"Let's take five, everyone."
Lisa made eye contact with Jennie through the glass partition of the rehearsal studio, gesturing with her head for Jennie to meet her out in the corridor during the break. Lisa had been engrossed in the music when Jennie arrived earlier, only exchanging the briefest of waves when she noticed Jennie come in.
Now Lisa grabbed her hand and led her towards a spare office down the hall, away from where the other band members and crew were milling around.
"So how was shopping?" Lisa asked over her shoulder as they walked. "Did you have fun?"
"Oh yes. Fun fun fun."
There was a bite to Jennie's tone that made Lisa glance at her face. "What happened? Did you buy anything?"
"Indeed."
Lisa pulled to a stop just inside the door of the little office and put her arms around Jennie's waist, bending down to peck her on the lips before she spoke again. "Are you going to tell me what you bought?"
"Cocktail dress." Jennie leaned forward and rested her face against Lisa's chest, presenting her with a view of the top of her head.
"That sounds nice."
"Yeah, it better be," Jennie said into Lisa's chest.
"Ok then. So..." Lisa hesitated for a moment, trying to gauge the reason for Jennie's bad mood. "Umm, can I have my card back?"
She chuckled and nodded, reaching her hand into her pocket. "Here ya go," Jennie said, shooting Lisa a frosty smile as she placed in Lisa's hand the remnants of her credit card, now cut up into four pieces.
"What the fuck, Jennie! You cut it up?"
"No, Lisa. I didn't cut it up. The helpful lady at the Chanel store did that."
Lisa looked back and forth from Jennie's face to the pieces of plastic in her hand. "This is my Amex Black Card!"
Jennie shrugged. "I believe the Amex fraud department may have left you a few messages this morning?"
"Shit." Lisa pulled a cell phone out of her pocket and looked down at the blackened screen. "I guess I forgot to turn it back on after the TV spot."
"Yeah, there may be a few messages from me on there as well," Jennie replied. "You might just want to delete those."
Lisa flicked the phone on and looked at the screen. Thirty-seven missed calls. "Jennie! What the hell happened?"
Jennie shrugged again. "I told you. I bought a cocktail dress."
"And?"
"And I gave them your card," she continued. "And then I spent my morning with a lovely man from Chanel security and a very nice LAPD detective, talking my way out of a grand larceny charge..."
"Shit!"
"... which would have been a hell of a lot easier if I could have gotten a hold of my alleged larceny victim on some sort of communication device. Like, maybe a walkie-talkie? Or a telegram? Or..."
"Ok." Lisa interrupted, beginning to grasp the reason for Jennie's annoyance. "You're mad because my phone was off."
"Ding ding ding! Someone give this genius a prize!"
"I'm sorry, Jennie!"
"I was inches from getting arrested, Lisa. Inches!"
"I don't understand. Aren't you supposed to be some kind of fancy lawyer or something?"
"Yeah. Believe me, if I weren't a lawyer, I'd be spending my night in jail right now," Jennie replied. "And you can wipe that smirk off your face, because if you think this was funny..."
Lisa tried to force her features to compose themselves into a more serious expression, but she couldn't keep her lips from quirking up into another smile. Jennie was irresistibly cute when she got all riled up like this. "Wait..." Lisa said. "So explain it to me like I'm stupid. What happened exactly?"
Jennie let out her breath in a loud huff and wiped one hand across her eyes in a gesture of defeated exhaustion, but her voice was calmer when she spoke again. "The purchase triggered a fraud alert with your credit card company," she explained. "Then when I obviously wasn't the cardholder and no one could get the cardholder on the phone, they thought..."
"... they thought you stole it?"
Jennie nodded.
"What the fuck? I've given my credit card to girls before."
"Yeah?" Jennie said, rolling her eyes. "Let me guess. You gave it to Julia Roberts?"
Lisa grinned at her. "I've never dated Julia Roberts, Jennie."
"Well, maybe if I looked like Julia Roberts, they wouldn't have batted an eyelash."
Jennie was looking down at the floor, and Lisa came back towards her, slipping one arm around her waist and using her other hand to tip Jennie's face up to look at her. "I'll take you over Julia Roberts any day. I will take you over anyone, Jennie." Lisa said softly.
Jennie rolled her eyes again, but she didn't resist when Lisa bent her head to kiss her.
"So how did you get out of it?" Lisa asked after a moment.
"I showed them one of the articles with me in the towel."
Lisa released Jennie and let out a burst of laughter. "No way!"
Jennie nodded. "It was the only way to prove I knew you," she continued. "And then I paid for the dress on my own credit card, and they let me go."
"So you actually bought the dress? Is it here?"
"No, I left it in the hotel."
Jennie's face had started to relax a moment ago, but Lisa saw her eyebrows drawing together again in irritation now.
"I'll reimburse you," Lisa said.
"You better," Jennie shot back. "I can't afford that thing."
"How much was it?"
Jennie paused for a moment, and spoke to a spot on the wall behind Lisa when she finally replied. "Fourteen..." she muttered.
"Whatever." Lisa shrugged. "Fourteen hundred isn't bad for a Chanel cocktail dress."
"No, Lisa," Jennie said, still not making eye contact. "Fourteen thousand."
Lisa felt her jaw go slack. "What?"
"I know, I know. It was idiotic..."
"... Did you just say fourteen thousand? Dollars?"
"No. Fourteen thousand pieces of bellybutton lint."
"Jennie, that's like a car!"
"No kidding."
"Well no wonder it triggered a fraud alert!"
She buried her face in her hands. "I'm sorry," Jennie said.
"Maybe I should drop you off at the dealership tomorrow and you can pick yourself out a Lamborghini!"
"I'm sorry," she said again. "Ok? It was stupid." She pulled her hands away from her face and looked back up at Lisa, expecting to see anger, but Lisa was chuckling.
"It's cool, I'm just kidding." Lisa said. "I'm glad that you got yourself something nice."
Jennie nodded. "It's nice. It'll be good if I ever have to do a red carpet or something..."
Her words were cut off by the sound of a phone ringing. She looked at Lisa questioningly. The cell phone Lisa had taken out before was sitting on the desk where she'd placed it a moment ago, but the ringing wasn't coming from there. She watched as Lisa reached into her pocket and pulled out a different phone, answering the call on the first ring.
