J. Lo, Crystal Bowls, and the Red M&Ms

Deleted scene from Girl, Unemployed, “J. Lo, Crystal Bowls, and the Red M&Ms”

Erica waited for acknowledgement, folding her arms tightly across her chest while anxiously tapping her foot.

“Everything okay over there?” I asked.

Erica suddenly jumped back to her feet as Missy tried desperately to salvage the mound of magazines slipping off the edge of the couch. “If Damita is so fabulous with all her singing and choreography, then why has she been living at The Winifred for so long?!”

“Do you want to say that so loud? The walls have ears.” I whispered to Missy, “and I’ve been told The Winifred is haunted.”

“I don’t care who hears me this time!” Erica’s face turned bright red.

“Oooh, can you sing that again? This time louder with a little more vibrato, and in an E flat.” I leaned back into Missy while circling my head around the ceiling. “I just love the sound in this room. It’s almost as if they really were preparing us to work with Liza Minnelli.  Perhaps you should take the piano and I—”

“I mean it!” Erica yelled. “I tried to watch TV, but Damita barged in claiming she’d reserved the room to practice. But I stood up to her like you told me too, Jess! I asked if she signed up, and she said yes!”

I scanned the room. “Don’t see her, Erica. What’s your point?”

“As soon as I left, I saw her go to the front desk.”

“Ah, there you go again, hiding out in dark corners, creepy.”

“Damita ran to the front desk and said, ‘excuse me, I need to reserve the room to practice for half an hour.’ She lied to me! She was just trying to get rid of me again! She never signed up for it! I was here first!”

I wondered what this fight was really about. Lately, Erica spent most of her evenings watching TV on the couch while reciting stories she’d hoped would be her own one day—stories about Broadway, bosses who had SAG cards and awards, or bosses who at least knew people who had SAG cards and awards. Fortunately, the Broadway theater had at least promoted Erica from intern to mailroom clerk.

“Erica, calm down.” I looked around. "Clearly, you won. I didn’t see Damita at dinner, and she’s obviously not here tonight."

“No, I didn’t win! I waited for an hour! It’s Thursday.”

“Ahh, yes, Thursday. Damita must have just left for Ashford & Simpson’s Sugar Bar."

Erica stood in front of me fuming, while I, relieved to have missed Damita, took a little bit of pleasure in poking at her. I jumped up off the couch passionately, my faux Burberry throw floating above my head as I spoke. "But Erica, the show must go on! How could you keep Damita from her big break?! Catherine Zeta-Jones and Michael Douglas were in the front row last time, Erica! Yes, they were, yes they were."

Missy had to bite her lip.

As usual, Erica found it difficult to catch my sarcasm. She stomped her foot at me. "But every night is her big break! She parades around here in those fake white silk robes with her name in cursive on the back, calling out the shots. She hasn’t made it yet, and she still acts like she’s Madonna."

“Well, I didn’t want to say anything, but—no, I don’t think I should say anything.”

Erica took the bait and finally stopped shouting. The tone in her voice suddenly turned down—hushed, persuasive. “What? You can tell me. I won’t tell anyone. What did you hear?”

I lowered my shoulders and head, pretending to self-consciously stake out our surroundings. “I did overhear her talking to housekeeping the other day.”

“Yeah? And?”

“She told them that her pillows needed to be fluffed three times instead of just the standard two.”

“What?” Innocent Erica started thinking, her eyes scrolling, flashing left to right. “She gets her pillows fluffed? I don’t get my pillows fluffed! Not even two times, not even one times. And I already heard she has a cappuccino maker in her guest room. They said we aren’t allowed to have appliances like that in our rooms!”

“Well, not Damita. The Winifred clearly considers her VIP.” I was enjoying it a little too much. “And, remember how we were all watching E! News in here with Damita last week?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you remember the story about how when J. Lo goes on tour she has hotel staff put three bags of M&Ms in crystal bowls by her bed?”

“Yeah, so?”

“Well, afterwards, I saw Damita go to the front desk. Can you believe she wanted four bags of M&Ms in her crystal bowls?”

“What?!” Erica’s eyebrows shot up. “I don’t have crystal bowls in my room. How did she get crystal bowls in her room?!”

“Oh, it’s even worse than that.” My voice got softer as I carefully looked around and noticed Missy holding her breath and bracing her stomach. “Apparently, the housekeepers have to pick out all of the M&Ms that aren’t red. Like J. Lo, Damita refuses to eat any of the other M&Ms.”

Erica’s jaw suddenly dropped. “I can’t believe her.”

“Yep. Apparently, one of the housekeepers even got fired. Because…” I lowered my head further as I became quieter. “One of them accidentally left a yellow M&M. It was hiding at the bottom of the bowl. And the housekeeping shift manager was at the front desk yelling at her lowly staff member like, ‘it was yellow! How could you miss the yellow M&M?!”

Missy couldn’t help herself by then. She rolled over in laughter, the stacks of free Tilly Worth advertising on her and beside her slipping to the floor. “Jess! Stop. It. Can you just stop being so funny right now? I’m going to pee. In my pants.”

Erica threw herself back down on the couch yet again, tightly crossing her arms against her chest. I finally laughed too and lied down, grabbing the faux Burberry blanket from the floor to throw over me. My work here was done.

Missy started to sit up. “The red M&Ms. Everyone’s favorite. Erica, what’s your favorite?” Missy rearranged two piles of stacked magazines, sifting through the important Tilly ones that had dog ears halfway through them. “Oh, I bet you’re a Skittles kind of a gal? Oh, that’s it. You are so Skittles. But the pinks and the purples, I bet!”

Suddenly, Erica was crying. She threw her head into her hands. “It was…It was…” Erica’s sniffles became fuller with the practice room echo.

“Erica? Erica?” Missy scooted over while trying to juggle the magazines on her lap. “Jess was just kidding, you know Jess.”

“Erica, I’m sorry.” I hopped to the other side of Erica to squat down on the couch beside her.

****

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