A Life More Complete

---Chapter 2---

As I step out of the shower I can hear Ben rushing around my bedroom. He’s sifting through t-shirts looking for one that, in his words, won’t make him look like he’s wearing a girl’s t-shirt. He’s wearing a worn out, dirty pair of Levis and he couldn’t look more seductive if he tried. He stands there shirtless with his jeans hanging loosely from his hips. I can’t help but smile when I’m around him and I know deep within me that I want to love Ben Torres. Maybe someday I will or maybe I already do. He pulls an unsuspecting t-shirt from my drawer and swipes it over his head. Looking down he notices that he’s wearing my Princess Half marathon t-shirt from Disneyland.

“Damn it! Don’t you have any t-shirts that aren’t plastered with girly shit?” I laugh out loud and join him at my dresser wrapped in a towel. I reach into the drawer and pull from the bottom a t-shirt that I got from one of the many swag bags that my work receives daily. It’s from an organic shampoo company and it will have to do. He tosses the princess t-shirt on the bed and grabs me around the waist in one rapid movement. “I love starting my morning with you,” he whispers into my wet hair. “It’s better than coffee and you know how much I love coffee.” He makes me smile for the umpteenth time this morning.

“Me too, but not that whole coffee thing, you know I hate coffee.” I wrinkle my nose at him and he kisses my forehead before he rushes away.

Hurrying in the opposite direction, I quickly slip on a bra and underwear. I have to be at the office in an hour, which will be cutting it close and I know he’s already late. It’s 7:15 and Ben’s workday begins far too early even for me. Standing in front of the mirror, I whip my hair into a bun, I add bronzer, blush and mascara to my luckily flawless skin and brush my teeth all in record time. I apply my usual cherry chapstick and it’s a moment like this that I’m glad I have never been high maintenance.

I take a deep breath, gather my laptop bag and slip my feet into a pair of butter yellow open toed sling backs. I shuffle out of my room pinning a yellow flower that matches my camisole and shoes to the lapel of my pale blue and white seersucker suit jacket.

Stumbling through the kitchen, I try to accomplish more tasks than necessary for one person. Ben is waiting for me at the door to the garage, grinning as Roxy anxiously awaits her car ride at his feet. “It’s like sleeping with two different women,” he says. “I get the messy, sweaty girl and now I get the hot, sexy business women.”

I shake my head and shove him out the door as he reaches for me. “We’re both going to be late if you don’t get moving,” I respond sternly.

“I know. I’m already late and I still need to swing by my place and pick up my work truck.” Yet he moves slowly encircling me in his arms pulling me against his firm chest.

Glancing up at him, I say, “You’d better hurry, I heard your boss is a real a*shole. A stickler for punctuality.”

Ben owns a landscaping and pool company in El Segundo, but the majority of his customers are wealthy business owners or high profile celebrities out in L.A. and in the nearby beach communities. He places his hand under my chin and tips my face up until my lips are level with his. He plants a soft, lingering kiss on my mouth and I feel my lips swell. “What am I going to do with you?” Shaking his head, eyes closed. “Have a good day, baby. See you tonight?” he asks releasing me.

“Yeah. Dinner, after work?” I mumble, breathless from his kiss.

“Good, I’ll see you then,” he says as he climbs into the 4Runner.

I hop into my little Volkswagen Cabrio and put the top down, since my hair is held firmly in place. I swing through the drive thru of McDonald’s picking up the usual, two coffees, one black, the other with two creams and a Splenda and this morning, a chocolate shake. The lady at the drive thru gives me that disgusted look I always get when I order a chocolate shake at 7:30 in the morning. I want to respond to her sour, repulsed face with, “Piss off, bitch. How’s it any different than ordering a hot chocolate? No one seems to frown upon that.” But I don’t. I plaster a fake ass smile on my face and hand her the money.

My car flies into the parking garage at record speed barely missing the arm of the security gate at its entrance. Being late makes me anxious, but no matter how hard I try I can’t get it together to be on time. Here I am over thirty minutes late and aimlessly looking for a parking spot. By now I have inhaled three-quarters of the chocolate shake and my mood has changed drastically. Being late and combined with traffic makes for serious road rage, which translates to just plain old rage. Suddenly I feel like I want to kick someone in the teeth.

I finally come across a spot. “Thank God,” I mutter as I put the car in park. I throw my laptop bag over my shoulder; grab the coffee and what’s left of the shake. I head toward the elevator as quickly as I can manage. The coffee is bouncing around as I carry it close to my body, menacingly sloshing out of that little hole you’re supposed to drink out of. Suddenly I hate coffee more than usual.

I punch the elevator button with my elbow as I grip the cups tightly just waiting for the moment when the coffee finally falls in love with my jacket and jumps out of the cup. I hear the gears turn and the lurch of the wire as the elevator makes it way up from the ground floor. The doors slide open and it’s practically filled, with clean-shaven-suit-wearing men with vacant stares. The smell of cigarettes, cologne and coffee overwhelm the small space and I want to gag. I wriggle my way into the small spot available directly in front and no one moves to make room. Who said chivalry is dead? When the doors close, I zone out.

The elevator dings and I’m out and rapidly making my way toward the conference room.

“Morning Maggie,” I say as I blow past her sitting behind the reception desk.

“Hey, Kristin,” she says and trails off when I don’t stop to chat. Normally I would’ve stopped, but unfortunately for her I’m late. Really late, now.

The conference room is buzzing with conversation and I notice immediately that my boss, Ellie, is absent from the overly large table. But my partners in crime are there, staring at me from their chairs awaiting the coffee that is now ridiculously late. I lean down and peck both of them on the cheeks as I hand off their coffee.

“Good morning.” I smile and flop down next to them. I suck down the rest of the chocolate shake, which is now just chocolate milk, totally proving my previous point.

“Why the hell are you so late and on your day to pick up coffee?” Melinda asks.

“I overslept and then I got caught in traffic.” I roll my eyes trying to force my story home. It’s only a partial omission of the truth.

“Whatever,” she says rolling her eyes back at me before taking a long drink of her coffee. Before she can speak again Bob jumps in with his two cents.

“You did not oversleep,” he accuses with such force I want to defend my lie entirely. “You never oversleep. In the six years I have known you, you have never once overslept. If by “overslept” you mean you were shacking up with Ben, then that I believe.” He glances at Melinda and I know the two of them are about to gang up on me.

“Agreed. Why can’t you just admit that’s what you’re doing? We don’t care, well I think Bob cares because he secretly hoped Ben was gay, but other than that we don’t care.” Bob laughs at this statement and shrugs his shoulders. We all know it to be true, Bob has a huge crush on Ben.

My BlackBerry vibrates on the table and silences them for a few seconds. It’s a text from Ben.

Ben: Have a great day at work. I miss you already and you’re right...My boss is an a*shole. Working too hard already. Shoulda called in sick.

I beam and text him back quickly.

Me: At least your boss is hot as hell. Mine is a menopausal control freak. Miss you, too. See you tonight.

When I finish they are both staring at me with intent and even though I love them both dearly I don’t want an early morning lecture regarding my sex life.

I met Melinda and Bob when we were all hired six years ago to comprise a new public relations team at Ellie Regan P.R. We became inseparable, all of us having nothing better to do than throw ourselves into our entry-level jobs, booze it up after work and enjoy each other’s company. They are my family and we tease and torment, laugh and cry, love and hate each other with such potency it’s no wonder everyone else in the office avoids us. Both Melinda and Bob are Southern California natives and they pretty much embody everything you imagine that to be. If I met either of them on the street I probably wouldn’t even consider talking to them. They are completely out of my realm of reality, but that’s what makes our friendship so bonded, so different.

Melinda is the epitome of a California girl. She’s from Laguna Beach. Her family, so wealthy that I can’t even begin to fathom the amount of money, yet she sits next to me at our monetarily amazing job that doesn’t even cover the rent on her Los Angeles high rise penthouse. She is overly blonde, overly skinny, overly tanned, always over the top. Her boobs are fake, along with her nose and excessively plumped lips. She bears an uncanny resemblance to a Barbie. She is manicured, pedicured, bleached and waxed on a regular schedule. She is the total opposite of me. The first day we met she ran her index finger down the length of my nose, taking me by surprise. “Oh my God! I wish I had known you when I got my nose done. Yours is so perfect and cute. Damn it!” Those were the first words she said to me and to this day she still stands by them. In spite of all of these things, she’s caring and kind, but when crossed or backed into a corner she can turn on you rather quickly. And something no one would know by her outward appearance, she will always be the smartest person in the room. When I say smart, I mean crazy smart, like solving-quadratic-equations-long-division-in-your-head-knows-every-U.S.-President-in-order smart, which sometimes leads to a battle of wits with anyone who is willing to challenge her. But she can play dumb to beat the band. I adore her.

Then there’s Bob. The only man I know who can make premature gray look as sexy as George Clooney. It suits him at twenty-nine years old, along with his strategically grown stubbly beard and fitted designer suits. He’s tall and thin, but muscular, a natural runway model and a total disappointment to women. Melinda and I love to watch the faces of women when they realize he’s gay. All he has to do is utter a few simple words and their smiles drop away, along with all their hopes and dreams of finding the ideal man. In my eyes he is the ideal man. He wants nothing from me except friendship and he loves me regardless of my mass of faults. He’s funny, crass and vulgar. Bob is everything to me, a father, a brother, a best friend and he makes me feel safe. He can throw a punch better than any straight man I know. I witnessed him knock out a guy twice his size at a club one night, because the guy got a bit too fresh for Melinda’s liking. He’d do anything for the two of us and we feel the same.

Ellie bustles into the office, all flowing red hair and file folders. For once, I’m happy she has arrived. Her suit is too tight around her middle and she’s flustered like always. She’s a micro-manager who loves dissecting news articles depicting public relations disasters and she loves, loves, loves to be in control. She is, for some reason inexplicably terrifying. I remind myself again for the thousandth time not to think badly of Ellie. Not only is she my boss, but she also took a chance on a twenty-two year old with no experience or connection to her company. She hired me and I like to believe it was because of my great interview, but I think it had more to do with my mention of being from Illinois. Ellie is from Indiana and her eyes lit up when I told her. I think she was looking for a protégé to mold into a mini control freak like her. I never conformed and as much as she liked to come down on me, she knew our little team was her ticket to catapult her company beyond her vision. She started the company at eighteen and has kept it running for thirty plus years, but had never seen the success that Melinda, Bob and I brought. We landed a gold mine six years ago and didn’t even know it.

Ellie begins the meeting with a schedule of events that need promoting and continues on to the nightmare of dividing and conquering the new client list. This seems to go on for hours and I zone out. Dropping my phone twice with a loud clatter on the table warrants nasty looks from Ellie and a slight laugh from Bob. I mouth “sorry” to Ellie but she seems unfazed by my ill-fated attempts to feign interest. It doesn’t concern me. There will be no new clients assigned to Melinda, Bob or me. After six years our little group should have been disbanded, we should be independent of each other taking on our own clients, traveling alone, being lonely. Yet our clients became so accustomed to having at least two of us present at press junkets or grand openings or interviews that we remained intact. We branched away somewhat, each of us having someone that worked only with one of us, but we always bounced ideas off each other and treated the clients as a whole rather than belonging to one person. Ellie dismisses the meeting and I realize an hour has passed and I have no idea what went on. Whoops!

“Melinda, Kristin and Bob I need you to remain behind. We have some business to attend to and I want your full attention.” All three of us stare at Ellie. She’s tapping her pointed toed pump on the ground as the rest of the group shuffles out the door. The annoyance is evident as she sighs heavily.

“Okay, here’s the deal. I received an email this morning from Debi Miller, Kathy’s assistant, of Green Pea Baby. I guess there was some backlash from her customers regarding changes to her products that she failed to mention. Some chemical additions in efforts to save money on production. Customers have had awful reactions to the changes and are now emailing and forwarding pictures to her of their broken and burned skin. And in Debi’s words, Kathy “lost her shit” and shot off a mass email to every customer on their email list. She claims that it could ruin the company. Not only did she send the email, but also she turned into a screaming lunatic outside her Calabasas store.” Ellie pulls her hand through her hair and shakes her head. She thrives on this shit even though she wants everyone to think she can’t handle a minute more.

Green Pea Baby was one of our first clients. We worked for hours on end with Kathy to promote her product. She had created baby shampoos and washes in BPA free plastic containers using only natural ingredients. We pushed the product into the hands of every retailer who would take it. She opened her store in Calabasas with a lavish party and seemed fit to enjoy her early retirement. But recently cracks began to show in the façade and to say I’m surprised she “lost her shit” would be a lie. She wanted to create a product she could be proud of and it never really mattered if it went very far. This was our first lesson in knowing your clients. We assumed everyone wanted wealth and success. She was a prime example of how wrong we were.

“Bob,” Ellie addresses him harshly causing all three of us to whip our heads around to stare at her. “Work with IT and figure out if there is anything we can do about the mass email. Liaison with Green Pea’s IT department if needed. Melinda, type up a statement regarding the changes in the product after you meet with Debi Miller. She’ll be able to fill you in on the changes that have been made. This will be hitting the news soon, so make sure the statement is ready when the calls come in. Kristin, I need you to meet with Kathy and find out how serious the damage is. Meet her in the Calabasas store. And Melinda, email the statement to Kristin, because she’ll need to do some damage control. All statements need to match in order for this to be seamless. We need this to blow over, Kathy needs this to blow over.” That’s Ellie for you. She doesn’t even come up for air. She thrives on this kind of shit and her day has been made.

Ellie slams the door behind her as she exits the conference room with such purpose that I fear for anyone standing in her way. Before the door even closes Melinda laughs.

“Can’t we just have a normal day at the office?” she giggles. “Most people get to take an hour lunch, eat sushi, drink a beer, play solitaire. Not us.”

Before I can answer her the bell on my phone sounds alerting me of a notice on my calendar. “Shit,” I mumble to myself. As I scroll through the calendar. “Today’s Trini’s interview with Hollywood Reports and I never got the list of “don’t ask” questions to the interviewer. Also, one of us needs to be there. She’ll never make it on her own.” I reach for my milkshake, knocking it into my lap by accident, spilling the small amount that is left onto the crotch of my pants. “Damn it,” I say as Melinda instantly hands me a Tide stick from her purse. I smile at her gratefully.

“At least it’s not on your butt this time. You looked like you shit your pants,” Bob says smirking. “I got Trini. No worries.” He leans down and kisses me good-bye.

Trini Walters is our cash cow, our gold mine, the reason we earn the salary we do. The reason we amassed more celebrity clients than Ellie Regan P.R. has ever seen. Trini was an adorable twelve-year-old girl on the brink of stardom when she signed with Ellie. A tiny little thing with chipped nail polish and an adorable smile, precocious and endearing, but she could force your hand at anything. I loved her at first sight. She could sing, dance and act. We got along famously. Her mother left when she was a baby. She was being raised by her elderly father and series of revolving nannies, leaving her on her own more often than not. Her father, famous in his own right, was a musician, a bona fide 1950’s pop star, who fell from grace and was now surviving on residuals and his daughter’s money. Trini had just inked a deal with a children’s network starring on a show called Trini Knows Best. The show became wildly popular in a matter of weeks and catapulted her into a world she was far too young to ever know.

Trini is now eighteen and we still remain close. Her show ended two years ago and in that short span of time she recorded her second album and starred in four movies. I need to call her and let her know that Bob will be meeting her at her interview this afternoon. I mark that down in my endless list of things to do today.

We all head off in our respective directions knowing this day will last forever. It will be one of those days when you glance at the clock and an hour has passed; yet it feels like an eternity. We’ll work into the night, tiring long before it will be over. There is no overtime pay in my job. I just do it exhausted and defeated.