Lost In Pacific Time

My Blackberry vibrated from my nightstand. I snatched it up right away, usually no one contacted me during my vacation unless it was an emergency.

Milan: What are you doing.

Oh yeah there were people I didn’t work with who had my number now. Proper punctuation:
No. At least I’m on his mind, kind of.

Amber: Nothing much. Just debating whether or not to get up and start my day but my bed is so comfy. What about you?

I write rolling over onto my stomach. I have meshy white curtains which don’t really do the job blocking light from the floor to ceiling windows. Once again I had nothing to do. I scrutinized myself in the vintage mirror adjacent to my bed. I have major bed head but at least I look well rested. That seemed to be all I had going for me right now. Well that and I was definitely going for a run today. What better time than right now, I thought finally climbing out of bed.
_____

Milan: I just got out of the gym. Now I’m going to help my mother go grocery shopping. Any requests?

I pulled up to the simple two storey brick house, my childhood home. I opened up the door and immediately heard the sound of sizzling bacon or in my case low-fat turkey bacon. Even though it was the offseason, I couldn’t just go around eating McDonalds every day.

“Hi, mom” I hadn’t told my mother about Amber coming over later but I’m sure she’d be fine with it.

“Good Morning Milan, how was the gym?” she asked happily handing me a plate of eggs with the turkey bacon.

“It was okay…” I reply piling my eggs and bacon onto a piece of toast. “Amber’s coming over tonight for dinner.”

My mother smiled “I can’t wait to see her, do you want some ketchup?” my mother says pulling out an industrial sized bottle of Heinz.

“Okay…” I say checking my phone.

Amber: I’ve eaten dinner at your parents’ house so many times and I’ve never had a bad meal. I’m going for a run now. It seems your athleticism is contagious. Talk to you later.

“What are you making? I’m running into town for lunch later anyway. So I could pick up some stuff.”

“Amber always liked my moussaka, pick up some potatoes and yogurt.”
Moussaka is basically a casserole. The best known one is the Greek one with eggplants and béchamel sauce. The kind my mother was going to make was the Serbian version which was almost the same expect we use potatoes instead of eggplants and thick yogurt instead of béchamel. A lot of Serbian food is like that, variations on Mediterranean and Middle Eastern food. Amber was so interested the first time she ate at my place; she said that they didn’t eat home cooked meals like that at her own house.
_____

I was a decent runner. I should register for the LA marathon and raise money for a new wing in the hospital or something. Dolce and Coco weren’t too bad either. Of course I wasn’t one of those people in LA that pushed their dog around in a stroller or carried them around in my purse. Dog were not meant to be treated as accessories.

I had on tight black short shorts, an aqua colored sports bra, and mint green Nikes. I was almost half way around the Seawall which was about ten kilometres and my leg muscles were starting to cramp up. All along the Seawall were beaches and on the next beach I saw I climbed off the paved area for runners and sat down on the beach. Dolce and Coco were panting so I gave them some water. As I sat under the Lion’s Gate Bridge I realized that maybe ten kilometers was enough for the day and headed back to my apartment. Instead of running the rest of the circle, I just cut through the woods where they were filming a movie or something.
_____

“Amber’s back in town,” I say picking up the top bun of my burger to spread relish onto the patty.

“Yeah I heard,” says Nikola, stealing one my fries “you know Rachel, that girl I’ve been seeing? She’s obsessed with Amber.”

I wondered how Amber would feel if Rachel came to dinner. I liked meeting fans but that was kind of my job. I was supposed to work the crowds and represent the Bruins organization. Amber’s role was a different story. She was an interior designer first and a reality star last. If she flipped out on someone almost next to nothing would happen to her. Maybe the network would send her to rehab or cancel her show but they couldn’t take her job away, Amber was self-employed, I wasn’t.

“Amber’s coming over for dinner, why don’t you bring Rachel?” I say taking a gulp of iced tea. I knew I was taking a gamble. From my experience there was a sixty percent chance that Amber would feel indifferent about Rachel, thirty percent chance that Amber would hate Rachel, and only a ten percent chance that Amber would like Rachel.

“That’d be great Milan. But how’d you convince Amber to come to dinner? Are you going to pay her an appearance fee?” Nikola laughs at his own joke.

“I ran into her at the park across my house and took her to lunch, we talked and I asked her if she wanted to come to dinner with me. It’s no big deal.”

“I just hope you remember that she’s probably not interesting in continuing where the two of you left off and probably never will be.”

“Guys and girls can be just friends, they don’t have to be attracted to each other in order to be friends.”

“Honestly? You don’t still find Amber attractive?” Nikola asks. Honestly I do, she looked better in person than on TV. Despite the fact that Amber was trying to be a bitch in the beginning I still broke down her walls, just like I had when we first met. She was real and despite what I thought she was still Amber, she still had her Amber laugh and her Amber vibe. But shouldn’t I be getting some feedback telling me that she wasn’t attracted to me?

The lunch we had yesterday was friendly there was no flirting but I wanted to. I wanted to tell her that there was no one else like her. Not in Vancouver during the summers. Not in Boston during the season. Maybe she wasn’t the prettiest girl in high school but I had always thought that she was the most beautiful. Although my mind wanted to believe an entire different thing, I knew that she was still just as beautiful as she was from that night on the Granville Bridge to that night I drove her to the airport.

“You do realize your just setting yourself up for disappointment right?” Nikola adds seeing me lost in my thoughts.

“Maybe she’s just confused,” I try, just because she isn’t exactly trying to jump my bones doesn’t mean that she isn’t interested. Lots of girls in their twenties experiment. She’s Amber she didn’t like me because I was a hockey player she liked me because of what I was according to her: thoughtful and kind. Not those girls who just want me because of who I am.

Nikola rolled his eyes. “Milan, trying to change someone’s sexuality is absurd. Just imagine how awkward it would be if one of your teammates tried coming onto you.”
I grab a napkin and wipe my fingers before giving Nikola a puzzled look. “Fine,” I’ll take whatever Amber gives me.
______

Dear Ambrosia Li,

I love your show and I think you’re amazing. I’ve just discovered that I am pregnant with a girl and I’ve decided to name her Ambrosia, after you of course. I’m wondering what kinds of colors you’d recommend for a unisex nursery since I plan to use the same room for all my children and move them into their own rooms within the house later on.

-Thank You
Rebecca Clarke from Savannah, Georgia

I was sitting on a comfy deck chair on my patio with an ice cold glass of vibrant pink green soda next to me answering letters. If they took the time out of their day to write me a letter and spend a dollar sending it to LA they deserved a personalized response sent to their door. I don’t respond to emails. I had an entire silver Louis Vuitton embossed satchel at my flip flop clad feet filled with letters. I assumed I needed some way to keep myself entertained that was stressed free. I pulled a piece of personalized stationary from my white and magenta striped folder. On the very top was my name scribbled in my own writing, it took me half an hour of writing Ambrosia Camille Li until I found the one I was going to send to the print company. I popped the cap off my dark purple sparkly gel pen and began writing.

Dear Rebecca Clark,

Hi Rebecca, congrats on the new baby! It’s been a while since I’ve decorated a nursery but if there is one thing I know it is color. Pastels are the norm for baby rooms and I’ll stick with that today because I don’t recommend painting a child’s room bright red. The pastels I’d recommend are: a pale yellow, creamsicle orange, and mint green. I think any of them would look great but I’ve never tried a green and orange combination of any kind so I’d stick with pairing those two colors with the pale yellow.

-Sincerely,
Ambrosia Li in Vancouver, British Columbia

P.S. I’m so flattered that you’re naming her after me.

I looked up at the clock and it was almost time to get ready for dinner with Milan and his family. I was nervous. “There still the same people, Amber.” I say as I pull a Gucci sleeveless dress that is on the latest cover of Vogue. It’s actually really weird looking on the hanger, its purple on the top and coral on the bottom with a gold belt wound around the wait, color blocking at its finest. Obviously I didn’t actually buy it, a former runway model I decorated for realized that Gucci sent it a size too small and gave it to me. Of course the mid-thigh dress on her was practically knee length on me but she said that it was perfect, put it in a garment bag and gave it to me.

The dress did fit me pretty well although I thought it the cut-outs on both sides exposing a sliver of my ribcage were a bit odd. I slipped on a pair of deep blue Valentino sandals with bejeweled straps and a six inch heel and grabbed my grey quilted Jimmy Choo shoulder bag before pressing the down button on the elevator.