Carter is sort of dorky, despite being hot. The glasses look real, dark and thick-framed. He’s taller than me, but not too tall—which is a bonus in my book—with eyes that are a startling green, hair deep brown and thick . . .
I blink out of my inspection and back down to his face, realizing how long I’ve been staring at the top of his head. “Nice to meet you.”
“You too.” He points to his own costume again and smiles. “This was about the best I could do on half-assed motivation and an uninspired closet.” He looks me over again. “You’re an amazing Hermione, though. Harry and Hermione. Perfect. I ship it.”
My stomach does another little tumble. “My friend Daryl was supposed to come along as my Ron, but she had to bail at the last minute. She’s dead to me.”
Carter’s laugh comes out as a loud, surprised guffaw before he pops the tab on a can and takes a long, slow drink.
Honestly, I’m trying to stay cool and not look too closely at him, but failing.
Living in LA, and especially working in Hollywood, I meet beautiful people every day, even dated a few. But in a town full of pretty faces, I’ve become immune to the predictability of them, the symmetry. Carter is pretty in a distinctive way: His eyes are big, and lined with the darkest, thickest lashes. His jaw is sharp. With the thick frames of his glasses, his is an oblivious type of beauty. He needs a haircut. When he smiles, I see that his teeth are white but not perfectly straight. It makes him seem immediately friendly. And his imperfections are surprising in a sea of Invisalign, Botox, and self-tanners. He looks . . . real.
Now, before you think I’m putting too much thought into this, let me remind you that I am no longer in my twenties, and when you meet men at my age you immediately place them on one of three lists, just to make life easier for everyone: datable, not datable, or gay. Datable basically means you wear your bra when they’re around, and you don’t talk about bodily functions or pimples. Not datable or gay: anything goes.
“You’re ahead of me there. I never even had a plus one,” he says. “I was threatened into coming by our illustrious hosts. How do you know them?”
“I used to work with Steph at Alterman.”
Something passes over Carter’s face—a flicker of recognition, maybe?—but before I can question it, Steph walks out juggling an armful of plates. Carter and I both struggle to make room for them amid the Red Bull.
“What’s up with the bar selection?” I ask her, gesturing to the table. “Are you expecting frat boys later?”
“Oh my God, can you imagine?” Her question comes out breathy—nearly orgasmic—and I stare blankly at her. “Everything else is over there.” She lifts her chin, gesturing to another table in the living room that I now see is covered with wine, beer, and all the usual spirits.
I slump my shoulders in mock defeat. “But that’s in married territory.”
“We don’t have tickets to that side of the room,” Carter adds.
Steph looks like she’s about to roll her eyes at us but then freezes, and her mouth drops open. “You guys match.”
Carter and I exchange a knowing look. “We talked earlier,” he says. “Made sure to coordinate it for maximum awkward.”
She slaps his arm. “Shut up! Mikey and I knew the two of you would really hit it off. Did you know that we’re all in talent management? I mean, guys. The two of you are like a match made in heaven, right?”
Just before she heads back in the direction of the kitchen, Steph scrunches her nose at us as if we are a cute set of porcelain figures on a shelf and she’s tilted us just so toward each other.
When Carter turns to me, we stare at each other for a wordless, stunned beat.
“Those assholes set us up,” he whispers.
“It appears so.” I glare back in Steph’s direction. “Don’t they know that sort of thing never works?”
“It’s like that movie with Seth Rogen and Katherine Heigl where they have that disastrous date.” He pauses with his can partway to his lips. “Or wait . . . am I remembering that wrong?”
A sensation like Pop Rocks goes off in my chest—I know which movie he’s talking about. “You mean Knocked Up?” He nods, and I roll on: “It’s not a date, actually. They meet at a club after she—Katherine Heigl—gets a promotion. She meets Seth Rogen at an actual club here in LA called Plan B, and they get drunk and have unprotected sex. She realizes she’s pregnant eight weeks later and then they have the awkward date where she tells him.”
When I finally come up for air, I see him watching me, eyebrows raised over the top of his Red Bull. “That was an impressive summary for a movie that came out over ten years ago.”
I give him a little shimmy. “It’s my other gift.”
His eyes shine. “I have to be honest, Stephanie should know better. You are incredibly pretty, and obviously blessed with at least two enviable gifts, but sight unseen, nothing sounds worse than dating a fellow agent.”
God, I agree. Dating someone in my business would be a disaster: the hours are terrible, the phone calls are constant, and the blood pressure—and the sex life—suffer.
So I’m glad he’s said it, glad he’s just thrown it out there. It’s like we’re on the same team and suddenly there is zero pressure: Team They’re Cute But It Could Never Work.
“And,” he adds, “I just realized that you’re the beloved Evelyn Abbey. It’s all falling into place now.”
I’m caught off guard for a second and not sure how to react. Hollywood is an industry of almost forty thousand people, but its circles are small. If he’s heard of me—and my track record—it could be great . . . or not. I feel uneasy not knowing which.
“So you’re an agent?” I ask. “How have we never met?”
“I’m in TV-Literary.” Small circles. I relax a little. “But Michael Christopher and Steph talk about you all the time.”
“You call Mike ‘Michael Christopher’?” I ask. “That’s really cute. I’m getting Winnie the Pooh vibes.”
“We went to grade school together,” Carter explains, “and old habits die hard. He tries to pretend he’s cool being married and having a three-year-old kid who makes him wear tiaras, but deep down I know it makes him crazy that I’m still single and there are no pictures of me on Instagram wearing my kid’s sparkly lip gloss.”
I laugh. “Well, if it makes you feel better, this is going so much better than the last time Steph tried to set me up.”
Carter has the magical ability to sharply lift one eyebrow, and it makes a chemical reaction in me go off like a bomb. “She does this to you a lot?”
“Last time,” I explain, “she set me up with her chubby twenty-two-year-old cousin, Wyatt.”
“That’s thoughtful. She must really like Wyatt.”
I let this compliment slide warmly over me. “I’m thirty-three, so . . .”
Carter’s laugh is soft, but his entire face smiles when he does it. “He couldn’t handle you, I take it.”