13 Going on 30
Rose floated home on a cloud. She and Mack had kissed, and nothing had ever felt more right. When he had pulled away, he had smiled down at her and helped her up. Mack had hugged her for a long time and then walked her home. Outside of the building, Mack kissed her again. "Goodnight."
"Goodnight." She looked at him hopefully. "Mack, I'm really glad you did the project with me, and I'm glad we were finally able to be honest. I wasted so much time, Mack. I'm sorry I did."
"I'll see you later, Rose," Mack said quickly as he turned away. He walked away swiftly, knowing that he had to keep what had just happened with Rose a secret.
As Rose went into her building, her heart was still beating fast. He was a really good kisser, and now she could be happy again. Rose remembered being kissed by two guys: Dax and Ty. Neither meant anything to her. But Mack did. Mack was everything.
Near her apartment door, she spied a gang of giggling girls, Becky among them. "Hi, Becky," Rose greeted her young neighbor. "Having a sleep over?"
"Yeah," Becky said, "Actually, Rose, we were wondering…could you give us makeovers? We're so bored, and since you're so glamorous, maybe you could give us some tips?" The redheaded girl looked up at Rose hopefully. Rose knew what it was like to idol someone. She nodded.
Rose opened the front door and the younger girls raced inside. Rose smiled as she followed them into her bedroom. "Wow," one of them breathed. "It's beautiful. I bet this room is nicer than my whole apartment. Can I touch things? If I break it, do I have to buy it?"
Becky grinned. "You're so overdramatic, Kim."
"I don't think there's anything to break, anyway. Let's go raid the closet," Rose suggested. The girls shrieked in delight. Rose felt so popular. As they ran into the closet, she changed into pajamas.
When the girls had finished playing dress up with Rose's clothes, they filed out into Rose's bedroom again. "I bet you have a boyfriend," one of the girls spoke up. "Is he really cute?"
"Dana!" Becky cried. "You don't have to be so blunt. If Rose wants to tell us about her love life, she will."
"It's OK, Dana. I don't officially have a boyfriend, but I kind of do. I just got back from seeing him. He kissed me goodnight." Rose could feel herself smiling. She loved this girl talk.
"What's his name?" Kim asked.
"His name is Mack, and I've known him since we were both in diapers. We grew up together. He's my best friend."
"Tell us more," spoke up the girl named Cassie. "Please?"
"It was just amazing," Rose said dreamily. "It was like I wasn't even there. I was just watching us down below while we were kissing."
"That's so romantic," Becky gushed. A curly haired blond named Sydney nodded her agreement.
Rose smiled, rolling up the sleeves of her pajama top. "Look, goose bumps," she said, holding out her arm.
"Wow," the six other girls breathed.
"Do you love him?" Jen asked.
"Duh," Kim said.
"When are you going to see him again?" Dana questioned in her soft voice.
Rose shrugged. "Oh, I don't know. It's all so complicated. We can't really be together. He's engaged." She let out a big sigh. "It's a grown up thing."
"At least you have someone to dream about," Jen offered.
"Guys don't want to jump your bones when you're a metal mouth," Cassie spoke up.
Rose had been fiddling with her stuffed elephant's trunk absentmindedly. But at Cassie's words, Rose snapped back to attention. "What kind of attitude is that? We are young, and we are beautiful. Boys are dumb, girls. Heartache to heartache we stand. Love is a battlefield, and there are a lot of casualties."
"Wow," the girls sighed again. "You're deep."
Rose turned the TV to a channel that played music from the '80's. Coincidentally, the song she had just been quoting came on, and she laughed. Rose began to dance around her bedroom, and soon the younger girls joined her, delighted to be part of Rose's games.
When Becky announced that they should start heading back to her apartment, Rose pranced into the closet and pulled out six purses similar to the one Becky had admired. "Remember me fondly, girls. And remember, love is a battlefield."
With her young friends gone, Rose felt strangely lonely. Now she would have to think about Mack and what had happened just two hours before. Rose felt guilty as she realized exactly what she had done. She had kissed Mack, her best friend, and nothing could ever come of it. He was engaged to Ronny, not to her. She'd been out of his life for too long to have a real claim on him. She had to let him go.
0o0o0o0
At work on Monday, Rose brought along the pictures Mack had taken so she could finish the final arrangement. Her presentation was in two hours, and Rose was very nervous. 'Breathe,' the petite woman reminded herself. 'You have to breathe. You can do this, Rose. You can do it.'
Rose grinned and picked up the first picture Mack had taken. "Isn't Francis cute?" she asked Arlene, who looked confused. "The dog," Rose clarified.
Arlene nodded as Rose spoke again. "So what do you think, Arlene? Isn't Mack so talented?"
"I think that I'm actually going to start reading Poise...for the first time ever," Arlene replied. The older woman smiled at Rose. "I'll leave you to your work, Rose." It was the first time she'd called Rose by her first name.
Maybe Rose wasn't as bad a person as she'd thought.
0o0o0o0
Mack sat at his desk in his apartment, talking to the owner of a formal outfitting store. "I have a place I rent in the village. I can get it by Friday." The owner began to babble, and Friday crossed Mack's mind. Rose…he was going to meet her for dinner on Friday. While the owner jabbered on, Mack took out a calendar and penciled in her name on the square. He ignored the fact that his wedding was taking place on Sunday.
There was silence on the phone. It must be his turn to talk. "I'll see you then. Bye."
He had just hung up the phone when a pair of hands suddenly covered his eyes. "Hey," he said, reaching up to touch his companion. Mack peeled the other pair of hands off of his face and turned in his chair to see his fiancée. "Hi…Ronny."
"What, were you expecting someone else?" Ronny teased. She did not notice that Mack suddenly looked guilty. She was too busy being happy that she was finally getting to spend some time with Mack. "I want to take you to lunch. Are you hungry?"
"Yeah," Mack answered as he stood up. Ronny pressed herself closer to him, grabbed his face in her hands and kissed him. But for Mack, it meant nothing. She was just a girl.
Ronny picked a sushi restaurant for lunch. She always forgot that Mack hated sushi. He tried to ignore it. She made small talk until their orders arrived, and Mack couldn't help but feel this was just like a blind date. After Ronny took her first bite, she pounced. "We need to figure out what we're doing here, Mack. You can take pictures of vitamin bottles anywhere. I don't want us to be a commuter couple during our first year of marriage."
"What?"
"Our first year of marriage. Aw, you're nervous, aren't you? It's OK, Mack. I am too." Ronny picked a California roll off of his plate. "So, Florida?"
"Florida," Mack agreed weakly.
0o0o0o0
Rose strode out of her office. She was about to address Arlene when Richard appeared at Arlene's cubicle looking very angry. "Excuse my French, Rose, but my balls are in an iron vise. Corporate is squeezing like a dominatrix on steroids and Mira just told me she is doing her own presentation. Would you please tell me what's going on here?"
"What's going on is that you'll have more choices."
"With all due respect to Mira, I'm more interested in seeing what you've been up to."
"Thank you," Rose began, smiling. Richard quickly interrupted his employee.
"That's not a compliment. I'm trying to pressure you."
"Can you hang in there for an hour?"
"Rose-"
The phone rang. Arlene picked it up. "Poise magazine, Miss Ortiz's line." The secretary listened for a moment. "Right away." She looked up at Rose. "The prints are done."
"Goodie." Rose ran into her office, and then Richard turned to Arlene.
"Why does nobody listen to a word I say anymore?" he asked. Arlene shrugged.
"Arlene, aren't you coming?" Rose asked. Arlene's face lit up and she followed Rose.
"Oh, she's invited to go along. Who am I? I'm just the editor-in-bloody-chief."
The smiling receptionist had a taxi waiting when Rose and Arlene arrived in the lobby. Rose and Arlene scrambled into it. "1221 West Powers!" Rose told the cabbie.
As Rose and her secretary went off to get the photographs, Mira was just starting her presentation. The lights in the conference room were off, and all eyes were on Mira's slide show. "The new Poise will explore the final frontier. It will do heroin chic one better. It will OD. It will kill." The image flickered in bright colors, with words like "shocking" and "chic" jumping out at the viewer.
Mira walked in front of the projector. "Poise will be serious – deadly serious. It will be fashion suicide." Mira turned her brown eyes on Richard. "What do you think?"
"I don't like it," he said simply. "You may go."
Mira stormed out of the room and into the hallway, knocking over boxes and pictures as she went. When she reached Rose's office, she saw that it was empty. She decided to wait for the other woman to come back. Mira opened a desk drawer and was shocked to see an envelope marked Sparkle in it.
0o0o0o0
Rose stood at the head of the conference table, feeling very nervous. She took a deep breath and began to speak. "I know this is different from anything we've ever done before. I know you might hate it and think that I'm completely crazy. But I won't care. I don't mean it disrespectfully," Rose added, looking at her boss. "But I've realized something."
Taking another deep breath, Rose spun around to look at her first three posters. "Who are these people? I don't recognize any of them. Do you guys?" Rose took down the boards with the unfamiliar models plastered on them to reveal the boards with Mack's pictures on them. I want to see my best friend's big sister," she said, pointing to a girl in a cheerleader uniform. "Or the girls on the soccer team. My next door neighbor. Real woman who are smart…and beautiful. They're happy to be who they are. I think we can put life back into the magazine, and fun. We all need to feel again, or we'll lose sight of what really matters."
Rose turned to face the rest of the Poise staff, waiting for their reaction. To her surprise, they burst into applause, and Rose felt her heart soar. "You guys like it? Really?"
"We'll present it to corporate first thing in the morning," Richard announced as he stood to join Rose. He gave her a big hug and then turned to look more closely at the photographs. "Who is this photographer? He's brilliant. We'll pay top dollar to sign him."
"His name is Mack Hartford," Rose said, "He's an old friend of mine."
"Arthur or Martha?"
"No, Mack," Rose corrected. "Mack."
"I mean…is he into boys?"
"Are you?"
Richard burst out laughing.
0o0o0o0
Rose walked out of the Poise office feeling on top of the world. She had to go home and tell Mack the good news. Now, since he'd be working for such a prominent (or soon to become prominent once more) magazine, he wouldn't go to Florida. He couldn't go to Florida.
Rose walked off in the direction of her apartment, not knowing that Mack was just a block behind her.
He knew he shouldn't be here, especially now that Ronny was in town, but after the disastrous lunch, she'd gone off to do some last minute shopping before the wedding. So Mack decided to pop in on Rose, because who knew when he would see her again.
Mack was told that Rose's office was on the top floor. No one mentioned that Rose had left not five minutes before.
0o0o0o0
Mira crept back into Rose's empty office. She'd had to leave when the photos for Rose's presentation were brought in so she wouldn't be discovered, but now the coast was clear. Mira's brown eyes studied the pictures, trying to decide what was so special about them. The whole office was buzzing about Rose's idea, but Mira couldn't understand why. They looked like something straight out of a high school yearbook. Photos by: Mack Hartford. No wonder.
The brunette sat down at Rose's desk once more and went right for the drawer where she'd found the Sparkle envelope. She still couldn't believe what she'd uncovered not an hour ago. Mira had never known Rose had such a deceitful side to her in the first place. Well, two could play Rose's little games.
Mira picked up the phone and dialed the number for city listings. "San Angeles, Sparkle Magazine on Park Avenue." She waited for a moment while she was connected. "Trish Sackett, please."
It took Mira all of five seconds to convince Trish that Rose Ortiz was not the right person for the position that Trish had promised her. On top of that, Mira told Trish that she could give Sparkle a whole new look, one that was guaranteed to sell millions of copies monthly in exchange for the position of editor-in-chief. Mira was smirking as she got off the phone with Trish.
Mack walked into Rose's office not a minute later. The desk chair was turned away from him, and he couldn't see who was sitting in it. "Hi, Rose. So how did the presentation go? Can we take a walk, maybe? I came to talk to you."
"Guess again, Beaver," Mira said coldly as she spun the chair around. Mack looked away, irritated. Why couldn't Mira just grow up? She seemed to sense his annoyance. "I meant to say 'Hi, Mack.' I'm sorry. Old habits, you know."
"Fine. Look, is Rose around? I really need to talk to her."
"Are you here about your pictures?" Mira asked in a falsely innocent tone.
"No, actually I'm not."
This was where all of Mira's lying skills came into play. "Well, I guess I should just tell you," she began in a serious tone. It was all she could do not to grin. Mira unfolded herself from Rose's desk chair and slowly began to walk towards him. "Rose decided to go in a slightly different direction, with a more established photographer. She's gonna use the guy who takes all of the official photos of her sweetie." Mira pointed to a picture of Dax posing in what he clearly thought was a cool way. "It's nothing personal. It's just a little bias, you know."
Mira was now just a few inches away from him. "I'm sorry to be the one to tell you. I think your pictures are really cute, Mack."
He turned to leave. "Nice talking to you."
"Oh, Mack, while I've got you here, would you mind signing a general release? Maybe we could give your pictures to a catalogue or something." This was turning out to be much easier than Mira had expected it to be.
"Fine. Whatever."
0o0o0o0
On Friday evening, Rose tied a pink ribbon in her hair, the final touch for her outfit. She was going to meet Mack for dinner, or she hoped she was. She hadn't been able to get a hold of Mack all week, so she was clearly taking a risk by walking over to his apartment. She hoped he was feeling OK.
A block away from Mack's apartment, Rose passed a newsstand. Frowning, she pulled down the copies of Sparkle and hid them behind the copies of Poise. She felt a little better as she continued on her way.
The gate buzzed as soon as Rose pressed the button, almost like he was waiting for her. But to Rose's surprise, Mack didn't answer the door. Instead, the petite woman found herself face to face with Mack's fiancée. She was wearing one of his shirts. "Hi," Rose said hesitantly.
"Hi. It's Rosalina, right?"
"Just Rose, actually. I was looking for Mack. Is he here? I have some news to tell him, and he hasn't been answering the phone." Rose thought it was safer not to mention that she'd thought she and Mack had had dinner plans. "It's his pictures. Everyone just loved them." Hopefully, corporate would love them, too. They just hadn't had a chance to meet with the president of Poise yet due to scheduling errors.
"Oh, that's great. I'll make sure to tell him when he gets home. He's just out getting his tux."
"His tux?" Rose echoed.
"I know. Men. Everything is at the last possible minute." Ronny smiled, shaking her head. "I mean, we have last minute things to do all day tomorrow until we leave for his dad's and our wedding is Sunday morning. He left it as late as possible. But that's Mack."
"His dad's?" Rose repeated.
"We're getting married there. It's going to be the cutest backyard wedding since I don't know when. We're so happy."
"Congratulations," Rose managed to choke out.
"Thanks. I'll tell Mack you came by. Goodnight."
Before Rose could say anything, Ronny had shut the door.
0o0o0o0
After Rose left Mack's apartment, Richard called and told her that he had finally pegged the president of Poise for a meeting. The only drawback was that it meant she had to go the office on Saturday. But Rose was too excited to care.
She got to her office on Saturday morning and ran through her speech a few times. Then Richard appeared in her office. Rose turned to him. "Ready?" she asked. He shook his head.
"There's no meeting, Rose. The photos aren't ours anymore. Mira got to Mack. She got him to sign a release and then gave the photos to Sparkle. She's their new editor-in-chief."
Rose could understand why Mira would stab her in the back, but not why Mack would. "Why?"
"I don't know. Go ask her. She's in her office, packing up."
Rose marched past her boss towards Mira's office. She had a score to settle, and she planned on doing it.