I skip into the living room, towel tight around me, pour myself another quick glass, and tip the contents of my audition bag out onto the sofa.
High-heeled boots, makeup pouch, white blouse, my wallet, Emily’s wallet, Emily’s Avis car keys, my water bottle, folded-up audition pages, and my phone. The lit-up screen showing a text from a number I don’t recognize.
“Oooo!” I plop down next to the pile of stuff and read.
Weds Feb 10, 6:36pm
Hi Mia, this is Delilah from reception at Casting Ground Zero. Thought I should let you know: nobody collected your note today. We’re closing up now but I’m in tomorrow so will pass on your cell number if she shows up then. Del x
I stare at the text, unblinkingly.
What? Emily didn’t show up. My eyes find her wallet beside me. Her car keys with their Avis key fob containing its hastily penned number plate info. What the hell happened to her? With no money and no car.
I shiver and reflexively take a sip of my drink, the sound of the bath thundering on in the other room. What should I do? Should I call Michael and tell him what happened today? But I don’t want him to make trouble for her with her agent. I’m pretty sure if something bad happened to her someone else at the studio would have noticed.
I have a habit of assuming something terrible has happened to someone when in actual fact they’re just ghosting me. George was absolutely fine, just moving house and having a drink in the pub without any intention of ever speaking to me again.
So perhaps Emily is fine, too. Maybe she has another bank card in a coin purse, or Apple Pay, who knows. Perhaps she’ll get in touch tomorrow. I should probably wait until the morning and reassess.
I head back to the bathroom to turn off the water, warm steam hanging in the air. Maybe something just came up, an emergency, perhaps she got a call and didn’t make it into her audition. I know if anything happened to my family, I’d be off instantly, leaving everything behind me. But the thought niggles slightly because how would she have gotten anywhere in an emergency without her car and her money? I suppose someone could have picked her up, or she could have ordered an Uber on her phone…Whatever it is, it won’t be a mystery for too long. If she doesn’t contact me by tomorrow then I’ll pass her things on to her agent through my agent. None of it is really my business. If she’d thought about me today half as much as I’ve thought about her, I’m pretty confident we wouldn’t be in this situation.
And with that thought I tap on some music, slip out of my audition clothes, and sink into the hot bubbles of the bath.
Half an hour later my self-care session has moved to the bedroom. Thick toweling robe on, dark chocolate selection box on my chest, and old Sex and the City reruns playing on the TV. The idea of ordering in some kind of udon is playing at the back of my mind when one of Carrie’s ill-advised shoe shopping excursions is unceremoniously interrupted by the loud electrical buzz of my apartment door bell. I bolt up reflexively, scattering chocolates across the bedding.
Someone’s at the door.
The clock under the TV reads 7:12. It’s not so much the hour that bothers me—it’s the fact that I literally know no one in LA except Souki and she doesn’t know where I’m staying.
I grab my phone, slip it into my robe pocket, and pull the robe tight around me. The buzzer fizzes loudly again as I pad out to the apartment hall. The security monitor next to the front door is illuminated and there is a woman standing in the hallway outside my door, holding something in her hands. Closer to the screen I take in her features. Dark-brown hair pulled back from her face, a white blouse—and for a second I’m certain it’s Emily.
But then there’s no way she could know where I live. She doesn’t even know my full name, let alone my address in LA. I squint at the monitor, the figure’s features slowly making sense. It’s the building’s front-desk concierge. I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding and swing open the door.