Minutes later, the limo driver was trying to navigate the drive-through of a Jack in the Box, and Max and I decided it was easier to get out of the car and go in.
The two of us stood in line, me in my navy-blue silk gown, him in his tux, behind two teenage boys ordering french fries. And then, when we got to the front of the line, the cashier screamed as if she’d seen a mouse.
“Oh, my God!” she said. “You’re Evelyn Hugo.”
I laughed. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I said. After twenty-five years, that line still worked every time.
“You’re her. Evelyn Hugo.”
“Nonsense.”
“This is the greatest day of my life,” she said, and then she called to the back. “Norm, you have to come see this. Evelyn Hugo is here. In a gown.”
Max laughed as more and more people started to stare. I was beginning to feel like a caged animal. It’s not something you really ever get used to, being stared at in small spaces. A few of the people in the kitchen came forward to look at me.
“Any chance we could get two burgers?” Max said. “Extra cheese on mine, please.”
Everyone ignored him.
“Can I have your autograph?” the woman behind the counter asked.
“Sure,” I said kindly.
I was hoping it would be over soon, that we could get the food and go. I started signing paper menus and paper hats. I signed a couple of receipts.
“We really should be going,” I said. “It’s late.” But no one stopped. They all just kept pushing things at me.
“You won an Oscar,” an older woman said. “Just a few hours ago. I saw it. I saw it myself.”
“I did, yes,” I said. I pointed at Max with the pen in my hand. “So did he.”
Max waved.
I signed a few more things, shook a few more hands. “OK, I really must be going,” I said.
But the mob of people crowded me more.
“OK,” Max said. “Let the lady breathe.” I looked in the direction of his voice and saw him coming toward me, breaking up the crowd. He handed me the burgers, picked me up, threw me over his shoulder, and walked us right out of the restaurant and into the limo.
“Wow,” I said when he put me down.
He got in next to me. He grabbed the bag. “Evelyn,” he said.
“What?”
“I love you.”
“What do you mean, you love me?”
He leaned over, smooshed the burgers, and kissed me.
It felt as if someone had turned on the electricity in a long-abandoned building. I had not been kissed like that since Celia left me. I had not been kissed with desire, the kind of desire that spurs desire, since the love of my life walked out the door.
And here was Max, two deformed burgers in between us, his warm lips on mine.
“That is what I mean,” he said when he pulled away from me. “Do with that what you will.”
* * *
THE NEXT MORNING, I woke up as an Oscar winner with a precious six-year-old eating room service in my bed.
There was a knock at the door. I grabbed my robe. I opened the door. In front of me were two-dozen red roses with a note that said, “I have loved you since I met you. I have tried to stop. It will not work. Leave him, ma belle. Marry me. Please. XO, M.”
WE SHOULD STOP THERE,” EVELYN says.
She’s right. It is getting late, and I suspect I have a number of missed calls and e-mails to return, including what I know will be a voice mail from David.
“OK,” I say, closing my notebook and pressing stop on the recording.
Evelyn gathers some of the papers and stale coffee mugs that have accumulated over the day.
I check my phone. Two missed calls from David. One from Frankie. One from my mother.
I say good-bye to Evelyn and make my way onto the street.
The air is warmer than I anticipated, so I take off my coat. I pull my phone out of my pocket. I listen to my mother’s voice mail first. Because I’m not sure I’m ready to know what David has to say. I don’t know what I want him to say, and thus, I don’t know what will disappoint me when he doesn’t say it.
“Hi, honey,” my mom says. “I’m just calling to remind you that I’ll be there soon! My flight gets in Friday evening. And I know you’re going to insist on meeting me at the airport because of that time I got lost on the subway, but don’t worry about it. Really. I can figure out how to get to my daughter’s apartment from JFK. Or LaGuardia. Oh, God, you don’t think I accidentally booked the flight to Newark, do you? No, I didn’t. I wouldn’t have. Anyway, I’m so excited to see you, my little dumpling baby. I love you.”
I’m already laughing before the message is over. My mother has gotten lost in New York a number of times, not just once. And it’s always because she refuses to take a cab. She insists that she can navigate public transportation, even though she was born and raised in Los Angeles and therefore has no real sense of how any two modes of transportation intersect.