Page 7 of For My Finale

L ilah clenched the steering wheel of the rental car, her jaw tight, and her patience nonexistent.

Bringing the car into town had been a stupid idea.

She should have walked. But whilst she might be technically English, she was very much an American by habit, and jumping into the car to come into town had been second nature.

And now this.

Parallel parking.

Driving in LA had meant wide lanes and drive-through parking spaces and frankly, she hadn’t even needed to parallel park for her driving test. But here she was.

She knew the basics, of course. It was something to do with turning the wheel opposite to something else and… and just sliding into the space. She’d seen it done. It couldn’t be that hard.

The little car beeped in protest as she inched it closer to the curb, opened her door, looked out, gritted her teeth, closed her door, pulled out, and started all over again.

It wasn’t that the space was too small. It was huge. Far bigger than the car.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she growled, backing the car in again and ending up at an almost ninety degree angle to the pavement.

There was a knock at her window, startling her. She looked up to see a tall, middle-aged man with salt-and-pepper hair and an amused expression on his face. He made the old fashioned gesture for rolling down the window. Lilah obliged.

“Need a bit of help here, love?”

“I’ve got it under control,” Lilah said primly.

He crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow. “Right. Course you have. Um, you know that you’re pointing the wrong way and you’re half-way into the street, right?”

She glared at him. “Who even are you?”

“Arthur Foster, Arty to you. Landlord of the local pub and parking expert.” He grinned a bit there.

“I don’t need your help,” said Lilah.

“Of course you don’t.” He sniffed. “You won’t mind if I stand here and watch then? Only that car behind is mine and I’d hate to see it squished.”

“I’m not going to squish anything,” Lilah protested. She scowled, and, out of sheer stubbornness, tried again.

The car lurched back toward the curb at an angle that could only be described as obtuse. Lilah thought she might just get out and abandon the car. She didn’t need the damn thing now, anyway. Maybe she should just walk away.

Arty sighed. “Move over,” he said.

“What?”

“I said, move over. I can’t in good conscience let you leave your car like this.”

She opened her mouth to argue, but, to be honest, the last thing she needed right now was for yet another local to think she was an asshole and/or completely incompetent. With a huff, she undid her seatbelt and climbed out.

Arty slid into the driver’s seat, adjusted the mirrors like a pro, and, without needing to correct even once, parked the car neatly and perfectly in something under ten seconds.

Lilah folded her arms and gave him another glare as he got out. “Show off.”

He smirked. “You know, I spent a decade as a journalist in London, and I was damn good at my job. But this, this is my real talent. I could park for England, I could. ”

Against her will, Lilah found that her lips were itching to smile. She swallowed it down. “Congrats then, you’re officially better than me at one thing.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Arty said, as he climbed out of the car and leaned against it. “So, what’s the plan, Paxton?”

Her stomach screwed up into a ball. It was too much to hope for that she wouldn’t be recognized everywhere that she went, she knew that. But some people at least had the courtesy to pretend not to know who she was. “The plan?”

He shrugged. “You’ve been in town, what, a week? What’s next? What’s the plan?”

Lilah stiffened. “I don’t know.”

Arty whistled. “No job, no hobbies, no plan at all? Did you seriously implode your career just to come here and sit around doing nothing?”

“I’ve got a plan,” she snapped. It was a lie, but he didn’t have to know that.

“Uh-huh. And what would that be?”

“I’m working on it.”

Arty raised an eyebrow. “Look, all I’m saying is, people don’t up-end their lives without some kind of goal in mind. Unless you’re here to, I don’t know, rediscover yourself and your roots.”

Lilah bristled. “I am not one of those Hollywood people who go on self-discovery retreats, thank you very much.”

“Could have fooled me.”

Before she could retaliate, a familiar figure walked past. A bright, sunshiny presence on the street. Lilah clenched her teeth. Blossom. Just what she needed. She’d avoided the woman thus far. She didn’t need that kind of positivity in her life.

“There’s someone who can find you something to do,” Arty said with a grin.

Blossom stopped and blinked at them. “Um, why does this feel like I’m being volunteered for something?”

“She’s got no plan,” Arty said.

“This man is seeing fit to interrogate me as to me future,” Lilah said crisply .

Blossom sighed and shook her head at Arty. “You’re not a journo anymore. Leave her alone, Arty. Go back to the pub before someone burns it down.” She looked at Lilah. “Come on, I’ll get you some of that coffee you’ve been wanting.”

Arty didn’t move, still standing against the car, so Lilah stepped around him and joined Blossom. The lesser of two evils. And she did want a coffee, so there was that.

???

As they walked, Blossom kept sneaking glances at Lilah, still not quite able to believe that she was there at all.

Despite her expensive-looking coat and air of city know-it-allness, there was something a bit lost about her. Something lacking in direction. She wasn’t sure if it was because of Arty grilling her or because Lilah wasn’t sure what she was doing in Bankton or a little of both.

Then again, it wasn’t really her business.

They walked toward the corner, but just as they turned, Blossom’s stomach twisted itself into a knot. There was a new sign on the door there. The building had been empty for months now, but no longer. Not according to the sign.

Coming Soon: Coffee-To-Go.

She felt sick. Sick and light-headed and like her world was about to come crashing down around her ears.

Then she felt Lilah looking at her, and she fixed her expression, swallowing and dropping her shoulders. The last thing she needed was Lilah Paxton, famous actress and, admittedly, sex symbol, thinking that she was a failure. She forced a smile and kept walking.

“You okay?” Lilah asked, in a moment of what Blossom suspected was rare perceptiveness.

Blossom waved a hand. “Yes. Fine. Obviously. Just thinking about… scones.”

Lilah squinted. “What’s a scone? ”

“It’s…” Blossom sighed. “I’ll show you when we get inside, alright?”

“Please yourself,” said Lilah. She stopped in front of the cafe. “Is this it then?”

Blossom hesitated. She really couldn’t handle Lilah criticizing the shop right now.

She wasn’t sure she could handle anything right now.

She wanted to go home and put her head under the blankets.

She took a breath. It would all turn out alright, she reminded herself.

Life always turned out alright. “Yes, this is it.”

Lilah nodded. “Looks… nice. Cozy. Comfortable.”

Blossom’s cheeks flushed as she unlocked the door and let them both in.

“You’ve even got a counter with stools like an American Diner,” Lilah said with glee, hopping up onto one of them.

“Homesick?” asked Blossom, ducking behind the counter and opening the baked goods cabinet to extract a scone. She placed it on a plate in front of Lilah.

“What’s that?”

“A scone,” Blossom said.

And she was about to explain, about to say more, but before she could, Lilah picked it up and took a giant bite out of the side. Her face went red and she looked like she might choke. Quickly, Blossom got her a glass of water.

“What the hell…?” coughed Lilah when she could get a breath. “That’s like eating… a sock.”

“Mmm,” said Blossom, trying not to laugh now that it was clear that a movie star was not going to choke to death in her cafe.

“If you’d have let me finish, I was about to tell you that we cut it in half, spread it with jam and cream and then eat it.

Traditionally.” She gave Lilah a look. “Although your way works as well, I suppose.”

“Jesus, I thought I was going to die for a second there. I hope you know the Heimlich.” Lilah peered at the cupboard. “Have you got something in there that isn’t a sock and won’t kill me?”

“Cinnamon roll?” offered Blossom as she started up the coffee machine .

“Perfect,” purred Lilah.

And Blossom was just about to start thinking that maybe this wasn’t so bad, that maybe having Lilah Paxton here could be like having anyone else here, when Daisy burst through the door like a tiny, round tornado.

“Did you see?” Daisy squealed.

Blossom sighed. “The sign? Yes.”

Daisy blinked. “What? No, not that. Lilah Paxton. Her car’s parked just over there. She must be in town somewhere.”

Blossom cleared her throat and gestured vaguely toward where Lilah was sitting at the counter.

Daisy’s eyes widened as big as saucers. “Oh. My. God.”

Lilah groaned. “Please,” she began.

“Daisy, be cool,” said Blossom.

“I am cool,” Daisy insisted, barely containing her excitement. “So, Lilah, I can call you Lilah, right? What’s it like being famous?”

Lilah took the coffee that Blossom offered her. “Exhausting.”

Daisy beamed. “Sounds amazing!”

Blossom stepped around the counter and gently started ushering Daisy out, reminding her that she had her rounds to do and that Lilah would be around town for a while yet.

When she was done, Lilah gave her a grateful look. “Thank you.”

“She’s harmless, just star-struck,” Blossom said.

Lilah neither agreed nor disagreed with this. Instead, she took a slow sip of coffee, then said, “So what’s up with the coffee chain opening up on the corner then?”

Blossom’s smile faltered. “It’s nothing.”

Lilah gave her a skeptical look. “It didn’t seem like nothing. When you saw that sign you looked like you’d seen a ghost.”

“It’s nothing,” Blossom said again. “So, Arty seems to think that you need something to do. How do you feel about making lattes?”

Lilah’s expression was horrified.

Blossom laughed. “Just kidding. Kind of. ”

Lilah rolled her eyes but, to Blossom’s surprise, she smiled. And it wasn’t a Hollywood smile. Not the perfectly practiced one that Blossom had seen in magazines. It was a real one. And just like that, Blossom realized that Lilah Paxton might be more interesting than she’d thought.