Junior Year Box Set

The company he once owned had shown him the door. Still, after talking to me, Rita had decided to keep him as her agent. Someday I would have to get all the gory details on what had happened to cause them to push him out.

Saul had to be over-the-moon excited that he’d placed two of his clients in such a high-profile movie.

After I hung up, I walked over to Rita’s suite.

“Have you heard?” she asked as she opened the door.

“That you’re playing my mother?” I asked.

Even my little dig about her being old enough to be my mother couldn’t dampen her excitement. Trip and Halle caught it and rolled their eyes at me as I hugged a very happy Rita.

She invited me inside and sat me down.

“Tell me what you’re getting,” she ordered.

I knew that they tended to shortchange female cast, so I figured I would give her all the details. I even shared what they had offered to pay Daniel Craig and how Chubby planned to roll the savings into increased production costs and better talent.

Rita gave me a tight smile that I interpreted to mean she hadn’t gotten close to what I was offered.

“I need to go talk to my agent,” Rita decided.

“I still haven’t signed my contract. If you’d like, I’d be willing to enter joint negotiations,” I said.

She was taken aback.

“Thanks, but I don’t think that’ll be necessary. The studio has to know that Saul represents both of us. He should have told me what you just did to help me decide on my offer. Plus, I don’t want you to ever make that offer to anyone again,” she said, scolding me.

“Rita, I won’t, but the offer stands. I consider you to be a mentor and almost family. I wouldn’t do this for anyone else,” I admitted.

We hugged, and I left so she could make her call. I ran off to find my parents and Caryn so she could get Kent on it.

◊◊◊

When I finally made it back to my room, I received a call from Jeff Delahey.

“I got a strange request. My parent company wants me to interview you and Rita James. It was just announced that the two of you will be in the next James Bond movie.”

I should have figured they would release that announcement. That meant I should expect press from the States to start showing up. Jeff and I agreed on a time and place. He then sheepishly asked if I would ask Rita. I just laughed at him, hung up, and dialed a number.

“Frank, it’s David. Something’s come up,” I started.

“Did you get caught with a dead hooker?” he asked.

We’d joked about that in the past. I contended that Fritz could make a dead hooker disappear. I think Frank just relished the payday he expected to help me fight it in the press.

“No, they just announced that Rita James and I will be in the new James Bond movie.”

Frank had me on the phone for the next thirty minutes, going over everything I knew. He planned to crank up his media team so he could control the narrative to my best advantage. He promised to have talking points to Rita and me before we met with Jeff.

After I got off the phone, I shook my head. It seemed like whenever one of my activities wound down, one or two of the others would make their presence known.

◊◊◊

I had a big grin on my face when we sat down with Jeff. I’d heard him on more than one occasion rail against the fashion and entertainment reporters who showed up at sporting events to ask questions.

“Just shut up,” Jeff said, which confused Rita since I hadn’t said anything.

“We better hope they wrote down a bunch of questions for him, or this will be fun,” I said.

“What do you mean?” Rita asked.

“Jeff is a hard sports reporter. I bet the last movie he watched was Finding Nemo with his granddaughter.”

“Oh,” Rita said to me, and then turned to Jeff. “Did they give you a list of questions?”

“Yes.”

“Can I see them?” Rita asked.

She began to read them and shook her head.

“Let me help you,” she suggested, and he handed over his pencil so she could mark through the questions. She looked over what she’d done and then added a few more.

Rita even numbered them and marked each one with whom he should ask it of.

“Here, this should help.”

Jeff took them and read what she’d given him.

“Okay, this makes more sense. I think this’ll work,” Jeff agreed.

We did twelve minutes of interview. That later turned into ninety seconds on air, thirty of which was eaten up with Jeff introducing himself and another fifteen of us being introduced. Thankfully, they picked Rita’s response to one of his questions to air. All I had to do was sit there and smile. I wish all my interviews were that easy.

◊◊◊

Mom sent me a text saying the people from Busch Gardens were here. I gathered my parents, Cassidy, and Chuck, and we drove to the veterinarian who was keeping the tiger cubs for us. Someone had tipped Jeff off, and he had his camera crew there to film the handover.

“I bet you’re getting sick of seeing me,” Jeff said.

“For this … no. I’m just glad we found a home for them. I think my Lab, Duke, would have been worried if I brought them home.”