“Where are you?” Gen asked. “Are you on Mulholland? The reception is horrible”
Had she listened at all to the first half of this conversation? The one where I’d revealed that Drake was cheating on me and I didn’t know what to do so I left L.A. to go visit the one woman who had always been a steady figure in my life, my Gam. “I’m in Wishing Well, Texas.”
“Where?”
“Texas,” I said louder.
“What are you doing in Texas?”
“I told you, I needed to get away.”
“I thought you were going to Montecito or maybe Palm Springs.”
I looked around. This was definitely not Montecito or Palms Springs. It reminded me of a backlot of a small town. There was a diner called The Greasy Spoon. A large grass area that appeared to be the heart of the town with an adorable wishing well in the center. A pizza place with a man that I assumed was supposed to look like Marlon Brando smoking as he leaned against the G on Godfather’s Pizza. A beauty salon called The Best Little Hairhouse in Texas. A large lumberyard.
I hadn’t seen a spa, a McDonald’s, or any other chain store.
“What’s in Texas?” Genesis asked.
She hadn’t been listening at all. “My grandma.”
“Oh, Gam! I love her!”
Gam was Genesis’ number one fan, so naturally, Genesis adored my grandma. Gen’s IMDB page was filled with Lifetime movie credits. She’d played an abused wife who had to leave town in the middle of the night to escape her deranged husband. A psycho nanny who seduces the father of the children she’s hired to take care of. A drug addict nurse who steals drugs from the hospital she works at and then resorts to prostitution to support her habit. A mother who had her children kidnapped by their father. A woman sold into sex trafficking that has to escape when she finds out her sister is being targeted next.
Basically, Gen was working on soap operas, too. Hers just came on at night instead of in the afternoon. But she still turned her nose up at my eight-year stint on Sunset Bay. I wasn’t saying that my performances had been Oscar-worthy by any means, but soap acting was hard work. Most days were sixteen hours long, we had to memorize an insane amount of dialogue, and somehow, someway ground even the most outlandish storylines in reality.
I didn’t think soaps got enough credit. The grind was real, and it had ground me to a nub of a person. Which was why my latest contract negotiations had been so critical to me. I felt like I deserved the same pay as some of my co-stars who had been on the show much less time than I had. Which was why my personal life falling apart right now could not be worse timing.
Drake was my love interest on the show. Us being a couple in real life had garnered a lot of goodwill from the audience. Fans of our show had glommed on to Alexis and Trent being a real-life couple and were demanding more of our storyline. The last thing I needed was for the tides to turn because Drake couldn’t keep his dick out of Janika’s vagina before my deal was inked.
The irony was not missed on me that Drake and Janika’s characters on the show were also having an affair behind my character, Alexis’ back.
“How is Gam doing? Did she mention my performance in Dangerous Love?”
“I haven’t seen her yet.” And when I did, Dangerous Love wasn’t going to be at the top of things I wanted to talk about.
“I’m sure she loved it,” Gen relayed confidently. “When you see her make sure to send her my light and love.”
“Okay.”
“And Sushi, sweetie, remember there are two sides to every story.”
Two sides to every story?!
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I’d expected my best friend to take my side. Which I didn’t feel was too much to ask. I’d known Genesis since we were fourteen years old. We’d met our freshman year at a performing arts high school in Los Angeles that was modeled after La Guardia High School of Performing Arts a.k.a. the Fame school in New York.
We’d been there for each other during puberty, college, early adulthood, first jobs, loss of friends, parents, and countless heartbreaks. She was my ride-or-die. The Christina to my Meredith. The Shirley to my Laverne. The Ethel to my Lucy. So why wasn’t she already plotting ways to make Drake pay for his betrayal?