Page 26 of Arranging Ayra
“I’m there for you, Keely. We’re in this together. Don’t let this stress you out. We’re makingPride and Prejudice. This is great.”
A tentative smile barely curved her lips, but her eyes were still filled with tension. “I know, and that’s probably what’s keeping me from collapsing.” Her smile broadened. “Now that you’ve given me a pep talk, go on and get to work.”
With a chuckle I walked away and joined Cindy and Jai.
“Good,” Cindy immediately said. “We need another pair of hands.”
I glanced at the unfamiliar woman beside her.
“Oh,” Cindy said. “And this is Jodi. She’ll be assisting us.”
Jai led the way to the sitting room. “As you may know, we’ve been using the space to store a few items since arriving here.”
“Yeah, Keely told me,” I said.
“But I’ve had it emptied and had it painted.”
I feared asking what color it’d been painted.
I walked into the room and was pleasantly surprised. The walls now painted a pale, pale green, left the room feeling huge and airy.
“It’s hard to believe that you were using this space for storage,” I said. “Where did you put all the stuff that was in here?”
He grinned. “You don’t want to know.”
“Now,” Cindy said as she looked around. “Where to begin.”
“We could start by putting up the wall sconces,” I said.
“The what?”
“The candle holder wall sconces I bought yesterday,” I said with surprising conviction. After all, wasn’t she the one in charge of décor? How could she not know what a wall sconce was? “I think we should set one between every one of those windows, on either side of the doors and...” I looked around the room. “One over there and another two on that wall there.”
“Sounds good to me,” Jodi said.
She and I got the box of sconces and set to screwing them to the wall while Jai and Cindy tended to other matters.
A quiet girl, Jodi was efficient and easy to work with... almost phantom like. We quickly went around the room and set up all the wall sconces which immediately gave the room a more refined appearance.
“What next?” I said as we reached Jai and Cindy.
“We have drapes to set up,” Cindy said. She bit her bottom lip and looked at me. “Problem is I found the red velvet ones, but Keely has decided to go with the gold ones... which I can’t find.”
“Great,” I said with a dry drone. “How hard can it be to find heavy golden drapes meant to adorn such large windows?”
“Well, for one thing, the gold ones aren’t velvet. They’re some sort of silky looking synthetic. That means that the drapes for each window would fit in a package only so big.” With her hands, she vaguely formed a toaster sized box.
“Great,” I said again.
Jodi spoke up for the first time. “Why not put up the red velvet ones to see if Keely won’t change her mind?”
“I have a better idea,” I said, jumping off Jodi’s initiative. “I’m a producer on this film. I have a say in what happens on this film. I’ve put up some of my own money to make this film.”
They all looked at me, anticipating.
“I second Jodi’s suggestion that we put up the red velvet drapes but disagree with her hope that Keely might approve... because... I approve. I think red velvet drapes would look positively smashing on these windows. Let’s get to it.”
Jodi smiled.
