passengers actually calling us on our cells to complain about the crappy service?
“It seems you left some papers behind and they got mixed in with mine. We almost filed them in court today. Good thing you had your name and number on the front.”
“You have my manuscript?” I asked, relieved that it was no longer lost, yet horrified to think he might have read it.
“Should I messenger it to your I can have it there by five o’clock.”
“No, I’m going out of town,” I told him. “Could I maybe pick it up somewhere?”
“Can you get to midtown?” he asked, sounding distracted, as there were now several other voices in the background.
“Perfect. I’m catching a ride on Forty-second Street. Just give me the address and I’ll see you there.”
The second I hung up I tore into the cardboard box that housed my favorite non-Atlas approved accessories. If memory served me right, then Dane Richards was a total hottie. And since during the course of our brief conversation I’d specifically heard the words “court” and “midtown,” I knew I’d just been presented with an opportunity I couldn’t afford to ignore.
Even though there were no shortage of hotties in Manhattan, finding an age-appropriate, unmarried hottie with a good job was like getting a really great gift-with-purchase—they were only available while supplies lasted. Whereas finding an unmarried, age-appropriate hottie with a good job
who wasn’t afraid to commit
would be like locating the Holy Grail—we’ve all heard it exists, though we’ve yet to see it for ourselves.
Changing from my boring, Atlas-approved, fake pearl earrings to my favorite gold-and-emerald chandeliers I’d bought on a trip to Bombay, I released my hair from its usual headache-inducing French twist and let it fall loose and wild down my back. Then I folded over the waistband of my navy blue skirt, which hiked it up a good inch and a half, and slipped into a pair of nonapproved but supercute wedge-heel pumps. Then, looking in the mirror, I assessed my two-minute makeover from strict scary prison warden to style-conscious stewardess. And then I crossed my fingers, ran out the door, and hoped I wouldn’t run into Lawrence.
But by the time I was standing in front of Dane’s building, gazing up at all intimidating forty-four floors, I started to feel incredibly small and nervous. I mean, who was I kidding? Midtown was
teeming with all kinds of gorgeous, chic, professional, well-heeled women, and I was gonna try to impress someone with my poly cotton blouse, plastic wings, and flammable skirt?
Because even though the average American woman was supposedly five feet four and a size fourteen, here in Manhattan that statistic was more like five feet ten and a size two. And although I was currently one inch taller and several sizes smaller than the national average, in these parts I might as well be invisible.
I mean, in the movie version of my life, I would be played by Blossom the Powerpuff girl. And even though she might be adorable and feisty—with genuine, kick-ass, save-the-world abilities—she was still no match for all those long, languorous, Jessica Rabbit types that were currently cast opposite me in this cutthroat world of big-city dating.
Buttoning my blazer, I rode the elevator all the way to the eighteenth floor, lecturing myself the entire way for getting so excited about seeing this Dane guy, who probably wasn’t all that hot, was most certainly married, and in all likelihood was a big fat jerk. Because let’s face it, anyone who shows up at the last minute like that, expecting the entire plane to wait for
him
while recklessly bumping someone out of a first-class seat is obviously an entitled elitist who should be avoided at all costs. And I had so successfully convinced myself of this that by the time I reached his floor, I was determined to just grab my manuscript and get the hell out of there.
Standing in front of the shiny black quarter-moon-shaped desk, I struggled to get the attention of a receptionist with a rolling chair and a headset who for no apparent reason seemed dead set on ignoring me.
“Hi,” I said, waving at her as she quickly swiveled away while an endless stream of chatter drifted into her mouthpiece. “Uh, excuse me, but I’m sort of in a hurry, and I’m here to see Dane Richards? My name’s Hailey Lane?” I stood there lamely, with no way of telling if any of that had penetrated.
I watched as, with no sign of acknowledgment, she rolled her way back, punched on her keyboard, squinted at the computer screen, then reached into a cubby and retrieved a thick manila envelope with a big white label bearing the name HAILY LAIN.
I stared at it for a moment, feeling like the world’s biggest idiot for wearing my coolest shoes for someone who couldn’t even spell my name right. Then I crammed the envelope into my overstuffed bag and headed for the elevator.
And the second I was seated on the bus to JFK, I flipped through my manuscript, searching for coffee stains, fingerprints, DNA—any sort of clue that would show me Dane had been curious enough to at least glance through it. But the only pen markings and page creases I found were the ones I remembered making, which only proved that Mr. Dane Richards, Esq., wasn’t even curious enough about the first page to flip through to the last.
And since everyone knows how nosy lawyers are, it was pretty clear I’d just gotten my first bad review.
After surviving a five-hour flight to Missoula with two nearly empty beverage carts and just twenty-four sandwiches to feed 128 passengers, I was in the hotel gym, riding the recumbent bike and reading the latest issue of
Author!
magazine when my cell phone rang. Immersed in an article titled, “Bring Your Characters to Work!” I answered without checking the display.
“Hailey? Is that you?”
Oh great. It was my mom. I promptly dropped the magazine on the floor and settled in for what I knew would be a long, emotionally draining conversation.
“I have a surprise for you!” she squealed, sounding way too excited for my comfort.
“Yeah?” I said, already dreading whatever it might be.
“I’m coming to New York! To visit with you and Michael!”
“Oh . . . that’s . . . great,” I mumbled, staring at my reflection in
the mirrored wall, wondering how I could deter her. I mean, there was no way I could allow that to happen, since I hadn’t quite gotten around to telling her about Michael and me. I’d been hoping I could put it off for, I don’t know, a year? Maybe two? “Um, when were you thinking of coming?”
“Day after tomorrow!”
“Oh. Well. That really is a surprise,” I said, frantically brainstorming for one very good reason why this visit could never,
ever
happen. “How long were you planning on staying?”
“Two days, two nights,” she singsonged.
“But have you checked the flights? Because they’re really overselling them these days, so there’s a good chance you won’t even get on,” I warned. Just because my flight privileges extend to her didn’t mean there’d be a seat.
“I already checked, and it’s wide open. I get in at three, and I’ve even booked a room at the SoHo Grand. I didn’t want you to worry about putting me up.”
“You’re staying in SoHo?” I asked. I don’t know which was the bigger surprise, her visit or her room reservation. My mom’s always been the more conservative midtown hotel type, not the hip downtown boutique type.
“Yes, and I’ve made dinner reservations at Spice! I hear that’s the hot new place.”
First SoHo and now Spice. . . . Was she watching
Sex and the City
reruns on TBS?
“Well, it might just be me,” I warned. “Michael’s flying so much I hardly see him anymore.” I laughed nervously.
“Well that will just give us a chance to catch up then, won’t it? It’s been so long since your last visit. What has it been, a year? Year and a half? You know, for someone who flies for free, you really don’t make it home much, do you?”
I just sat there breathing in and out, determined to rise above that last little dig of hers. “Okay,” I said finally. “I get in at five
tomorrow. If you want to wait, we can ride into the city together.”
“That’s okay. I’ll just grab a cab and head to the hotel. We can meet there later.”
“Do you need me to put you on the standby list?” I asked.
“That would be great. And if you could list me for first class, I’d really appreciate it.”
By the time I’d made it to Broadway, I was resigned to the inevitable, knowing exactly how the evening would go. First, my mom would give me a quick once-over and say, “Oh, so
that’s
how you’re wearing your hair these days.” Then she’d smile politely and ask how I’ve been. And then, without any further ado, she’d plunge right into the whole point of her two-thousand-mile transcontinental journey. Touching me lightly on the arm, she’d lean toward me, and in the voice of a conspirator ask, “Have you two set a date yet?”
I shook my head and pushed through the Coke-bottle glass doors, heading straight for the noisy, packed bar and squinting in the dim light as I searched the crowd of after-work revelers, still not quite believing I’d really find her here among New York’s trendiest.
Then suddenly I was enveloped in a Gucci-clad hug while a cloud of Christian Dior Addict hung over my head. “Mom?” I asked tentatively, pulling away and scanning for just one familiar feature on the face of the woman who gave birth to me nearly three decades ago. “Are you in there?” I joked, knowing I was gaping, but unable to stop.
“What do you think?” she asked, smiling and twirling like a seasoned catwalker.
“You look so . . .
different,”
I said while taking in the formerly brunette bob that had somehow turned a sunny, buttery blond.
And the bright blue eyes that I could’ve sworn were once brown. Not to mention the shiny, full lips that used to be . . .
not quite so full.
“I had a few things done,” she whispered. “So?” She smiled, waiting for the verdict.
I continued to stare, taking in the creaseless, evenly pigmented skin and the abundant cleavage peeking out of her low-cut sweater. “Um, you look great. Really,” I said, secretly wondering if I’d missed a crucial episode of
The Swan.
“Well, I
feel
great. It’s like a new beginning! And I’ve got so much to tell you!” She smiled, exposing shiny new teeth. “But first, I want you to meet my friends.”
She led me over to the bar, where two dark-haired Wall Street types were waiting. “This is Mark,” she said, pointing to a guy in a charcoal suit and pink polka dot tie that he’d already loosened in some kind of after-hours, “let’s get this party started” rebellion. “And this is Daniel.” She motioned toward a slightly balding version of Mark.
“Hey.” I smiled, feeling like an awkward twelve-year-old, watching my makeover mom flirt with two men who were obviously much closer to my age demographic than hers.
“Can I get you a drink?” Mark asked.
“Um, what are you drinking?” I peered at my mom’s glass.
“I’m having an apple martini!” she said, sounding like she might already be on her second.
“Hmm, I think I’ll just have a glass of wine,” I said, sliding onto the stool between them.
“So, Cindy tells me you’re both from California.” Daniel smiled.
I glanced quickly at my mom, who was giving me a look I couldn’t quite read. And not knowing what was going on, though positive that
something
was, I answered as vaguely as possible. “Yup, born and raised in the OC.” I nodded.
“We were actually roommates for a number of years, but then
Hailey got a job with the airlines and flew away.” She took a sip of her drink and giggled fondly at this charming little nugget of revised history.
Roommates? Was she serious? I mean, I guess in a way it was true . . . but still. I shook my head, taking in her fluffy bleached hair, her prominently displayed cleavage, and the martini glass half full of tart fuel. . . .
Oh my God
—
my mom’s on the prowl!
I watched as she smiled flirtatiously, knowing there was no way I could go through with this. It was way too disturbing, and could quite possibly send me to therapy for the next twenty years. “Uh,
Cindy,
don’t we have dinner reservations?” I asked, tapping the face on the Cartier watch she’d given me when I started my freshman year of college, and then threatened to repossess when I dropped out two years later.