series of deliberately terrible accents. But then Brooke became compelled to try to coach memorable performances out of her, and Max didn’t have the patience to morph herself into an actress on top of everything else.
At least the blog was going okay. Traffic was soaring. The other day Vixen.com had called Brooke the “celebutante Dorothy Parker of our time.” The hyperbole had made Max want to barf a little—it was just a blog about random crap, half of which she made up—but then Brooke had given her a bonus. Maybe, Max thought as she trailed Brooke down a wide lane filled mostly with white vans, she should stop being such a crank. It wasn’t
Brooke’s
fault that Max’s father had broken the coffeemaker when he’d tried to turn it into a cocktail shaker, and a sunny, crisp mid-March day rolling around the back lot of one of the biggest movie studios in Hollywood was bound to be more fun than her usual routine (sleeping until noon,picking a fight with her mother, staring at her still-blank NYU application, and then watching a crummy Drew Barrymore movie on HBO).
“Fine. One more time,” Max said. “But just the part with your speech, okay? And you now owe me
two
coffees.” She cleared her throat and read aloud, in the most deadpan voice she could muster, “Nancy, this is crazy.”
“No, Ned. Crazy is me lying shivering and hungry on a bed made of the trash bags of
strangers
,” Brooke replied, halting in front of a vending machine and reciting the line from memory. “Crazy is how all my bedtime stories came from the drug dealer selling crack outside my window. But finding the man who killed your father? Fighting for the truth? From where I’m sitting, Ned, that’s the only thing that makes any sense at all.”
A tear squeaked out of Brooke’s left eye and rolled through her bronzer onto her chin.
“Not bad,” Max offered, trying to take in the sights of the lot. She was pretty sure the parking spot they’d just passed said G. CLOONEY on it.
“Gee, thanks,” Brooke snorted, turning away and breaking into a walk so speedy that Max could barely keep up. “Daddy always says, ‘Nothing is
so
bad as something that is not-so-bad.’ ”
“I don’t even know what that means.”
“It means that if you can’t be awesome, you’re better off being awful, because at least awful is memorable,” Brookesaid from several feet down the road. “I mean, look at Keanu Reeves.”
Max thought about the
Point Break
poster in her room. “Huh. I actually agree with you,” Max said. “Okay, then, you were good. Very believable.” And she meant it. “But the script is cracktacularly bad.” She meant that, too.
Brooke sighed, and finally stopped to examine her lip gloss in the reflection of an office window. As Max caught up, a guy looked up from his computer and jumped in surprise when he saw them.
I feel you, dude
, she thought.
“No, Max. It’s actually a really gritty look at the
Nancy Drew
mythos,” Brooke explained, in words Max suspected she’d been fed by Caroline Goldberg. “Nancy is
the
hot role in town right now. They’ve been trying to cast her for months.” She fluffed her hair. “It’s a lot to expect my first time on the circuit, of course. Personally, I think I’d make a wonderful Bess. She
is
the pretty friend.”
“I also seem to recall them calling her fat a lot of the time.”
Brooke brightened. “Yes! A fat suit would be so humble. I mean, Nicole Kidman won an Oscar for going ugly, and that was just a fake nose and a bun.”
A golf cart sped past them—was that Jeremy Renner?—as they trudged across the expansive studio lot. Max had only been there once before, when she was in sixth grade and her mother had insisted they go on the official tour. Like any kid that age being forced to sightsee, Max hadspent the entire time staring at her sneakers and wishing she was somewhere else—specifically, a place where nobody used perky phrases like
movie magic
and meant them.
At least the blog was going okay. Traffic was soaring. The other day Vixen.com had called Brooke the “celebutante Dorothy Parker of our time.” The hyperbole had made Max want to barf a little—it was just a blog about random crap, half of which she made up—but then Brooke had given her a bonus. Maybe, Max thought as she trailed Brooke down a wide lane filled mostly with white vans, she should stop being such a crank. It wasn’t
Brooke’s
fault that Max’s father had broken the coffeemaker when he’d tried to turn it into a cocktail shaker, and a sunny, crisp mid-March day rolling around the back lot of one of the biggest movie studios in Hollywood was bound to be more fun than her usual routine (sleeping until noon,picking a fight with her mother, staring at her still-blank NYU application, and then watching a crummy Drew Barrymore movie on HBO).
“Fine. One more time,” Max said. “But just the part with your speech, okay? And you now owe me
two
coffees.” She cleared her throat and read aloud, in the most deadpan voice she could muster, “Nancy, this is crazy.”
“No, Ned. Crazy is me lying shivering and hungry on a bed made of the trash bags of
strangers
,” Brooke replied, halting in front of a vending machine and reciting the line from memory. “Crazy is how all my bedtime stories came from the drug dealer selling crack outside my window. But finding the man who killed your father? Fighting for the truth? From where I’m sitting, Ned, that’s the only thing that makes any sense at all.”
A tear squeaked out of Brooke’s left eye and rolled through her bronzer onto her chin.
“Not bad,” Max offered, trying to take in the sights of the lot. She was pretty sure the parking spot they’d just passed said G. CLOONEY on it.
“Gee, thanks,” Brooke snorted, turning away and breaking into a walk so speedy that Max could barely keep up. “Daddy always says, ‘Nothing is
so
bad as something that is not-so-bad.’ ”
“I don’t even know what that means.”
“It means that if you can’t be awesome, you’re better off being awful, because at least awful is memorable,” Brookesaid from several feet down the road. “I mean, look at Keanu Reeves.”
Max thought about the
Point Break
poster in her room. “Huh. I actually agree with you,” Max said. “Okay, then, you were good. Very believable.” And she meant it. “But the script is cracktacularly bad.” She meant that, too.
Brooke sighed, and finally stopped to examine her lip gloss in the reflection of an office window. As Max caught up, a guy looked up from his computer and jumped in surprise when he saw them.
I feel you, dude
, she thought.
“No, Max. It’s actually a really gritty look at the
Nancy Drew
mythos,” Brooke explained, in words Max suspected she’d been fed by Caroline Goldberg. “Nancy is
the
hot role in town right now. They’ve been trying to cast her for months.” She fluffed her hair. “It’s a lot to expect my first time on the circuit, of course. Personally, I think I’d make a wonderful Bess. She
is
the pretty friend.”
“I also seem to recall them calling her fat a lot of the time.”
Brooke brightened. “Yes! A fat suit would be so humble. I mean, Nicole Kidman won an Oscar for going ugly, and that was just a fake nose and a bun.”
A golf cart sped past them—was that Jeremy Renner?—as they trudged across the expansive studio lot. Max had only been there once before, when she was in sixth grade and her mother had insisted they go on the official tour. Like any kid that age being forced to sightsee, Max hadspent the entire time staring at her sneakers and wishing she was somewhere else—specifically, a place where nobody used perky phrases like
movie magic
and meant them.
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