COSMOPOLITAN
MEL
Completely confused by Jason's actions, mixed with her understanding of how rushed the entertainment industry could make your life, Mel decided to give her dress a rest. She had just carefully put it back in its bag and hung it in the closet when her phone rang.
"Hey, you busy?" Nikki asked.
"Not at the moment. Are you looking for Ike? He's not with me."
"No. I called to talk to you."
"Well, good, I'm glad you called. I want to tell you something, but don't get mad, okay?"
"Whatever it is, it can wait," Nikki said. Her tone didn't contain its normal, pleasant ring, which caused mild alarm to rise in Mel. "I got my Cosmo subscription in the mail today."
Mel laughed. "Nikki, I think what I have to tell you is a little more important than Cosmo."
"No. You don't understand. This month's cover girl is none other than a scantily-clad, flaming-haired Drew--and her cover article is just as revealing."
Mel was used to seeing Drew in magazines, so this didn't phase her much at all. The fact that Nikki felt the need to talk about it is what made Mel curious. "Well, what's in the article?"
"It's not pretty. You need to go and find the article and call me back. And, please...remember it's a magazine and things can be taken out of context."
Mel wasted no time leaving her apartment and hailing a cab to her favorite magazine stand downtown. She could have just as easily gotten a copy of Cosmo close to her condo, but she liked Barney, the guy who ran the stand.
Mel had exchanged a few words with Barney's familiar face before making her purchase. On the cover, Drew
had a smile plastered across her face. Mel couldn't help but feel sick. However, before she could crack open the pages, a voice said beside her, "Cosmopolitan, huh?"
Startled, she looked up into the blue eyes of a sandy-haired man smiling at her. He was clean-cut in a long, collared coat and scarf. "Uh, yeah..." she answered.
"So, Melody Banks, right?"
Mel eyed the guy suspiciously. "Yes...and you are?"
"Wow, you are a hard woman to track down, you know that?" He held out his hand. "Sean Wills, Maxim
Magazine."
Reluctantly, Mel shook his hand, never taking her suspicious eyes off of him. "Maxim Magazine? How did you find me here? Are you--are you stalking me?"
Sean laughed sheepishly. "No, no. Absolutely not. This was completely coincidence that has apparently worked out in my favor. Actually, we've been trying to reach you for several weeks, to no avail. I'm not sure if we have your contact information wrong or something, but we were about to just give up hope and then here you are! Boy, am I relieved!"
"Why the hell is Maxim looking for ME? If you're needing me to answer questions about Andrew Brooks or
something, you're barking up the wrong tree."
"Andrew Brooks? No, we're interested in YOU." He fished out a business card and offered it to her. "We were hoping you would be in an upcoming issue. We're doing a special: Babes We Wish Were More Famous, But Aren't. Anyway, your name came up, we looked you up, and we want you in the spread."
"You're crazy if you think I'm gonna pose for Maxim. I might as well hold out for Hugh Hefner."
Sean was genuinely amused. "I had a feeling you would be difficult to convince. Your reputation becomes you--"
"WHAT reputation?"
"That wasn't meant to be negative. It's no secret that you're straight-forward, no holds barred. It's what gets things done and makes you high in demand. Men find that very sexy. It's perfect for our magazine."
"It's smut."
"It's exposure."
"It's bullshit."
"It's exactly like your Cosmopolitan there, only geared toward men."
Mel glanced down at the magazine in her hand and curled up her lip. Sean Wills had a point. She glanced up at him. "I'm high in demand?"
"You seem to be popping up in conjunction with more and more public events nationwide lately, is that correct?"
"Business is picking up some, yes..."
"Well there's obviously a reason for it. Look, people are interested in you and you don't even know it. And I haven't even started talking about you physically yet. It will be tasteful. You can customize the contract to your needs and demands. We're very easy to get along with. Anyway, we're on our last leg with this issue and we need a decision. Just think about it and get back to me in the next day or so. Okay?"
Hesitantly she took the business card from his hand and shoved it in her purse. As he walked away, she thought about it. She didn't want to show it to him, but she was extremely flattered at the offer. She had never been approached by a high-profile magazine before. She had hoped that her first magazine would be the likes of Vogue or Vanity Fair, but she supposed she could only dream.
Glancing back at Barney, he smiled at her, holding out the latest issue of Maxim. She got the hint and paid for it, shoving the men's periodical in her purse.
Back to the issue at hand, no pun intended, she opened the pages of the Cosmopolitan she was still holding,
straight to the Andrew Brooks feature article and began to read, right there in the street.
____________________________________
COSMOPOLITAN
"Andrew Brooks: The Action Superstar We Never Saw Coming"
"Andrew Brooks was virtually unknown two years ago, only acting in off-Broadway productions and
barely-noticeable bit parts in television sitcoms. But one movie changed her entire world and turned her into an icon for women everywhere. This month, Cosmo celebrates the fiery badass beauty and dares to get under her skin."
Mel skimmed the article quickly. She wasn't seeing was Nikki had seen apparently. It profiled Drew's Tulsa roots, her New York life...she lied about her mother, that was for sure. In real life, Drew's mother was barely ever around. In Cosmo, her mother was her best friend. Please.
Mel skimmed until she got to the last section, "The People Who Love Her (And We Don't Mean All Of
America)" It started out, name-dropping Zac, Taylor, and Isaac, naturally, but things got interesting when her own name came up.
"Andrew was an only child, but she didn't grow up without siblings. Her old best friend, Melody Banks,
stuck by her, her entire life. 'If it weren't for her, I don't think I'd be the person I am today. I wish she was around more now, but things between us became strained when Jason Kamealoha came into the picture. I
never understood why, seeing how she was so smitten with her old flame, Zac's brother, Taylor (Melody is now engaged to be married to the MMMBop singer), but she never could handle it when Jason became interested in me.'
Andrew is referring, of course, to the first movie she ever filmed with then-unknown and now-mega-superhunk Jason Kamealoha. 'Jason and I had chemistry, there's no mistake in that. I think that's why the movie did so well in the box office. I don't tell a lot of people this, but behind-the-scenes and late night delirium can get really interesting in one's trailer.' She laughs, not divulging any more details but we could only imagine what she's getting at. As we're envious of her on-set romps, we ask her about her husband, world-renowned director, Gerard Cline. 'Everything changed when I married Gerard. He's the love of my life. Jason still calls me but I always remind him, I only have eyes for my husband."
Mel's blood boiled on levels she never thought it could. Ripping the pages of the article out of the magazine, she threw it away in the trash can and stormed in the direction of Jason's nearby hotel. If he wasn't in his room, there would be hell to pay somewhere in the middle of New York City.
--------------------------------------------------
MEL
After threatening World War Three with the receptionist at the front desk, Mel banged violently on Jason's
hotel room door with the side of her fist.
Jason swung the door open, his face the picture of annoyance. "Mel, what are you doing here?"
She shoved the wrinkled up pages into his chest as he barely caught them. "You LIED to me! You sat in front of me and bold-face LIED to me! I don't give a shit what you do in your personal life, but you are the LAST person I would ever think I couldn't trust!"
"You've fucking lost your mind, woman, do you know that? Get the hell in this room and stop screaming in
the middle of the hallway."
She shoved her way in past him and he closed the door, trying to make sense of the wrinkled magazine pages he now had in his hands. She didn't give him the chance to read it before she started up again. "It's all right there. All of it! In black and white! I see it now, it all makes sense! My best friend won't talk to me because she obviously doesn't know how to break the news to me that YOU are trying to get in her pants. She KNOWS what you mean to me! She KNOWS!"
He read over them swiftly, turning the pages over and over in his hands. Finally having enough of them, he wadded them tightly in his large fist. "This is a crock of shit, Mel! Every single bit of it! Everything in here is a fucking lie! I've never once even LOOKED at her twice! I could sue her for slander, and so should you!"
"Oh, yeah, right. Smooth it over with legal terms. It still doesn't change what's written right there in front of my face!"
"You're fucking blind as a bat! How can you be so BLIND? And besides, in the long run, what would it matter whether I slept with her or not? Which I DIDN'T--but even if I had! I have no obligations to you, Mel. NONE,
whatsoever! YOU made sure of THAT!" He advanced several steps toward her, throwing the wadded paper aside, not caring where it landed. "You know what I think your problem is, Mel? Honestly? I think, true or
not, you're scared because it could be HER and not YOU!"
Mel took a step backward, her heart pounding. How had she lost control of this confrontation so quickly? Quietly, she tested the waters. "I think that's how you WANT me to feel."
His eyes darkened and he advanced toward her once more. "Did it ever occur to you that maybe the reason Drew stopped talking to you is because she knew THAT article was coming out? That she KNEW that crock of shit would be seen by all of us and now she's in fucking hiding?"
Mel shook her head in disbelief. "No. Drew would never do that to me...Gerard, he's--he's your FRIEND. How could you do that to your friend, Jason?"
"Goddammit, Mel, I'm not sleeping with her! I never did! And if I was ever going to scam on any of my friends' women, it would be Taylor's!"
Mel's breath caught in her throat. She knew she lived in denial and she liked it there. She was completely happy being an emotional agoraphobe. She was losing control of her relationships, it seemed, platonic and not, and it scared her. Something nagged at her, even as she knocked on Jason's door, but she did it anyway. And now here she was, stuck in exactly the place she didn't want to be.
"I don't think I can do this," Jason continued, his voice defeated. "I just--seeing you in that dress today, it--it really fucked with me. Bad. I don't think I'm as prepared to process this as I thought I was. I want to be there for you, but--"
"So why do you stay?" Mel whispered meekly.
"Because I can't stay away."
"It's unfair..."
"It doesn't matter what's fair. I've tried to stay away since day one. So I--you're my best friend and I can't lose you. So I cope. I deal with it. And maybe deep down I wish that someday--"
"I love him...Jason...I love him..."
Mel didn't realize he was in an arm's length of her until he gripped her tightly by her hips and pulled her up against him. Her heart pounded against his torso and her hands gripped his forearms as a reflex. She stared up at him, a deer in headlights, too afraid to move or even speak. He stared back down at her, his green eyes piercing hers. He pulled her even tighter for a moment before he said quietly, "You need to leave. Right now. You need to leave before I do something you're going to regret. Just know that I stay because I choose to, not to be a burden on you."
"You've never been a burden."
"You should go."
In a blur, Mel left Jason's hotel room and made her way down the hallway. She felt like the world's most horrible person and she had absolutely no idea what to do about it.
Once the winter air hit her face as she walked out of the hotel, she called Isaac. "Are you still in the city? Let's go get a drink. I need one, desperately."
-------------------------------
Mel didn't care where they went. Anything was good for her. So when Isaac suggested they meet at the bar he liked to go to when he came to the city, she didn't object.
They sat at the bar, her with her wine and him with his Makers Mark and cigar. She didn't dare tell him about the exchange with Jason in his hotel room. She did, however, discuss the Cosmo article. "I know," Ike said. "Nikki told me all about it. Read it to me, actually. Word for word."
"I guess that's it," Mel said. "I mean, she obviously wanted to end our friendship anyway. Why would she say all those things if she didn't?"
"I wish I had some insight for you on that. I mean, in my opinion, if someone's gonna publicly blast you like that, there's no reason to keep them around. You know?"
"But, Ike, she's a major star now. Do you know what people probably think right now? About me and Tay and Jason and...oh god." Mel couldn't finish her drink fast enough.
"Shit like this happens. Unfortunately there's nothing you can really do about it. The only advice I can give you is to issue a statement and move on. People are going to believe what they're going to believe. As long as the parties involved know the truth, that's really all that matters." Ike then fished his cell phone out of his pocket. "I bet I know how to cheer you up."
"Good luck with that," Mel responded sarcastically as she ordered another round.
"Seriously. Check this out." He handed his phone to her. "While you were trying on your dress today, I was looking up info on your apartment building because the architecture fascinates me. As I was looking, I came across this."
Taking the phone from his hand, she looked at the picture on the screen. "Wow..." she whispered.
"It's pretty great, huh?" Ike smiled. "I mean, I don't know how big or small you want your wedding to be or anything, or even if you've considered a location wedding, but I saw this and immediately thought about you and Tay. I got a visual right away."
She was looking at pictures of The Corinthian in Houston, Texas. According to their website, they were
located in the first two floors of an office building and the internal architecture was absolutely gorgeous. Mel fell in love at first sight with the picture. The high ceilings, hardwood floors, double staircases and overhead balcony were perfect. The oversized columns holding up the balcony created a perfect aisle right down the middle. Mel looked at the pictures, seeing her wedding immediately.
She looked at Ike and smiled. "You think it's too short notice now to try to book them for October?"
Ike chuckled. "You think you wanna run it by Tay first?"
She smiled down at Ike's phone once more. "He'll think it's perfect." Then she looked back at him. "Ike! I have my dress. If I get this venue, the rest of it will be a piece of cake! I can't believe how this is turning out!" She hugged him excitedly. "God. Do you know how much has been lifted off my shoulders just in these past couple of days? I should come to the city more often!"
"Well, I'm hoping you do, if you're gonna oversee the 3CG office here."
Mel handed his phone back to him. "You want ME to oversee it?"
"Sure. Makes sense. You love it here, you have a condo here. Who better to run the place than you? I mean, there'll be an office manager and such, of course, you'd only have to fly in maybe once or twice a month. But what do you say?"
She held up her glass to toast him. "I say I am honored and I will gladly take you up on the offer." After taking a sip, she asked, "How do you think Tay will feel about it?"
Ike winked at her. "It was his idea."
Mel wasn't so sure how she felt about that all of a sudden. What she did know, though, was that she and
Taylor had much to talk about when she got home.
MEL
Completely confused by Jason's actions, mixed with her understanding of how rushed the entertainment industry could make your life, Mel decided to give her dress a rest. She had just carefully put it back in its bag and hung it in the closet when her phone rang.
"Hey, you busy?" Nikki asked.
"Not at the moment. Are you looking for Ike? He's not with me."
"No. I called to talk to you."
"Well, good, I'm glad you called. I want to tell you something, but don't get mad, okay?"
"Whatever it is, it can wait," Nikki said. Her tone didn't contain its normal, pleasant ring, which caused mild alarm to rise in Mel. "I got my Cosmo subscription in the mail today."
Mel laughed. "Nikki, I think what I have to tell you is a little more important than Cosmo."
"No. You don't understand. This month's cover girl is none other than a scantily-clad, flaming-haired Drew--and her cover article is just as revealing."
Mel was used to seeing Drew in magazines, so this didn't phase her much at all. The fact that Nikki felt the need to talk about it is what made Mel curious. "Well, what's in the article?"
"It's not pretty. You need to go and find the article and call me back. And, please...remember it's a magazine and things can be taken out of context."
Mel wasted no time leaving her apartment and hailing a cab to her favorite magazine stand downtown. She could have just as easily gotten a copy of Cosmo close to her condo, but she liked Barney, the guy who ran the stand.
Mel had exchanged a few words with Barney's familiar face before making her purchase. On the cover, Drew
had a smile plastered across her face. Mel couldn't help but feel sick. However, before she could crack open the pages, a voice said beside her, "Cosmopolitan, huh?"
Startled, she looked up into the blue eyes of a sandy-haired man smiling at her. He was clean-cut in a long, collared coat and scarf. "Uh, yeah..." she answered.
"So, Melody Banks, right?"
Mel eyed the guy suspiciously. "Yes...and you are?"
"Wow, you are a hard woman to track down, you know that?" He held out his hand. "Sean Wills, Maxim
Magazine."
Reluctantly, Mel shook his hand, never taking her suspicious eyes off of him. "Maxim Magazine? How did you find me here? Are you--are you stalking me?"
Sean laughed sheepishly. "No, no. Absolutely not. This was completely coincidence that has apparently worked out in my favor. Actually, we've been trying to reach you for several weeks, to no avail. I'm not sure if we have your contact information wrong or something, but we were about to just give up hope and then here you are! Boy, am I relieved!"
"Why the hell is Maxim looking for ME? If you're needing me to answer questions about Andrew Brooks or
something, you're barking up the wrong tree."
"Andrew Brooks? No, we're interested in YOU." He fished out a business card and offered it to her. "We were hoping you would be in an upcoming issue. We're doing a special: Babes We Wish Were More Famous, But Aren't. Anyway, your name came up, we looked you up, and we want you in the spread."
"You're crazy if you think I'm gonna pose for Maxim. I might as well hold out for Hugh Hefner."
Sean was genuinely amused. "I had a feeling you would be difficult to convince. Your reputation becomes you--"
"WHAT reputation?"
"That wasn't meant to be negative. It's no secret that you're straight-forward, no holds barred. It's what gets things done and makes you high in demand. Men find that very sexy. It's perfect for our magazine."
"It's smut."
"It's exposure."
"It's bullshit."
"It's exactly like your Cosmopolitan there, only geared toward men."
Mel glanced down at the magazine in her hand and curled up her lip. Sean Wills had a point. She glanced up at him. "I'm high in demand?"
"You seem to be popping up in conjunction with more and more public events nationwide lately, is that correct?"
"Business is picking up some, yes..."
"Well there's obviously a reason for it. Look, people are interested in you and you don't even know it. And I haven't even started talking about you physically yet. It will be tasteful. You can customize the contract to your needs and demands. We're very easy to get along with. Anyway, we're on our last leg with this issue and we need a decision. Just think about it and get back to me in the next day or so. Okay?"
Hesitantly she took the business card from his hand and shoved it in her purse. As he walked away, she thought about it. She didn't want to show it to him, but she was extremely flattered at the offer. She had never been approached by a high-profile magazine before. She had hoped that her first magazine would be the likes of Vogue or Vanity Fair, but she supposed she could only dream.
Glancing back at Barney, he smiled at her, holding out the latest issue of Maxim. She got the hint and paid for it, shoving the men's periodical in her purse.
Back to the issue at hand, no pun intended, she opened the pages of the Cosmopolitan she was still holding,
straight to the Andrew Brooks feature article and began to read, right there in the street.
____________________________________
COSMOPOLITAN
"Andrew Brooks: The Action Superstar We Never Saw Coming"
"Andrew Brooks was virtually unknown two years ago, only acting in off-Broadway productions and
barely-noticeable bit parts in television sitcoms. But one movie changed her entire world and turned her into an icon for women everywhere. This month, Cosmo celebrates the fiery badass beauty and dares to get under her skin."
Mel skimmed the article quickly. She wasn't seeing was Nikki had seen apparently. It profiled Drew's Tulsa roots, her New York life...she lied about her mother, that was for sure. In real life, Drew's mother was barely ever around. In Cosmo, her mother was her best friend. Please.
Mel skimmed until she got to the last section, "The People Who Love Her (And We Don't Mean All Of
America)" It started out, name-dropping Zac, Taylor, and Isaac, naturally, but things got interesting when her own name came up.
"Andrew was an only child, but she didn't grow up without siblings. Her old best friend, Melody Banks,
stuck by her, her entire life. 'If it weren't for her, I don't think I'd be the person I am today. I wish she was around more now, but things between us became strained when Jason Kamealoha came into the picture. I
never understood why, seeing how she was so smitten with her old flame, Zac's brother, Taylor (Melody is now engaged to be married to the MMMBop singer), but she never could handle it when Jason became interested in me.'
Andrew is referring, of course, to the first movie she ever filmed with then-unknown and now-mega-superhunk Jason Kamealoha. 'Jason and I had chemistry, there's no mistake in that. I think that's why the movie did so well in the box office. I don't tell a lot of people this, but behind-the-scenes and late night delirium can get really interesting in one's trailer.' She laughs, not divulging any more details but we could only imagine what she's getting at. As we're envious of her on-set romps, we ask her about her husband, world-renowned director, Gerard Cline. 'Everything changed when I married Gerard. He's the love of my life. Jason still calls me but I always remind him, I only have eyes for my husband."
Mel's blood boiled on levels she never thought it could. Ripping the pages of the article out of the magazine, she threw it away in the trash can and stormed in the direction of Jason's nearby hotel. If he wasn't in his room, there would be hell to pay somewhere in the middle of New York City.
--------------------------------------------------
MEL
After threatening World War Three with the receptionist at the front desk, Mel banged violently on Jason's
hotel room door with the side of her fist.
Jason swung the door open, his face the picture of annoyance. "Mel, what are you doing here?"
She shoved the wrinkled up pages into his chest as he barely caught them. "You LIED to me! You sat in front of me and bold-face LIED to me! I don't give a shit what you do in your personal life, but you are the LAST person I would ever think I couldn't trust!"
"You've fucking lost your mind, woman, do you know that? Get the hell in this room and stop screaming in
the middle of the hallway."
She shoved her way in past him and he closed the door, trying to make sense of the wrinkled magazine pages he now had in his hands. She didn't give him the chance to read it before she started up again. "It's all right there. All of it! In black and white! I see it now, it all makes sense! My best friend won't talk to me because she obviously doesn't know how to break the news to me that YOU are trying to get in her pants. She KNOWS what you mean to me! She KNOWS!"
He read over them swiftly, turning the pages over and over in his hands. Finally having enough of them, he wadded them tightly in his large fist. "This is a crock of shit, Mel! Every single bit of it! Everything in here is a fucking lie! I've never once even LOOKED at her twice! I could sue her for slander, and so should you!"
"Oh, yeah, right. Smooth it over with legal terms. It still doesn't change what's written right there in front of my face!"
"You're fucking blind as a bat! How can you be so BLIND? And besides, in the long run, what would it matter whether I slept with her or not? Which I DIDN'T--but even if I had! I have no obligations to you, Mel. NONE,
whatsoever! YOU made sure of THAT!" He advanced several steps toward her, throwing the wadded paper aside, not caring where it landed. "You know what I think your problem is, Mel? Honestly? I think, true or
not, you're scared because it could be HER and not YOU!"
Mel took a step backward, her heart pounding. How had she lost control of this confrontation so quickly? Quietly, she tested the waters. "I think that's how you WANT me to feel."
His eyes darkened and he advanced toward her once more. "Did it ever occur to you that maybe the reason Drew stopped talking to you is because she knew THAT article was coming out? That she KNEW that crock of shit would be seen by all of us and now she's in fucking hiding?"
Mel shook her head in disbelief. "No. Drew would never do that to me...Gerard, he's--he's your FRIEND. How could you do that to your friend, Jason?"
"Goddammit, Mel, I'm not sleeping with her! I never did! And if I was ever going to scam on any of my friends' women, it would be Taylor's!"
Mel's breath caught in her throat. She knew she lived in denial and she liked it there. She was completely happy being an emotional agoraphobe. She was losing control of her relationships, it seemed, platonic and not, and it scared her. Something nagged at her, even as she knocked on Jason's door, but she did it anyway. And now here she was, stuck in exactly the place she didn't want to be.
"I don't think I can do this," Jason continued, his voice defeated. "I just--seeing you in that dress today, it--it really fucked with me. Bad. I don't think I'm as prepared to process this as I thought I was. I want to be there for you, but--"
"So why do you stay?" Mel whispered meekly.
"Because I can't stay away."
"It's unfair..."
"It doesn't matter what's fair. I've tried to stay away since day one. So I--you're my best friend and I can't lose you. So I cope. I deal with it. And maybe deep down I wish that someday--"
"I love him...Jason...I love him..."
Mel didn't realize he was in an arm's length of her until he gripped her tightly by her hips and pulled her up against him. Her heart pounded against his torso and her hands gripped his forearms as a reflex. She stared up at him, a deer in headlights, too afraid to move or even speak. He stared back down at her, his green eyes piercing hers. He pulled her even tighter for a moment before he said quietly, "You need to leave. Right now. You need to leave before I do something you're going to regret. Just know that I stay because I choose to, not to be a burden on you."
"You've never been a burden."
"You should go."
In a blur, Mel left Jason's hotel room and made her way down the hallway. She felt like the world's most horrible person and she had absolutely no idea what to do about it.
Once the winter air hit her face as she walked out of the hotel, she called Isaac. "Are you still in the city? Let's go get a drink. I need one, desperately."
-------------------------------
Mel didn't care where they went. Anything was good for her. So when Isaac suggested they meet at the bar he liked to go to when he came to the city, she didn't object.
They sat at the bar, her with her wine and him with his Makers Mark and cigar. She didn't dare tell him about the exchange with Jason in his hotel room. She did, however, discuss the Cosmo article. "I know," Ike said. "Nikki told me all about it. Read it to me, actually. Word for word."
"I guess that's it," Mel said. "I mean, she obviously wanted to end our friendship anyway. Why would she say all those things if she didn't?"
"I wish I had some insight for you on that. I mean, in my opinion, if someone's gonna publicly blast you like that, there's no reason to keep them around. You know?"
"But, Ike, she's a major star now. Do you know what people probably think right now? About me and Tay and Jason and...oh god." Mel couldn't finish her drink fast enough.
"Shit like this happens. Unfortunately there's nothing you can really do about it. The only advice I can give you is to issue a statement and move on. People are going to believe what they're going to believe. As long as the parties involved know the truth, that's really all that matters." Ike then fished his cell phone out of his pocket. "I bet I know how to cheer you up."
"Good luck with that," Mel responded sarcastically as she ordered another round.
"Seriously. Check this out." He handed his phone to her. "While you were trying on your dress today, I was looking up info on your apartment building because the architecture fascinates me. As I was looking, I came across this."
Taking the phone from his hand, she looked at the picture on the screen. "Wow..." she whispered.
"It's pretty great, huh?" Ike smiled. "I mean, I don't know how big or small you want your wedding to be or anything, or even if you've considered a location wedding, but I saw this and immediately thought about you and Tay. I got a visual right away."
She was looking at pictures of The Corinthian in Houston, Texas. According to their website, they were
located in the first two floors of an office building and the internal architecture was absolutely gorgeous. Mel fell in love at first sight with the picture. The high ceilings, hardwood floors, double staircases and overhead balcony were perfect. The oversized columns holding up the balcony created a perfect aisle right down the middle. Mel looked at the pictures, seeing her wedding immediately.
She looked at Ike and smiled. "You think it's too short notice now to try to book them for October?"
Ike chuckled. "You think you wanna run it by Tay first?"
She smiled down at Ike's phone once more. "He'll think it's perfect." Then she looked back at him. "Ike! I have my dress. If I get this venue, the rest of it will be a piece of cake! I can't believe how this is turning out!" She hugged him excitedly. "God. Do you know how much has been lifted off my shoulders just in these past couple of days? I should come to the city more often!"
"Well, I'm hoping you do, if you're gonna oversee the 3CG office here."
Mel handed his phone back to him. "You want ME to oversee it?"
"Sure. Makes sense. You love it here, you have a condo here. Who better to run the place than you? I mean, there'll be an office manager and such, of course, you'd only have to fly in maybe once or twice a month. But what do you say?"
She held up her glass to toast him. "I say I am honored and I will gladly take you up on the offer." After taking a sip, she asked, "How do you think Tay will feel about it?"
Ike winked at her. "It was his idea."
Mel wasn't so sure how she felt about that all of a sudden. What she did know, though, was that she and
Taylor had much to talk about when she got home.