The Scholarship

MEET THE JUDGES-Chapter Four

William awakens to the annoying, incessant beeping of his alarm in his ear. It's 7am on the west coast. He cracks his eyelids and remembers where he is. He had woken up at 3am and it took him too long to fall back asleep. 

 His alarm is still going off as he crawls out of bed and shuffles into the bathroom. Coffee, he thinks, I need coffee. He turns on the shower and goes back to turn off the alarm. He wonders how Bobby Smarts is feeling this morning. Jet lagged and hungover, probably. He doesn't envy the guy.

He's expected in the lobby of the Marquis at 7:45am, and he gets there with a few minutes to spare to find the entire place in utter chaos. People are hurrying by him holding cameras and microphones, while a small group of men and women in suits stand at the front desk talking fervently to an older woman wearing a hotel nametag. He looks at his watch and wonders if he got the time wrong.

He sees Cynthia enter through the front doors, and she is immediately bombarded by a crowd of people. They're all talking at once, but she seems to take it all in stride. She sees him and walks over, completely ignoring the questions people are shouting at her.

"Good morning! Welcome to your last day of anonymity," she says. He opens his mouth to respond, but he is blinded by the flash of over a dozen cameras. Cynthia just laughs. "C'mon, William. Let's get you out of here." They turn and walk through a door marked "Employees Only."

"Are we allowed back here?" William asks, looking around the narrow, dim hallway.

"We're providing plenty of free publicity for this hotel," Cynthia tells him as she leads him through a thick metal door to the patio by the pool. He squints at the bright sunlight. "We can go anywhere we want!" 

She takes a seat in one of the lounge chairs and motions for William to do the same. "They can't get to us out here," she tells him. "The pool doesn't open for a few more hours. Only the employees have access." She gives him a mischievous grin and adds, "And us."

"I take it you've been here a few times," William says as he watches her stretch her long legs out and tilt her face toward the sun.

"I think this is my sixth, no seventh, press interview at this hotel," she tells him. "I almost forgot I did a press interview here for My Mother is Dead—this awful B movie I was in when I was 17." She shakes her head. "I still have no idea how that movie made any money. It was awful." She looks at William, but she can't read his face. "You must think I'm just another spoiled actress."

"Actually, I was thinking about my daughter, Gabby, who is 16," he says as he stares at the pristine blue water of the pool. "I wonder how she'd handle all that fame at her age. It must have been tough for you." Cynthia smiles at him with gratitude.

"Sometimes," she admits. She wants to ask about the rumors she's heard from the production crew about Gabby's mom, but she doesn't want to seem insensitive.

As if he can read her thoughts, he says, "My wife died five years ago. She had a rare form of leukemia. Ever since then, it's just been Gabby and me."

"It sounds like your daughter has had her own set of difficulties." Cynthia sits up and faces William. "How does she feel about you being all the way out here?"

William leans forward and clasps his hands together. "She says she wants me to have more fun in my life," he says. "And she can't wait to meet Stevie Quay," he adds with a laugh.

"Well, I can make sure both of those things happen!" Cynthia laughs, too, and she can't help by notice how comfortable she feels around William. "For now though, let's go get these interviews over with!" They stand up just as Cynthia's phone rings. Ella Fitzgerald's "The Lady is a Tramp" blares as Cynthia blushes and reaches into her purse.