that. I didn’t even go to foreign films ‘cause of the subtitles. I always said that if I wanted to read something, I’d hit the bookstore.
I watched as Jennifer pressed her point, hands gesturing, eyes flashing with passion. She had a dream. A goal. She studied her craft. She’d probably be a famous actress someday. She certainly looked the part. Real pretty, with watery blue eyes, pale skin and straw-colored hair. Kind of Paris Hiltonesque. No wonder Jamie was in love with her.
And Jamie—I glanced over at him—how his eyes were alight as he bantered back, easily countering her statements with intelligent ideas of his own. I felt bad for him, being stuck at News 9 until the economy cleared up. He must feel so stifled, shooting brainless news video. He had this whole world. This whole life that he had to leave behind.
“Uh, Jen? I think we’ve put Maddy to sleep,” Jamie’s voice brought me back to the present.
“I’m sorry, Maddy,” Jennifer said. “It must be so boring for you to have to listen to us drone on and on about filmmaking.” She didn’t sound too sorry, actually, but I let it slide. After all, I was the one barging in on her date.
“No, it’s fine. I’m fine.” I straightened up in my chair, suddenly realizing I’d almost been asleep.
Jennifer excused herself to go to the bathroom. Once alone, Jamie turned to me and smiled.
“Sorry about that. Ever since she took Acting one-oh-one at Hollywood Community College she thinks she’s Cecil DeMille.”
Argh. I didn’t know who that was. I mean, of course I’d heard the name but I couldn’t place it to an occupation. I was so subscribing to Variety when I got home.
“It’s okay. It was interesting.” I tried to sound convincing.
Jamie laughed. “Yeah, right. You’re a good sport. But Jennifer’s like a pit bull when she gets on a rampage like this. She loves to argue. And I can’t help egging her on, she gets so pissed.” He took a bite of his burrito and chewed. “It’s how all these Hollywood types act. They memorize a few directors’ names, throw in a couple obscure film references and they think it makes them sound all intellectual. And then at parties they sit around and argue points that don’t even make sense with one another. Each has no idea what the other is talking about, yet out of fear that they’ll be labeled wannabes, they pretend to.” He took a sip of Corona. “I can’t stand when Jen acts like them, so I always call her on it. If she’s going to spout of filmmaking nonsense around me, she’s got to at least know what she’s talking about. I don’t like being around pretentious fakes.”
“Well, you don’t have to worry about me. I admittedly know zilch about Hollywood,” I said, making a zero out of my fingers and thumb. “In fact, I don’t even like artsy movies.”
“You know, most of these snobs don’t like art films, either. They simply pretend to so they’ll seem cool, intellectual.” He grinned. “If they knew my secret love of cheesy eighties movies I’d probably be banned from LA.”
My eyes widened with interest. “You like eighties movies?”
He looked sheepish. “Not very manly, huh? Combine that with my love for eighties music and I might as well go around wearing a skirt.”
“Actually, I think it’s very manly to admit you like something unmanly. Shows you’re sexually confident. So what’s your favorite eighties movie?”
He thought for a moment. “Probably The Breakfast Club.”
“I love The Breakfast Club.” I tapped a finger to my chin, thinking. “But my favorite would have to be Some Kind of Wonderful.”
“Some Kind of Wonderful,” he repeated. “Yeah. I never got that one. I mean, why would Eric Stoltz spend the whole movie drooling over the boring, popular girl, even though he had that smoking best friend all along? I mean, he made poor Watts actually sit through their date.”
“Right,” I said, suddenly realizing the movie’s parallels to our present situation and hoped he didn’t think I’d brought it up on purpose. Time to change the subject. “And then there’s Pretty in Pink.”
“That’s worse.” Jamie groaned. “At least in Some Kind of Wonderful he ends up with the right girl at the end. Molly Ringwald screws poor, faithful Ducky in favor of that sissy Andrew McCarthy.”
“Hey, watch what you say about my boyfriend!” I laughed. “In third grade I was going to marry him, you know.”
Who would have thought I’d ever end up