"The 'Bu"

I finished another chapter in Bianca Reagan: Where the Action Is! Six more to go! An excerpt from Ch. 17:

“I have to put my whole hand in the scanner? I thought it was a fingerprint.”

“New company policy. Sign here please.”

“Which of the many forms is this?”

“It releases the company, the testing center, and the test administrators from liability for any injuries you may incur while at the facility. This includes, but is not limited to, falls, sprains, broken bones, eyestrain, seizures, cancer, and/or death, and you are present in the facility and are taking the exam of your own free will.”

I looked at the form. “To apply to business school, I am required to take and pass this four-hour-long exam. It is only administered on flickering computer screens instead of in paper form. And, at 25 miles away, this is the closest facility to my home. To enter and exit the exam room, I have to repeatedly place my hand on a radioactive machine. So yes. I am exposing my body to eyestrain, highway collisions, and cancer by my own free will.” I signed the papers and handed them back to the administrator.

“This way, please.”

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"Luv U, Baby Girl"

I finished another chapter in Bianca Reagan: Where the Action Is! Seven more to go! An excerpt from Ch. 06:

Jenny adjusted each person’s spacing. “Let’s do it!”

We heard the intro of the song. The synthesized melody crept over the background drum machine. Then came the lyrics. Maggie’s part was first.

“I will never break your heart
I promise from the start
Baby girl”

Her moment in the imaginary spotlight was halted by the ringing of my desk phone.

“Who is interrupting the magic?” Maggie demanded.

I picked up the receiver.

“It’s your mother,” I told Stacey. She took the call at my desk.

“She hasn’t moved out of Stacey’s house yet,” Maggie whispered.

The Intern shook his head. “That’s rough.”

Stacey busied her right hand by clicking her retractable pen. “Mami, I am having a very important business discussion . . . Si, that is ‘Luv U, Baby Girl’ . . . How do you know about Five Guys? . . . No, I don’t think that would . . . Why do you want . . . Fine, Mami, fine.” She switched her mother to the speakerphone.

“Hello, Stacey’s friends,” her mother greeted us with her Argentinean lilt.

“Hi, Mrs. Maguire,” we replied.

“Por favor, girls, we’re all family. Call me Mami.”

Stacey gripped her pen so hard it bent in half.

“My baby doesn’t know about Five Guys and my Teddy B like I do,” Mrs. Maguire said. “Sometimes I like to throw my hands in the air, and wave them around like I just don’t care. Turn the music back on.”

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"Alpha Beta"

Ten chapters completed in Bianca Reagan: Where The Action Is! An excerpt from Ch. 14:

Our waiter arrived with the National Velvet cupcake I had ordered.

“Cream cheese frosting,” Beck lamented. “To be in my 20s again.”

I dug into my crimson dessert. “In your quest for this extensive knowledge about relationships, have you ever dated a married man?”

Beck held up her index finger. “Once. In my defense, I did not know he was married at the time, because his wife lived in Switzerland. When I did find out, though, I ended it with the quickness. I was too old to be up in that mess.”

I kept eating and listening.

“Granted, I was 22 at the time, but there is no fool like an old fool. I didn’t want to wake up 10 years later, looking back on the energy I had wasted in a man who wasn’t even all that, because I had spent a decade being a fool. So that was done and done.”

All of a sudden, my plate was empty. Time flies when you’re having cake.

“I liked your story about you and Jean-Luc. It’s inspirational.”

“It’s a fairy tale,” Beck declared with a somber tone. “I got divorced from my first husband, met Jean-Luc, and got remarried. My life tied in a neat bow. I call it my resume gap story. Whenever I tell it, the listeners become beguiled by the meet-cute and the happily-ever-after ending. Their minds skip over the four-year period between nuptials.”

“Why don’t you tell them about those four years?”

Beck lowered her eyes. “I don’t want to sound weak and bitter and depressed.”

“If you ever want to talk about it, I’m a good listener.”

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"Lunchus Interruptus"

Ten chapters completed in Bianca Reagan: Where The Action Is! An excerpt from Ch. 05:

“What is your role in The Good Senator’s office?” I asked Benjamin.

“Bianca.” He took a chomp of his Philly cheesesteak.

I waited for him to chew and swallow. “Benjamin?”

“I’m The Good Senator’s right hand man.”

“I thought you were Cassandra’s assistant.”

Mike snorted grains of garlic rice out of his nose. Cassandra tried to hide her amusement by looking away from Benjamin and fixating on her meal.

“I don’t like to limit myself with labels. I work with Cassandra, so it’s a team effort, per se. She rocks out the day-to-day stuff. Right, Cassandra?”

“Yup.”

“On the flipside of that coin, I’m more the action guy. Innovation. Synergy. Git ‘er done. That’s what I’m talking about.”

“Hmm,” I packaged the rest of my food in an eco-friendly take-out box for later.

“I’m a forward thinker. In other words, I move the team forward,” Benjamin gesticulated. “Inasmuch as I’m involved with The Good Senator during that point in time, and so forth.”

“Very important work,” Cassandra winked at me.

Benjamin ingested more of his greasy sandwich. “At the end of the day, we make laws.”

We? I didn’t consider myself a C-SPAN enthusiast, but during the few times I had watched what I liked to call The Men’s Wearhouse Security Camera network, I had never seen Benjamin deliberating on the Senate floor.

“I’m taking The Good Senator to a whole ‘nother level.”

“What level would that be?” I asked him. A squeak escaped from Mike, followed by a series of forced coughs from Cassandra to cover her guffaws. Benjamin was too busy building momentum to notice.

“We're going viral. We're taking it to the streets. He’s going to be a national figure on the main stage. I want every family in America talking about Senator Nate Summerfield, make him a household name.”

“Ambitious.”

“Coke. Nate Summerfield.” He drew Venn diagram circles in the air. “Nike. Nate Summerfield. McDonald’s. Nate Summerfield.”

“Just do it,” I said with a straight face. “I’m loving it.”

“We’re shooting to the top, Bianca. President Nate Summerfield.” His pointer finger stabbed the tabletop with each word. “That’s what I’m talking about. Like I always say—”

“So, Bianca,” Cassandra cut in. “Mike tells us that you work at Shake?”

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"Almost Right, but Not Quite"

Five chapters completed in Hot Penguin Action! An excerpt from Ch. 15:

“What if that other guy weren’t in the picture?”

He was cutting me deep. “Dude, this has nothing to do him.” Though I wished it did. That would be a great excuse. “This is about you, and me, and . . .”

I was trying to concentrate on delivering my message. Why was he distracting me? Even though the other guy had blown me off, and I had absolutely no other prospects, I would rather be alone than poorly accompanied. I was willing to wait for the right person, instead of settling for a convenient, comfortable, yet unhealthy relationship.

“I have to respect what’s right for me. I want more. I need more.”

“You deserve more.”

“I do. In completely unrelated news, I’m not in a relationship of any kind with anyone.”

“Bianca, there is obviously something going on with you and—”

No. “If there ever was anything with him, there isn’t any more. He hasn’t talked to me since the night of the Rec Room taping, so his silence has made that perfectly clear.”

Jenny continued giving me sympathetic looks from across my desk. For some reason, I was glad she was there.

“I’m sorry, Bianca,” he said. “I’m not sorry he’s out of the picture. Although if we had to compete, I know I would beat him.”

“So cocky!”

“But I am sorry you’re unhappy. I thought he was a better guy than that.”

So did I.

“So you’re alone, I’m alone,” he lamented. “Where is the bright, shining light in all of this?”

“I did have fun meeting you for the first time at the taping.”

“The second time was even better. Even though that’s when I discovered my life is a mess, thanks to you.”

“What am I supposed to say to that? You’re welcome?”

“I meant it in a good way.”

“Explain please.”

“I have to accept that life I tried to create myself has failed. The first step is admitting that you have a problem, right?” His voice expressed a growing weariness. “So I admit it. I need to start over. I don’t know how, though.”

“And this is my fault because . . . ?”

“I’m not blaming you. I’m thanking you, because I can talk to you. I haven’t had to explain the situation to anyone else yet, not my family, not my friends. Not that I would have known what to tell them. It’s easier with you.”

“Because we just met?”

“Because I trust you.”

I trusted me, too.

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"Rhymes with Witch"

Four chapters completed in Hot Penguin Action! An excerpt from Ch. 09:

So.” Mike paused. “That interview was something, huh? On the show tonight?”

“It was something, indeed.” I nodded through the phone.

“We’re already getting negative feedback on the major news blogs.”

“There’s no such thing as bad publicity,” I assured him.

“I don’t know why Lexie didn’t focus on the book.”

“She did ask The Good Senator about his book. She brought up his many other accomplishments as well.”

“Yes, but then she focused on the health care bill. That wasn’t the purpose of The Good Senator’s visit to her show. Our pre-interview material was only about his Gulf War service, his Presidential campaign, and why he wrote the book.”

“Which she did ask about.”

Mike kept going. “No other talk show hosts asked about that bill, or about any bill The Good Senator sponsored or voted for.”

“Lexie isn’t just another talk show host. Haven’t you seen The Rec Room before?”

“Of course we’ve seen it. It’s supposed to be a comedy show. That’s why I wrote some jokes for The Good Senator.”

“You wrote jokes, Mikkel Jones?”

“You’re acting like I said I cured cancer.”

“Curing cancer I could believe.”

“So I’m smart, but not funny?”

“Can I get a third option?”

“Oh! You’re killing me, Smalls.”

“Bam!”

“The jokes were good,” Mike insisted. “He didn’t get a chance to use most of them, but—”

“Yes, the show is funny,” I concurred. “But Lexie challenges all of her guests with tough questions. Furthermore, her questions were not inappropriate.”

“Condom dispensers in every high school and middle school?” Mike sputtered. “Was she serious? How were we supposed to respond to that?”

“I don’t see a problem with the idea.”

“You don’t?”

I could have stopped then. I wanted Mike to like me, and if I agreed with him, he would. Maybe If I mirrored everything he said, he might think we had a psychic bond. That would make him feel secure in his points of view.

I could have surreptitiously kowtowed to Mike’s myopic arguments. I could have suppressed my instincts to share my counter perspectives. I could let him continue his circular logic until he ran out of steam. Then I could stroke his ego by complementing his repetitive monologue, and beg for more of his faulty assumptions.

Or . . .

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"It’s Been A Long, Been A Long Day"

Three chapters completed! An excerpt from Ch. 19:

A few hours later, we sat on the bed, paging through my senior yearbook. A Law & Order: Criminal Intent marathon played in the background.

“Things that make you smile,” He read from the Question Pages in the middle of the book.

“My nieces and my nephew.” Meaning Colby. The other nephews needed to learn how to behave. “Okay, next. If you could script the plot for your dream tonight, what would it be?”

“Me as Wolverine from X-Men. The movie.”

“The second one? Also known as, my favorite one.”

“No, the first one,” he replied with no hesistation. “Otherwise known as the best one.”

“My turn again. Things that make you go hmm . . . ”

“Duck-billed platypuses. Platypi? Mammals laying eggs.” He took a bit of the Croissant Hot Pocket in his hand, with the silver and white microwave sleeve still attached. “Now my turn. If you could have your SAT score be 1400 simply by having an ugly scar on your face, would you do so?”

“I had over a 1400, and I had scars. I think it would be 2100 now. And I still have scars.” I lean in to show him my cheek. But as I placed my finger on my face, I shrank away from him.

“What’s wrong? Are you having a flashback? You don’t really have to take another standardized test again. Sometimes I have nightmares that I have to retake the LSAT. Then I wake up shaking, all sweaty and scared.”

“I’m not Fancy Bianca.” I looked at my clean, pinkish fingertips, which had no cocoa-colored powder or concealer on them. “I’m Casual Bianca.”

“What are you talking about?”

“This morning I put on my GMAT outfit, so I would be as comfortable as possible. Then you called, and we went to Johnny Rockets. But I didn’t change my clothes, or deal with my,” I lowered my voice, “dermatological issues.”

“Okay . . . ?”

“So I’m still Casual Bianca.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“I wanted to be Fancy Bianca! I wanted to look nice.”

“You look fine. We got burgers, not filet mignon.” Mike furrowed his brow. “If I’m following what you’re saying, which is doubtful, you’d rather be fancy than casual? That doesn’t seem like you, though.”

“I like being casual. With my friends.”

“I’m not your friend?”

“You are, but,” I exhaled. “I want people to like me for who I am. So I show them Fancy Bianca first. By the time they see Casual Bianca, they already like me. So they won’t run away.”

“Why would they run—That’s insanity.”

“No, that’s LA. And the rest of American society. People judge you by an impossible standard of looks, which I could never measure up to. So I try to make the best of what I have. I try to look normal.”

He swallowed the last of the Hot Pocket. “You’re a piece of work.”

“So are you, kid.”

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Another chapter completed!

"Cake!" 19 more chapters to go. An excerpt:

If I had to choose between a burgeoning rock star whom I had spoken with for a total of less than ten minutes, and a Senator’s entry-level assistant whose light brown eyelashes had burned a permanent image in my brain . . . Someday I would learn to pick the hot, unstable guys over the adorkable, dependable ones. But that day was not today.

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