Oscar Night by Jennifer Brock Last time, novelist/screenwriter David Fine took his girlfriend model Maritza Delgado to a racetrack to learn to drive fast, and she loved it. In this installment, there are new developments in their relationship, and David's Friend fashion designer Claude Marsh reappears when it's time for the new movie's opening night.

Part 6

Maritza was busy for most of the month of September, and collected a few thousand frequent flier miles. If David hadn’t changed his calling plan to put her in his circle, his phone bill would have been monstrous. Her international roaming charges were obscene, but he chipped in a little. It was worth it to be able to stay in touch.

In the beginning of the month, she flew down to Acapulco for six days to do some catalog work, posing in swimwear in various natural locations. She described some of the things she’d worn to David over the phone, and picturing her in them only made him miss her more. She promised to try to get him on the mailing list so he could see for himself, since they didn’t let her keep anything. David gave her a ride home from the airport, but she just wanted to crash after her long flight and sleep for a day or two. He brought her to her apartment and tucked her into bed. He asked if she wanted company, but she was already out.

He didn’t know whether she was the kind of girlfriend who’d expect her boyfriend to stay over anyway, or if she’d consider that a serious invasion of her personal space. He chose to compromise, and left her a note that read, “Hi, Sweetheart. Call me when you wake up. I wish I could have just crawled in next to you, but I’ve got to go home. I’m behind schedule on my latest draft. Love, David.” He didn’t feel like too much of a weasel, since it was pretty much true, but he did feel ashamed that he didn’t know Maritza well enough.

When she called him several hours afterwards, she sounded disappointed that he didn’t stay and cuddle, so he kept that in mind for the next time. He cooked dinner for her the following night, and all was forgiven. She slept over, and they stayed in bed until noon, enjoying one another’s company in every way possible. David didn’t get a lot of work done with her hanging around, but he really didn’t care. Three days later she was on another plane.

She spent four days in New York shooting a perfume ad, and from there went directly to Milan to work a private show for some big shot David had never heard of. Sometimes her job sounded exotic and exciting, but other times it just seemed like too much discomfort and sacrifice.

After Milan, she only had three days in L.A. before she had to be in Miami to pose in the background of a music video, so David wanted to make the most of their time together. He met her at the airport when she got back from Miami, and took her back to his townhouse. He had a welcoming feast prepared for her, but she had other plans. She told him to let the food wait and led him up the stairs, shedding her clothes as she went.

He wasn’t stripping nearly fast enough for her, and she ended up tearing his shirt to get it off. She threw his naked body onto the bed and insistently mounted him, trying to release the urges that had built up inside her since they’d last been together. He took her energy and redirected it, turning her urgent sex into slow, sensual lovemaking, keeping all her passion but also matching it with tenderness. Ninety minutes later, they were both well-satisfied but sweaty and famished. He threw a light dinner together quickly while she grabbed a shower.

They shared a delicious meal of grilled chicken strips over a tossed green salad, but were dressed more for breakfast: he in his silk undershirt and boxers, she in his bathrobe. The moment just felt so comfortable. Maritza leaned over and gave him a kiss, savoring the vinaigrette on his lips. “You are an excellent chef, my love.”

He kissed her back. “Thank you. Your dinner was going to be veal medallions in a wine sauce with new potatoes, with an assortment of steamed vegetables, but we can have that tomorrow or something.” Then something in her words sank in. “Wait a minute. Back up. What did you call me?”

“I called you my love.” She kissed him again, knowing full well why he was surprised. “Because I love you. And I realize that I never said it before, but I was very scared. I don’t like to be so vulnerable.”

“You don’t need to be afraid. I will never hurt you. And in case I haven’t said it enough, I love you too.”

She kissed him again, and let her robe fall open. His hands moved to gently caress her, but then she pulled his shirt off, and her kisses drifted down to suckle at his nipples for a while before their path downward. Her tongue penetrated his navel while her eager fingers freed him from his shorts. She straddled his chair and lowered herself onto him, giving him a faceful of breasts to enjoy. His tongue found its way around some spots that drove her wild, and she reacted by wriggling faster on his.

They eventually finished in the dining room and went back upstairs for a shared shower, before collapsing together in bed, their naked limbs intertwining. She ended up spending all three days at his place, and only went back to her apartment to pack before going to the airport for her next trip. He really enjoyed having her around.

Upon her return from Miami, she had a little more of a break before her next business trip. They took a three-day weekend up in the wine country and they didn’t have any real clashes staying in the same room, so David decided to ask Maritza to move in with him.

Her first reaction was to try to laugh off the idea. But the more she thought about it, the more it felt like the right thing to do. On her recent trips, she had felt something she hadn’t in a very long time — homesickness. For all the new and interesting people and things she was seeing, she really wanted to get back home. And for the first time, “home” meant where she left her boyfriend, not where she left her mother. She accepted.

Claude’s business had a white cargo van they borrowed to move her things over. Her modeling agency rented the place for her furnished, so it was mostly her clothes that needed to be moved, plus a few personal things. The master bedroom at David’s had two closets, so he moved his things into the smaller one, and let her have the big one. Even so, her wardrobe still spilled over into the closet in the second bedroom, which he had been using as his writing room. She tried to put the things she wore less often in there, but for some reason she still occasionally went looking through that closet when getting dressed. Having his sexy, nude girlfriend rummaging through the closet across from his desk kept him from getting much writing done, but it was a sacrifice he was willing to make.

She had a few jobs in town, and it felt very good to come home to a delicious supper on the table, and a loving partner. David only had to adjust his menu a bit so she wouldn’t gain any extra weight. She had a regular exercise routine that did most of the work to keep her toned, and joined him for his nightly swims. He regretted that he wasn’t able to show her off by daylight, but she wanted to avoid any unnecessary sun.

***

Unfortunately, Maritza was in Tokyo when Condensation had its Hollywood premiere. David would have liked to show up with a pretty girl on his arm, but he felt like there would be many more events it the future that he could bring her to. It scared him that he was so nonchalant about just expecting to have a future with her, but in his heart of hearts he just knew she was the one he would spend the rest of his life with.

He called Nadine, his publicist, and asked her if she’d go with him. She was kind of surprised since he’d never asked her before, but he explained that previously when he was a single guy, it might have been seen as inappropriate to take her on what might look like a date. But this time around he had a girlfriend, so it would be just like all those married guys who bring assistants and agents to things when their wives can’t make it. Nadine had met him through his publisher, so more of her clients were from the world of literature and not showbiz. She jumped at the chance to go to a Hollywood Event. He tried to tell her that this movie wasn’t a big blockbuster or anything, but she got excited anyway.

Claude put a new look together for him for the premiere. He wanted to tone down David’s newfound “metrosexuality,” so that it wouldn’t tip his hand prematurely. But he also couldn’t let David know his real reason for butching up his style. He said that he wanted to make it up to him for pushing the fashion envelope at the Oscars by getting him to better blend into the crowd at his big premier. Since David knew full well that the spotlight wasn’t going to be on the screenwriter as much as on the cast and the director, it made a lot of sense.

Claude started by putting him back in cotton underwear and socks. David felt weirdly uncomfortable in things he’d worn most of his life. Then he gave him a plain white pleated shirt and a black wool tuxedo that didn’t even have a silk lining. Claude wanted him to have no fluidity or grace to his movement, so he put him in coarse clothes. Similarly, the shoes he picked to go with the outfit were shiny black loafers in a larger width than David usually wore. Claude thought the whole thing made him look kind of like a teenager going to the prom, which suited the plan perfectly. There was no way anyone would suspect anything out of the ordinary.

He had David remove his earrings, claiming that they might catch photographers’ flashes and twinkle, attracting unwanted attention. The only other issue was his hair. He needed to hide those flowing tresses. Claude pulled it back into a ponytail and secured it with a transparent elastic band, and then took a handful of gel and slicked it back to mask what was holding it in place. All he had to do was wear the jacket over the ponytail, and the length would be hidden. Claude was almost ready to let him go, when he noticed David’s French manicure, and had to take the time to clean the polish from his fingernails. He tried to say that David’s nails were in need of a fresh treatment, but he told Claude that it had only been a couple days since he had been to the manicurist. But he’d already started with the remover, so it was too late.

David looked in the mirror and wondered why his friend seemed to be turning down the “cool” in his look, but it would definitely keep reporters from bugging him. Maritza called to wish him luck and he told her that Claude was making him look kind of like a dork, but she said that was a good thing; she didn’t want any other girls hitting on her man. He said he’d have his publicist acting as his date, but she knew he was taken. He had a girlfriend who he loved madly and missed incredibly. She chuckled and told him she loved him too and would see him soon, but then she had to go.

Nadine showed up looking very cute. She was a petite blonde who was a little heavier than a starlet, but still had a decent figure. Her hair was in a fancy updo with a few escaping ringlets. She wore little rhinestone-studded cat’s eye glasses, and wore a sunflower yellow satin babydoll dress with little spaghetti straps and a hemline that flounced out. David worried that it would defeat the plan to blend into the crowd, but Claude was glad that it would take even more attention off of David. She was excited enough that he really just stopped worrying.

In the limo on the way to the theater, she told him that her sources had told her that industry buzz was already pretty good about this film. He teased her that he’d never heard about “her sources” before, and she got kind of giggly and said that it wasn’t a big secret. Mainly, his publisher had been talking with the producers on some combined advertising ventures, and they were expecting the book to need the movie’s fans more than the movie would need the book’s fans. David was really uncomfortable thinking about having fans in general, and now he had two different kinds.

He got quickly knocked off the pedestal he was building for himself when the car rolled up at the cinema and a security guy knocked on the window asking who it was. When the driver said it was the writer, the crowd of photographers made a collective noise of disappointment, and the bouncer told the driver he was too early and he had to circle around and come back in ten minutes. It was weird being famous, but not famous enough. Heck, Claude was a fashion name and had done wardrobe for the film, but he didn’t even get invited.

He tried talking about business with Nadine while they were killing time, but she didn’t want to. He had some questions about whether he’d have to do a book tour in conjunction with the movie, but she didn’t have her Blackberry with her with all her notes. The little bag that matched her yellow dress didn’t have room for it.

Watching the movie wasn’t easy for him. He had to see other people interpreting his characters, and there were several times when the actors or director had made decisions that caused his characters to do things they never would have done. And as a premiere this was even tougher because he hadn’t seen the completed film before. He’d been on set a few times, when scenes were causing problems and needed to be rewritten, but that had only given him a glimpse at how his babies were being raped. Okay, maybe that was too strong a metaphor, but it felt damned close to that.

At least the audience seemed to like it. They applauded at the end, and the director stood up and took a bow, and waved to the cast to stand also. David wasn’t sure if he wanted him to stand as well, so he stayed hidden. He didn’t even have to worry about whether he was invited to the after party, because Nadine felt that the buzz would be very good, so she wanted to get back to work as soon as possible.

The movie opened nationwide and was a huge hit, not Summer Action Movie huge, but Early Fall Poignant Drama huge. The critics loved it even more than the fans, and they all were calling it the one to beat at the Oscars that year. Buzz was very good.

Unfortunately, buzz was a little too good. His publisher was doing well with the paperback editions of Condensation with a picture from the movie on the cover, but they’d decided to hold back on printing Deposition until the negotiations for the film rights had finished, so they could make sure to include language allowing for more cross-promotion.

The only good news was that they weren’t pushing for him to go on a book tour. He really didn’t like those. Traveling around the country sitting at a card table in a shopping mall or giant bookstore for hours, living out of hotel rooms, having to be pleasant around all those people, even the ones who were sweaty or smelly or gross, none of that appealed to him in the slightest. He preferred to relate to his readers from a distance.

***

For their first Thanksgiving together, they had Claude and his latest boyfriend Antoine over to share the wonderful meal David had made. Maritza met them at the door. Despite looking like a big burly macho black guy, Antoine was delicately holding a beautiful bouquet of flowers, which he handed to his hostess. She welcomed them in and slipped past David in the kitchen for his vase. He made her stop so he could cut the stems before sticking them in water, and she set the vase in the middle of the table. He handed her a tray of hors d’oeuvres and a pitcher of sangria and shooed her out of his kitchen.

Maritza chatted with the boys while her housekeeper finished the feast. They all agreed that David’s little puff pastries stuffed with cheese and mushroom paste were scrumptious, but she told her guests they wouldn’t want to fill up. Countless delicious aromas had been coming out of the kitchen all morning. Claude agreed that David was the best nonprofessional chef he knew, and he was looking forward to his version of the ultimate American dinner.

Antoine shared some tasty celebrity gossip. He worked for a security company that occasionally hired him out as a bodyguard for C-list stars who didn’t have a regular entourage, and so he often found himself on the scene of breaking scandals in the business.

His latest tidbit concerned a certain pop princess who was trying to sell herself as a legitimate actress. Apparently, she’d thrown a tantrum on the set of her latest film when she couldn’t memorize her lines and still deliver them believably, so the director fired her despite the expense of needing to reshoot all her scenes with a new actress. She was just that bad.

Antoine’s impression of Little Miss Thing breaking down in front of the director and begging him to give her a second chance had Maritza and Claude breaking out in giggles. When “she” offered to do for the director all the things he’d seen in her amateur sex tape, Maritza almost wet herself from laughing.

When David came out to fetch everyone for dinner, they were all having a great time. He liked the feeling of having his home filled with family for the holiday. Maritza and Claude weren’t his blood, but they most definitely were his family, unlike those cousins that had put him back on the mailing list for their holiday newsletters only after he made the bestseller list.

Maritza gasped at the sight of the dining room table. He had cooked far too much food for four people, and the spread was incredible! There were four kinds of vegetables: steamed asparagus spears under hollandaise sauce, honey glazed baby carrots, sliced beets in a sweet and sour Harvard sauce, and buttered sugar snap peas. He’d made both mashed white potatoes and sweet potatoes, and rolls fresh from the oven in case that wasn’t enough carbs. His cranberry sauce was made from scratch; she’d seen him making it the night before. And in the center of the table was the main attraction: a perfectly roasted bird that he’d been basting every half hour all morning. It had been filled with chestnut stuffing using fresh chestnuts and his grandmother’s recipe, and he’d rendered the drippings and giblets into gravy that begged to be tasted.

They all overindulged and collapsed in the living room afterward, falling asleep to a DVD of Miracle on 34th St. David cuddled up on the couch next to his Sweetheart, and wished he could just live in that moment forever. He woke up to discover that she’d abandoned him to go clean up the meal, with some help from their guests. Since everyone seemed to have their second wind, he brought out the pies: a pumpkin, an apple, and a pecan; he had trouble deciding which kind to make, so he’d baked three.

Claude and Antoine stayed long after dessert, and he made sure to send them home with some of the leftovers. All in all, it was a holiday memory to be cherished. Maritza felt guilty about all the calories, so she led him down to the pool for a swim by moonlight in the brisk air. He almost refused, but seeing her in her tiny bikini in the cool night distracted his brain too much to complain. And when she kissed him in the pool, he couldn’t feel the temperature anymore. It was definitely his best Thanksgiving ever.

***

Maritza flew home to Venezuela to spend Christmas with her mother and sister. She wasn’t ready to introduce David to her family yet, and he still needed to work on his Spanish before he could get around down there without needing her to translate everything for him. She was going away for a whole two weeks, and she didn’t want him to forget her. So she came up with a plan.

Remembering how she’d borrowed his boxers at the racetrack, she raided his underwear drawer, packing all his silk undies in her suitcase. She even waited until he was in the shower to do it, so he had nothing to wear of his own. He came out to see her standing there in nothing but a pair of his boxers.

She smiled and traced a heart on his chest with her finger. “I want to think about you every day when I’m gone, so I’m going to wear these instead of mine. It will also prove to you that I won’t be trying to look sexy for any other men while we’re apart.”

“You still look very sexy, no matter what you wear. But that is a very sweet gesture.”

She crouched down and slid herself along his body. She licked and kissed each of his nipples before going down any further. She found his smooth skin so sexy that she wanted to kiss every inch of him. “I want you to think about me every day, too.”

“Don’t worry about that. I’m sure you’ll be in my mind, as you are always in my heart.” He gave a little shudder as she moved down and took his fullness into her mouth.

She very adeptly ran her tongue and lips around his most sensitive spots, and quickly brought him near to the point of completion. She looked up into his eyes and gave a slight nod when her fingers sensed the tension, so he would know it was okay to let go. He exploded into her mouth and she swallowed every drop. As he shrank down to normal size, she cleaned him off with her tongue, enjoying the feel of his hairlessness. When finished, she stood back up. “So I think it’s only fair that you do the same.”

He’d lost track of the conversation, and thought she was talking about what she had just done for him, so he started sinking to his knees. She corrected him, “No, Silly! Not that.” She pulled him up and led him across the bedroom to her bureau. She opened a drawer and pulled out a lacy pair of pink bikini panties. “While I’m wearing yours, I want you to wear mine. Here. Try these on. They have a little more coverage than the last pair that you borrowed, so they should fit better.” Before he could even process a thought, she’d bent down and coaxed his feet to step into her frilly undies and had pulled them up into place.

They had an actual back to them and did fit more comfortably than the thong he’d worn at the racetrack, but they rode a lot lower on his hips than he was used to. His beloved was smiling at him, so he tried to smile back. “If it’s that important to you, I guess I could try it. If you’ve taken all of mine, I’m not sure what other option I have.

She tried to dress him in linen pants, but he thought the pink was visible underneath. He wore his blue jeans instead. She made him wear one of his tighter silk t-shirts as a compromise. When she kissed him goodbye at the airport, she said he should feel free to borrow any of her clothes if he wanted to, and gave him a little wink. He said he would miss her terribly, but they’d have their own little Christmas celebration when she got back.