“No, Daddy. For the tenth time, I’m not crazy.” I tapped my cell phone against the side of my head as my father’s voice filtered through the speaker. On of the first items on my ‘To-Do’ list was to call my parents in South Carolina to give them the good news about my impending employment. The problem was my dad didn’t see me flying out to Los Angeles for a job as ‘good news’. He wanted me back home in Charleston so I could spend the rest of my life rearranging the tourist knick knacks in his store.
“You can’t be serious about this, Eva.” Daddy still had a monopoly on our conversation. “That place is dangerous. It’s full of nothing but drugs and crime.”
“I get it, Dad. I can feel the hellfire already.” I was standing in the middle of my studio apartment, surrounded by a medley of clothes and luggage. “This is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I can’t be on your dime forever.”
“You’re not ‘on my dime’ now. You keep refusing my offer to hire you on at the store.”
“Oh, don’t listen to him, honey.” My mom chimed in. Somehow, she’d managed to wrestle the phone away. “Are you excited? When will it be on? What channel?”
“I’m not hired yet, so I’m not excited. I don’t know, and I don’t know.” I answered her questions as quickly as she threw them out at me. But it didn’t matter. My mom wasn’t listening to a single word I’d said.
“Our baby is going to be on television! Oh Martin, can you imagine?”
I found myself once again holding the phone away from my ear, rolling my eyes as she dreamed up a party for the premiere of a show I wasn’t even a part of. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that if this Connor had any sense, he’d replace any notions of hiring me with someone else. I felt a sharp pang in the base of my stomach at the thought of it. Could I really want this job despite my obvious reservations? No, that wasn’t it. I wanted the money, not the position. Could I be jealous? Nah; not of Elliot. And certainly not of some girl they would hire to work with him. More like nerves. Yeah, that’s it. I was just nervous.
“Is it that boy?”
Dad’s voice broke through Mom’s yammering long enough to bring me back to reality. He was referring to Elliot, who had failed to meet my father’s impossible standards the moment he learned of his existence.
“No, it’s not Elliot. This is for me, Daddy. Surely you can understand that. When will I ever get another chance like this again?”
“Tonight. Tomorrow if you don’t want to work for me or the week after.” His voice shifted from condemnation to honey in a matter of seconds. “You’re such a smart girl and you’ve worked so hard. I’d hate to see your college education go to waste because you want to follow some boy out to California.”
“I’m not following him. He invited me with the off chance I might be able to land this job.” I frowned at the pile of shoes I had yet to go through. “Besides, whatever happened to you saying I could do whatever I wanted to?”
“Eva, I’m just worried.” My father sighed as he relinquished the real reason behind his distress. “I don’t want you to go across the country just to get your heart broken. You could end up homeless. Dead. Or worse.”
Before I could ask him what could be worse than dead, my mom was back on the line. She was oblivious to the anxiety in my father’s voice.
“You said they are going to pay you per episode? And you’ll have your own condo?” She all but squealed. “We’ll come out and help you get settled.”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, Mom.” I picked up two pairs of black heels and tossed them on the couch in the ‘maybe’ pile. “There are still a lot of details to go through.”
“Baby, don’t do this.” My dad must have picked up on the other line because I could hear each of them separately now. They were such a contradiction. Dad was the planner; the worrier in our little family. My mom? Not so much. “Come home and meet a nice boy who will take care of you instead of hanging onto one who wants to drag you all over the country.”
“I should be back in Athens on Saturday. Maybe Monday. I don’t have the itinerary for our little trip yet. I’ll have to call you when I know something for certain.”
I gave them both my love and disconnected the call before they could say anything further. I tried to turn my attention back to the mess I’d made in my living room, but sank down in a pile of pants instead. I had a knot in my stomach now I couldn’t explain. My dad didn’t think I could do this. Hell, I didn’t think I could do this. But Elliot did. Somehow, he believed in me enough to want me by his side.