The Second Assistant by Clare Naylor, Mimi Hare Page A

dress. Just let me know.” I was such a creep. So desperate for friends that I was offering to theme a party around someone’s dress.
    “So are you taking a date?” she asked as she sipped from the can of Diet Coke that had been sitting on my desk since this morning.
    “I don’t think that I’m allowed,” I confided. “Actually, I’ll be kind of on duty.”
    “Oh, I see. God, well, that’ll make it more interesting for you. At least when someone boring tries to talk to you, it’ll be easy to pretend you have to whip a waiter’s ass or something. So do you have a boyfriend?”
    “Actually, no. I’m pretty new in town. And I’ve been kind of busy.” Christ, I had no idea how important boyfriends were in Hollywood. It seemed that having a man to share a pizza with on a Friday night completely validated your existence, your beauty, your choice of gym, and your general interestingness in a way that it never would have done in D.C. I made a mental note not to be too scarred by the Jake Hudson experience and find myself one soon.
    “Shame.” Cameron, quite understandably, seemed a little over her conversation with me. I didn’t have a boyfriend, I was deferential to the point of creepiness, and I kept trying to check out the label on her pants, because if I looked halfway as good in them as she did, I was going to buy them no matter what they cost. I plucked up the courage to be casual-friendly.
    “I love your pants. Where did you get them?”
    “Oh, I dunno. What does my label say?” She stuck her butt across my desk, and I carefully looked. This time my prayer went:
    “Please, God, do not let me extract the label from her pants in any way that will suggest that my interest is in anything more than what brand they are. Or I will die.”
    “Oh, whaddaya know? Kmart.” I laughed too gaily, relieved not to have been arrested for being a pervert.
    “Oh, hey, that’s cool.” She giggled and slid off my desk. “And here he is. The handsomest agent in Hollywood!” And she leaped up like a Labrador, or a golden retriever maybe, as Scott walked along the corridor.
    “Cam, baby!” He grinned widely as she hugged him tight. “Come on over here. I’ve been missin’ you.”
    “You have not. I hear you’ve been bopping . . .” And she whispered the woman’s name in his ear. Scott actually looked a little shocked. Whomever she thought he’d been bopping, Cameron was correct. Lara, who had just walked back into the room, gave Cameron a polite hug before Scott led her away to his room.
    “So let’s talk business, baby. You gonna bring home that Academy Award for me this year, you gorgeous bitch?” Scott laughed as he closed the door in Lara’s face.
    “So did you call Jake back yet?” Courtney asked in a faux-casual manner as she swung backward on her chair and checked her newly bleached teeth in a compact mirror.
    “No, I didn’t,” I said calmly. “And to tell you the truth, I don’t think I will.”
    “Jeez, what? You think maybe by your not calling him back, he’ll just want you even more?” she asked sarcastically.
    “No, I’m just not especially interested.”
    “You’ve changed your tune.” She snapped her mirror shut.
    “I thought he was great. Before I realized what a complete slut he was.” I laughed, trying to sound as though I didn’t care, when really I had thought of little other than how, short of becoming Julia Roberts, I was ever going to get Jake Hudson to fall in love with me. Shortly after which I officially gave up. “Besides, I’m having enough trouble figuring out how to work the phones around here. I’ll leave dating until I’m competent enough to call guys back.”
    I knew that Courtney was thinking what a stuck-up bitch I was, but then she’d think that no matter what I said or did. I smiled at her as warmly as I could and then got back to my work.
    But no sooner had I put my head down than Cameron came bounding out of Scott’s office.
    “Okay, honey.