We are so excited and honored to be excerpting First Night by Carol Sabik-Jaffe today. This talented author is such an advocate for writers. For all romantic comedy fans, this is a must read.
Carol Sabik-Jaffe is an award-winning writer. Her screenwriting has been recognized at numerous industry events
and several of her scripts have been optioned by producers. She is ever hopeful that one of them will be produced one day. Carol holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Rosemont College. First Night is her debut novel based on one of her original screenplays. It is available on Amazon in paperback and eBook as well as retail outlets.
Chapter 1
“Always take a moment to compose yourself. Take a breath and pause so you don’t look like a complete mess. You don’t have to rush. An extra minute or two isn’t going to matter in the grand scheme of things, Maria. Remember to make an entrance. And, by the way, it doesn’t hurt to put on a little lipstick either.”
Maria couldn’t get her mother’s voice out of her head as she waited. She had missed the express elevator that would take her directly to the fiftieth floor. Instead of waiting for the next one to arrive, she awkwardly pushed through the first doors to slide open. She juggled a Starbucks Iced Caramel Macchiato in one hand and a large portfolio in the other. The oversized purse draped on her right shoulder caused her to slouch unevenly, making her arrival look as far from graceful or unruffled as possible. The Rum Raisin-colored lipstick she had remembered to apply was not going to make up for her disheveled appearance today.
Score another one for Mom. This is me making some kind of entrance and, as usual, I’m as far from composed as possible.
Antonetta Vigliano, her mother, had spent most of her life freely handing out bits of unsolicited guidance to anyone and everyone as if she had memorized a Bible of Rules set forth by god-knows-who, or Saint somebody. Maria was convinced she had made up most of her rules and they were really only created for, and directed at, her daughters to keep them in line. Despite her mother’s quips looping through her brain at inconvenient times, most days Maria paid no attention to Antonetta’s practical life advice because she simply didn’t have time for composure, or to give a thought about making an actual entrance.
The elevator car Maria rode in crept along, pausing intermittently to gather solemn-faced souls that entered and looked at their feet; cranky people working on this holiday. It seemed strange to Maria. Why haven’t they left to prepare for the big ball drop? But here she was at work on New Year’s Eve too.
The last recession had hit the agency world hard and most businesses had made large cuts to their advertising budgets. Even though most mainstream media and expert talking heads hyped economic recovery, no one was fully restored to pre-crash robust. Most agencies played it safe, thankful they still had client rosters. Always apprehensive that they were on the verge of being fired by their clients or having business poached by other agencies, the staff did what they had to do to keep their accounts and jobs. Life, and weekly status meetings, were focused on clicks, the never-ending battle for Google rankings, platforms, web traffic, and viewer engagement. The staff ate Search Engine Optimization stats for breakfast, anxious they were skating on thin ice. Maria was sure she wouldn’t have a job through spring and didn’t want to push her luck.
As the elevator doors slid open, Maria spotted her boss, Hal Tobias, exiting one of the express elevators across the lobby. Hal, a tall silver-haired man who looked much younger than his seventy-two years, looked at Maria and pointed to his eyes with two fingers and then at her and mouthed, “I’m watching you.”
“Your mother’s on line two,” shot in her direction as she stepped into the expanse that was Rotelle, Herbert, Tobias and Associates, aka R.H.T. and Associates. Her assistant, Lyndon, waved a phone in the air and frowned at her.
“Ohhhhhhhhh. Tell her that I’m in a meeting. Please?”
“I did, when she called at 8:57. And 9:53. And 11:42. Didn’t you see my texts? Take it please, please, please. The trees will thank you,” Lyndon whined as he ripped sheets off of a message pad and shoved them in her direction. “Pretty please? This is pathetic me begging. Talk to her before she gives me another recipe to try.”
Lyndon knelt, his steepled fingers pressed together holding the papers. He pushed them towards her again. “Pul-leeze. If I don’t make the dish, I can’t pass the quiz when she calls. Maria, I’ve gained ten pounds in the last year. This cannot go onnnnnn. I’m getting love handles,” he whined as he crept forward.
“You are not,” Maria shot back.
“I am. And you know how Darius hates love handles. He pinched them yesterday. Ewwwwwwwww. For the sake of my love life, and my wardrobe please take your mother’s call.” In a last-ditch sympathy play, he fell on the reception area sofa. Shoving one hand still clutching the papers up to the ceiling, he whimpered, “Pu-leeezze.” When Maria didn’t react, he hopped up from the sofa and took his place at his desk.
“God, you are such a drama queen,” she teased.
Lyndon scrunched his nose, flicked away imaginary sweat from his brow, shrugged, and said, “And don’t you ever forget that, sweetie.”
Maria loved him for his over-the-top reactions and carefree attitude. She felt on edge all the time, afraid to really express herself to anyone. I mean who really wants to know what I think anyway was always in the back of her overactive mind and surfaced at inconvenient times. Lyndon, king of word vomit with no filter, was her opposite and could be counted on to blurt out whatever flitted through his brain at all times. She secretly wished that she could be more like him, but was way too worried about her words being judged and used against her.
“Stellar meeting again?” he asked as he reached for the ringing phone, and said, “R. H. T. and Associates. How may I direct your call?” He nodded in her direction. Maria frowned and shook her head no. “I’m sorry. She’s in a meeting. May I take a message?” he said and scribbled something as he hung up.
“Hal announced out loud to the clients in the middle of the pitch that I’m his latest handpicked on-her-way-up hot-shot of Madison Avenue. His rising star. According to him, I’m the girl who’s going places.”
Lyndon’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully, “Ugh. He really needs a new script.”
“Hey, this girl-going-places is only one of the latest young fools in a long line of young fools desperate to take on as much work as possible for recognition and advancement. Now, most of all, also the one trying hard not to get fired.”
“Okay, GGP, call the printer after the holiday, okay? He wants a sign-off on that proof,” Lyndon added and snickered at her.
Maria glanced at her reflection in one of the colorful over-sized pieces of contemporary art that hung on the perimeter of the office. She knew she shouldn’t care about how she looked, but she did. Her blue topaz eyes looked a little bloodshot and just short of weepy and her usually styled and blown-out hair wasn’t reacting well with the combo of snow flurries and a too hot interior. The hair that began the day sleek and straightened was now a frizzy mass of brown waves circling her flushed and shiny olive skin. She wrinkled her nose and pushed her hair back as she sized up her overheated and slightly damp face.
“Do you want to blot, sweetie?” Lyndon teased as he lifted a box of tissues.
“Am I sweaty? I look sweaty, don’t I?”
“Ohhhh, a little moist, maybe…” he whispered as he tossed the box towards her.
“I hate that word.”
He gave her a thumbs-up as she batted the box in the air several times, trying not to spill her coffee as the carton landed on the floor.
Maria retrieved the box, yanked out three tissues, and tossed it back to Lyndon. She glanced at her reflection again, blotted her face, shoved the tissues into her coat pocket, and said, “Thank you,” with an exaggerated sigh tacked on. “Girl going nowhere,” she whispered, convinced her reflection said the opposite of “girl going places.” She was certain she still looked like the shy girl from South Philadelphia, not sure why she was in New York in this office faking it daily, positive that everyone saw right through her.
“That’s much better, sweetie,” Lyndon said as the phone rang again. Maria rolled her eyes as he reached for the phone and whined, “Oh my god, it’s a holiday. What is happening today?”
“I’m not here,” Maria blurted.
“R.H.T. and Associates. Hold, please,” he chirped into the phone. “It’s your mother. Again,” he hissed through gritted teeth.
If Maria’s turbo-charged helicopter mom had her way, she would still be safely ensconced somewhere in South Philadelphia, preferably within a stone’s throw of the immaculate brick row house on Dickinson Street that she had grown up in. Even Center City, twenty-five blocks north of her Bella Vista neighborhood, would have been considered too far for Antonetta. To this day, her entire family, except Maria, lived within blocks of one another. Aunt Sylvia and her daughters, Maria’s cousins, and best friends, Ava and Bambi, lived right next door.
College in New York was one thing, staying in New York was a knife straight through her overly dramatic mother’s heart. At least this was what Antonetta had told everyone within a fifteen-block radius when Maria took the job with R.H.T. and Associates two years ago. Maria had applied everywhere, and anywhere, like everyone else she went to school with. Most people were glad to be offered an unpaid internship or a part-time gig to have a foot in the door. Maria admitted then even she was surprised when she was offered the job. Both relieved and conflicted, she grabbed the opportunity, convinced separation would eventually be accepted by her mother. It wasn’t.
Lyndon’s phone rang again. “R. H. T. and Associates. How may I direct your call? Hold please.” Lyndon’s eyes shot open wide, “She’s on line three, too. How does she do that? You need to take this call. Now. Ri, please.”
Maria, again balancing a coffee in one hand and a portfolio in the other, pushed her office door open with her hip and entered. The latest campaign for Cee-Cee Berg’s newest cosmetic line circled the space. Stunning models with glowing faces and perfect eyes and lips taunted her. She took a long hard breath in, dropped the portfolio, and sat down at her desk.
Her sketchbook was propped next to the phone, open to a page of flashy feather and sequined costumes. Reminiscent of vintage Liberace, the glitzy get-ups were her latest designs for the family’s team, The Bella Vista Brawlers’ performance in this year’s Mummer’s Parade—Philadelphia’s New Year’s Day event and the oldest folk festival and number one holiday parade in the country, according to USA Today readers. String Bands and Comic and Fancy Brigades competing in ornate costumes marching and performing elaborately choreographed dances along Broad Street for large crowds in this day-long spectacle.
The Vigliano family tradition was a day away. Generations of her family had made this same trek strutting and playing in these bands for almost as long as the parade had been held. This was an event not to be messed with. Ever.
Maria reached for the phone, but stopped, sure that in her mother’s mind there was some imaginary emergency needing immediate attention. Stalling, and trying to steel herself for what was to come, she picked up a green marker and absentmindedly colored the large fan of ostrich and peacock feathers that made up the circular plume that would frame each of the performers.
Maria had scribbled drawings for the band ever since she could hold a crayon in her chubby little-kid hands. After successfully lobbying for a deluxe art set full of paint, markers, and colored pencils one Christmas long ago, her designs took off and her talents evolved into her being the band’s design team. Unfortunately, the team was her alone and was now more than she wanted on top of her day job responsibilities. But, try as she might, she couldn’t explain that to her mother.
She took a deep breath, picked up the office phone and punched the blinking button, and said, “Hi, Mom.”
“Maria. Maria. Maria. Where have you been? I’ve been calling all morning. Office and cell. You had me worried sick. I thought you were dead.”
“Not dead, Mom. Meetings. I had meetings. All morning. I turned my phone off,” she said.
“Your father said to leave you alone. But you know how I worry.”
“Meetings, Mom. Not axe murderers. Mom, I have a huge deadline. What’s wrong?”
“I know you’re busy, honey. You’re a very important person in New York, and all. I just told Stella Morrone that very thing yesterday when I picked up the almond paste at Esposito’s so I could make my Pignoli cookies for the New Year’s Party.”
Maria moved the marker over the drawing, quickly laying in color in fat, fast strokes, as her mother spoke. Her hand picked up speed as her mother’s words accelerated. “Mom,” she prompted.
“What?”
“Mom, please. I don’t have a lot of time.”
“Okay. I know you’re busy. You’re coming, right?”
“Uh, I don’t know. I, we…We’ve got a huge presentation the day after New Year’s. It’s a three-million-dollar account. My job is on the line.”
“But, the parade.”
The burden of this account and the precarious state of Maria’s job was lost on her mother. Antonetta didn’t understand her living in what equated to a closet, or her need to be away from the family, away from her, or the need for her to succeed at this career of hers. Nothing stood in Antonetta Vigliano’s way when she wanted Maria present for a family event. And nothing, not business or a cosmetic account, could be used as an excuse when the holidays were involved, and most especially not on New Year’s Day for the parade. Even though the event was an important part of her family history, and hers, this year New Year’s and all that came with it was the last thing Maria needed right now. “Ugh…”
“Wooahhh. Wait… three million for lipstick? That’s a bit much, huh? Think she’ll have any pinks I’ll like this year? Can you get samples?”
“Mooooooommmm. Focus, please. I’ve got to go.”
“Well, we don’t want you to lose your job or anything.”
“Mom! I’m hanging up now.”
“Wait,” she pleaded again, “Your father needs you home. The costumes. They’re just not right, Ri. Something’s off.”
Maria rested her head on the desktop and closed her eyes. Most days Maria could tune her mother out, but today her exasperated tone exhausted her. Whenever she called her Ri, Maria felt her mother’s grasp tighten. It was as if her roots had somehow extended all the way up I-95, through the Lincoln Tunnel, across the city, into the building and were now wrapped around her ankles. It was almost as if at that very moment, she felt them constrict.
“Mom,” she interrupted, “The costumes were fine a week ago when I saw them last. Uncle Iggy and the guys followed my designs. They did a fine job this year.”
“You looked at them so fast. You were in such a rush to get the train back to the city that you didn’t even stay for dessert. And I made you Pizzelles. Aunt Sylvia’s still mad you left the piece of brownie cheesecake she wrapped for you. I haven’t heard the end of that yet, either. You work too hard. What about P. T. O? Vacation days? Anybody get those anymore? It’s the holidays,” flowed out in what seemed like one long whine.
“Mom.”
“They followed your sketches, honey, but something’s missing. I don’t think they’re even going to place this year.”
Not placing would be a first and might just knock the Earth out of orbit. “Oh, c’mon, the Brawlers have NEVER, ever not placed in the parade.” Maria knew that was a fact. Everyone in South Philly knew that. “Ma, you know that it’s not just the costumes that count. I’ll see what I can do.”
“That can’t happen. Not placing. You know how your father gets if they don’t win something. It’s…”
“Tradition. I know. But they’ve never not placed. Even when Nonna…”
“Phhhtttt. Don’t even say it. Disaster that was a dis-as-ter.”
“I’ll do my best. But I’m not promising,” Maria promised.
“Okay, wonderful.” she sighed. “I’ll tell him. You know how much this parade means to your father. He works so hard all year long.”
“My best, Mom. I’ll do my best. Maybe you should wait to tell him. No promises. Okay? I really have to go. I’m late for a meeting,” Maria lied.