Just Like Me, Only Better by Carol Snow Read Free Book Online

Even sleeping is optional. If you can’t make a total commitment, you shouldn’t even be here.”
    Instead of telling Jason Katz to go to hell, Kitty turns her misty eyes down and forces a smile. In return, Jason taps her on the cheek and says, “Hey, I believe in you.” The cheek tap is meant to convey sexual tension, but there’s something about the Katz—his stiff dialogue? his smug expression? the refusal to shed the white coat, even at the restaurant?—that’s just yucky.
    Real sexual tension doesn’t appear until season two, when leather-loving Cassandra introduces her boyfriend, Chase, to Kitty. Chase is played by the dark-haired, dark-eyed, sweet-yetsmoldering Brady Ellis.
    “Yow!” I said, leaning toward the TV to get a better look.
    “Mommy, I can’t see.”
    I leaned back, my eyes still glued to the screen. “Smokin’,” I murmured.
    “Chase” wore soft blue jeans, a form-fitting black T-shirt, and black high-tops, a guitar slung over his shoulder. His smile revealed bright white teeth and boyish dimples. He had a shy gaze and a habit of sticking his hands in his pockets.
    “Mommy, why are you breathing funny?”
    (Oh, my God—I was actually panting.)
    I hit the pause button. “Eight o’clock. Time for bed.”
    “I just want to watch to the end.”
    I stood up. “C’mon, buddy. We had a deal. Get your jammies on.”
    “I didn’t get to watch Ninja Turtles . So I get to stay up later.”
    “Says who?”
    He batted his pale eyelashes, put his hands together and flashed an angelic smile. “Pleeeeeease.”
    “Brush your teeth and get your jammies on. Then you can watch to the end. But you’re going to bed the minute this is over, understand?”
    Three episodes later (I am such a sucker), Ben finally went to sleep, and I slipped Beverly Hills Bling into the DVD player. It was a made-for-TV movie, broadcast on the Betwixt Channel, the same kids’ network that produced Kitty and the Katz.
    This time around, Haley, in the role of perky, fresh-faced Joanna Judd, has once again moved to L.A. from flyover country (Wisconsin, this time), but her ambitions have shifted. Forget medicine—Joanna Judd wants to be a star! Not because she’s, like, narcissistic or anything—she’s just trying to fulfill her mother’s dream. Her dead mother. Who sang like an angel, her talent unappreciated out on the dairy farm. (In one flashback, we see Mama Judd singing to her cows.)
    Once in L.A., Joanna needs to support herself, so she gets a job at Bling, a high-end Beverly Hills jewelry store, even though she sounds and looks like a total hick. The store owner, a fat, bald guy who’s supposed to be funny but isn’t, appreciates her “authenticity.”
    Enter Travis Trayworth (Brady Ellis) and his girlfriend, Chelsea Davenport (the actress who plays Cassandra, minus the leather and black eyeliner). Travis is a college student majoring in education. Chelsea is a viper, but Travis doesn’t see that because he assumes everyone is as kind and genuine as he is. Travis’s father is a benevolent Hollywood bazillionaire, which is why he can take Chelsea to Bling to pick out a diamond tennis bracelet for her birthday. (Which begs the question: what is a tennis bracelet, anyway?)
    Ninety minutes later, Joanna has Travis’s love and a recording contract. It doesn’t really matter how she gets to that point (there was a very long society party sequence). I found the movie remarkably inane and predictable, and if not for Brady Ellis, I wouldn’t have sat through it even once. Instead, I watched it three times, finally falling asleep on the couch sometime around two o’clock, dreaming of Hollywood.

Chapter Seven
     
     
     
    H ello?”
    “Yes, good afternoon. This is Rodrigo Gonzo, Miss Haley Rush’s assistant. May I have the pleasure of speaking to Miss Veronica Zap, please?”
    “This is Veronica Czaplicki.”
    Dead silence.
    “Hello?” I said.
    “Can you spell that last name, please?”
    I did.
    “Right.