People would
say that it was the name of a star. When really, it was a hand-me-down from her
great-great grandparents from somewhere in Wales. Roxy- full name Roxanna- had a sister named Angel and a baby brother named Sander. It just
seemed her parents’ goal to make their kids stick out, whether they wanted the
attention or not.
They
must’ve had some sort of bet going with God. Roxy figured to herself. Course, Mom holds that she uses the name to
remind me how rocky my birth was.
Regardless
of her name, and popular demand, Roxy had confirmed that the stage and lights
weren’t for her. Unless she was setting them up. Her first ‘stage’ had been the
set pieces of ‘Grease Lightenin’ for her high school’s production of Grease. Since then, she had graduated to shooting and editing TV shows out of Hollywood. Yes, Roxanna
Colt had made it to Hollywood. And she was witnessing everything it had to
offer.
“I’ve come
to view Hollywood as one big mask-making workshop.” She’d quoted to a reporter
once- anonymously, of course. Roxy had recently switched studios, working with tag-team Jeff Goldmen and Marcus Ferry
for the past two years on Grading. It was the latest pre-teen comedy drama that was taking the
network’s ratings by storm. The elements put forth by its writers had been
risky. Which was why Roxy had put her best resume forth when it got green-lit.
And now, she steered Camera 3 over the sets, zooming, panning, and keeping her
lens consistent with the emotions of the actors on the other end of it. And she
loved it… she really did.
“What’re you
thinking about? Your face’s looking pretty deep there.”
“Sorry,”
Roxy gave a shrug on the comforter of her bed. She looked at the curly-haired Glennette Davis, who was inspecting her closet. “My brain falls into exposition
mode sometimes, at the end of a long day. Sometimes in the voice of the
Allstate commercial guy.”
Glennette
turned from her closet, giving Roxy that weirded-out look any teenager would give an adult. “Ok then… why that guy?”
Oh, how to explain the sexiness of a deep
baritone. Roxy giggled in her thought bubble. She propped up on her elbow
to see what Glennette’s assessment was of her wardrobe. She’d been lying on her bed and letting the teen rummage where she may. Roxy had a meeting coming up and had never been in favor of dressing up. Glennette had stated that she was the only one who could help her… and she was right. Two years working on the
show, and this was the first meeting that Roxy was attending. Mostly because, all
of a sudden, her presence was needed there.
“See
anything that’s doable?” Roxy ventured to Glennette.
“Only for
the Main Street hoedown.” Came her snarky reply.
“Please,”
Roxy rolled her eyes at the ceiling fan. “You think every place outside the LA
limits is the boonies? I’m from Petaluma.”
“So touchy.”
Glennette mumbled over a striped tank top. “White people.”
“Young people.” Roxy countered with a conscious study of her own pale hand. “So overly
confident... white, black, or orange.”
Glennette
lifted her round, adorable ebony nose, marching to the bed with an armful of clothes. “I’m confident that I got more style
then you.”
With that, she dropped a pair of faded black jeans
beside Roxy and began running a number of shirts beside them. At the fourth
one, a flowing mint-green, she smiled. “Get some high-heeled sandals on and
you’re good to go.”
Not that I wish to go in the first place.
Roxy dreaded, even as she applauded Glennette’s efforts. “That’s why you’re in
front of the cameras and not me.”
Glennette’s
face tempered a little at the mention of cameras. She fussed with the shirt a
moment, then glanced awkwardly at Roxy. “Those- expositions you say to
yourself.”
Roxy
blushed. “Yeah?”
“Am I in
them?”
That was a
rhetorical question at this point. She had gotten to know Glennette better
in the last two months then in the show's entire run. It was December and, for the actors and crew, the start
of the season’s hiatus. In years prior, they had known about a green light for
another season long before that. This was different though. Because Glennette
was fifteen; and as of December, three months pregnant.
“What do you
say to yourself about me?” Glennette pressed, her hands still messing with the
shirt. “And where’s your jewelry? You need bling.”
Roxy pointed
to the other side of her bed. She watched Glennette walk over and wrestle with
the simple hook for the jewelry cabinet. It was too big a piece for an LA
bedroom, but it had been handed down from Roxy’s aforementioned grandmother; a
few layers of lacquer removed.
“I remind
myself that I’m thinking about you.” Roxy told her. “That, you must be scared,
confused, wondering what happens now… or where it all went wrong.”
Glennette
fingered Roxy’s necklaces, which where few. “That’s sappy.”
Roxy
shrugged. “You asked.”
“You
shouldn’t get hung up on me.” Glennette yanked a necklace off of its hook.
“Worry about whether you still have a job.”
“I’ll worry
about that after I’m sure that you’re ok.” Roxy eyed the necklace; who had
given her that? “Or I can worry about them at the same time. Mankind’s track
record of multi-worrying is unbeatable-“
“I’m NEVER
gonna be ok.” Glennette dropped the necklace on top of the shirt, a tear
falling with it. “Never again! My career’s over and from now on, everywhere I
go, I’m gonna be ‘that girl’.”
She looked
up so Roxy would see the dark trails of tears on her cheeks. “You know that saying 'Everybody's doing it?' Apparently, that doesn't matter when it's you. Nobody looks at
me the same, if they look at me at all. Course, they have plenty of glances for
my stomach.”
She lifted
up her own ruffled yellow shirt, exposing her flat belly. Her flat, no-flab
belly. There was hardly any flab to any of Glennette’s limbs. The sort of
profile that Hollywood looked for, nine times out of ten. So there was that,
and she was short. Roxy found it hard to see Glennette carrying anything above
a fanny pack around her waist. Course, she’d never voice that sentence out
loud.
“Like
they’ve never seen one before.” Glennette lowered her shirt and crossed he arms
over it. Roxy sat up then, her full attention on the teen. Glennette
wiped her eyes as they narrowed on Roxy. “When are you gonna start staring,
huh? Why don’t you go out and whisper with everyone else? Give them the scoop
on how a pregnant teen acts.”
“I’m not
gonna do that, Glennette.” Roxy shook her head.
“Well,”
Glennette eyed her obscurely. “You should.”
“Nah.”
“Why not?”
“Probably
because David forgave Saul.”
Glennette’s
weirded-out look reached a new level. “What!?”
“David.”
Roxy repeated, pointing a finger to the fat and wrinkled Bible she kept on top
of the cabinet. "Before he was king, this
guy Saul was. Saul got jealous of David’s popularity and tried to kill him.
David was on the run for years and Saul never stopped hunting him; until Saul
was killed by a rival army. David wept for him when he heard the news. Then
killed the man who had killed Saul.”
“He what
now!” Glennette backed up from the bed. “The man who… what?”
“I know.”
Roxy agreed. “David held nothing against Saul, but mourned him as a friend and
avenged him, sort of. And again and again, God uses David as an example of
Christian behavior…" she paused, watching Glennette process this. Her faith was no secret around the studio; but also not a widely-talked about subject. Glennette wanted answers however, and Roxy's belief held them.
"I’m saying that you’re going to have to be responsible for your actions, Glennette." Roxy told her "But I’m not going to hold those actions against you for the rest of your life.”
"I’m saying that you’re going to have to be responsible for your actions, Glennette." Roxy told her "But I’m not going to hold those actions against you for the rest of your life.”
Glennette
clearly didn’t know what to do with that. She had been getting plenty of talks
in her ear lately, since news of the baby had reached her parents, and then,
this week, the two directors of the show. Both the Davis’ and Roxy would be
speaking with them at the meeting with a network representative.
Roxy had been the first to figure
it out, after catching Glennette puking in the bathroom of a
neighboring lot. Roxy had figured that once her parents learned about it- as
she’d insisted Glennette tell them- that she’d fade back behind the camera and
watch the drama unfold in its natural lighting. But then her folks had pulled
the ‘don’t tell a soul’ card and now, Roxy was Glennette’s only emotional
outlet until it could be decided what to do.
Hence, Roxy’s appearance tonight. Uggghhhh…
“T-Then what?” Glennette’s tears
had gone into sobs now. “If you’re not gonna stare, you’re obviously not
whispering, so what are you going to
do?”
“Pray that these choices will make
you a better, wiser, person.” Roxy said.
“That sounds like so much crap.” Glennette shot back without a blink.
“That’s all I’ve got.” Roxy said,
adding in another shrug. She’d had almost a month to think about this, same as
Glennette’s parents. Think about what God needed her to say. Roxy had had to
learn the hard way, that you needed to listen.
Glennette’s hands went back to her
stomach, rubbing at it. “I haven’t even told him yet. Mom says to let the agent
handle ‘breaking the news’, which means he might find out before I get the
chance…”
“You want to use my phone?” Roxy
threw out, her mind on her cell tucked in her pocket. That was the burning
question that Glennette had not divulged. And her eyes had taken on the scared
look that entered them every time the subject came up.
“I think it would mean a lot more
if he heard it from you.” Roxy prompted.
Glennette surprised her with a
nod. “He would. He’s not… We… we were each other’s… first.”
“Okay.”
Glennette snorted. “Of course you
wouldn’t ask who.”
Cue
your soap opera close up. Roxy snarked to herself. “It’s
killing me, believe me, this lack of information. But I won’t make it my
business unless you want-”
Glennette dropped her hands from her stomach and looked Roxy head-on.
“It’s Blake.”
[CUT TO NEXT SCENE]
