A Side Effect of Celebrity

Three

To be a celebrity, I couldn't think of anything more cringe-worthy – Bryan Adams

"Let me get this straight. You went all the way there, waited around outside in the scorching heat for a few hours, and you didn't even see a single actor?" Griffin snorted as he reached into the kitchen cupboards in Claire's apartment and went to set them on the table. "That sounds like a waste of time."

"It was but don't tell Ellie that. She was super excited to be there the entire time."

Claire followed behind Griffin, placing napkins and cutlery on the table next to the plates. She hadn't told anyone about her brief run-in with Jay Dawson in Central Park the previous day. Though she supposed it wouldn't have mattered now, it somehow felt like a violation. As if she were going against the agreement she'd made with the actor to not tell anyone that he was there in the park in exchange for the two dollars. Though he was certainly long gone from his hiding spot behind the tree, Claire had kept her mouth shut about the whole meeting.

"She's obsessed with The Cloaked City, that's why. Did she tell you that she sold her copies of the books just so she could get the new editions with the specialty covers and bonus material?"

Claire laughed. "No, she didn't."

Griffin rolled his eyes and leaned against the wall in the dining room. He folded his arms across his chest and said, "That's because she's embarrassed to admit that she spent a hundred and fifty bucks on them. She only got thirty for the ones she sold."

"Some girls buy expensive clothes, Ellie buys special edition copies of her favourite books."

"Which category do you fall into?"

"The one that is saving all of her money for college. For now, I'm enjoying thrift shops and libraries for my shopping and reading pleasures."

"How's the job hunt going?" Griffin asked. His head cocked to the side slightly.

Claire shrugged and picked a piece of stray lint from her shirt. "I've got a few interviews lined up for this week. Nothing fancy. Just a McDonalds line cook and a job at one of those new luxury grocery stores. They have a location over in Tribeca but apparently, they're opening a second store just a few blocks away from here."

"Are you still going to keep up with your dog walking business?"

She nodded. "Yeah, I think so. I've got five families that I'm walking for right now and they're flexible around when I come so I should be able to work it around a schedule if I ever happen to get a real job elsewhere. What about you?"

He said, "I was offered a position today as 'service technician' for a tech company. Pretty sure all it means is that when some idiot spills an entire jumbo Starbucks coffee on their laptop, I'm going to be the poor sucker that has to fix it."

"Venti," Claire corrected. "The biggest size of hot coffee Starbucks has is called a venti."

"Whatever." Griffin's lips twitched in the makings of a smile. "As fun as this conversation is, Claire, I thought we were supposed to be having a dinner party? From what I can see, we are the only two people in your apartment and there's no food in sight. Care to explain?"

"Ellie and her moms are running late. My mom attempted to make a roast chicken and then promptly forgot about it in the oven when she got drawn into an online antiquities auction and it was burnt to a crisp. So they're picking up Chinese food and then grabbing your parents from your place on their way back."