Free Starstruck by Rachel Shukert

devastatingly handsome midshipman. “Obviously, I wouldn’t expect anyone outside the industry to recognize the name, but he’s the head of the publicity department over at Olympus.
Fearfully
important, you understand, a great friend of
practically
everyone who’s anyone, and he thought I’d be a natural. Of course, I haven’t decided to accept just yet, but it is terribly
flattering
, if I do say so myself.”
    Evelyn was practically purple with rage. “I don’t believe you.”
    Margaret stepped forward. “Are you calling me a liar?”
    “That’s right, Frobie.”
    “Nobody calls me a liar.”
    Evelyn smiled her horrible crocodile smile. “Then prove it.”
    Orange Grove’s only working phone box had been a gift from the outgoing senior class of 1934. A glass booth with a sparkling paintwork border of mimosa flowers, it was easy enough to access from the hockey field unseen.
    Squeezing five people, two of them rather large, into a booth designed to accommodate one fashionably petite young lady of Orange Grove posed a more significant challenge. Margaret and Evelyn crowded around the receiver, so close they were practically locked in an embrace. Doris was wedged in a ball under the phone itself, like a walnut in its shell; Claire was flattened against the glass like a fly that had caught the wrong end of a swatter. Mary Ann, unable to fit, had to stand outside to keep watch.
    Fingers shaking, Margaret maneuvered her arm up the front of Evelyn’s blouse to deposit the nickel, still warm from when it had been fished from the depths of the pocket of Mary Ann’s capacious bloomers. In her other sweaty palm, she clutched the greasy reconstituted remnants of Larry Julius’s card.
    “This is the operator. How may I direct your call?”
    “Burbank 4716, please.”
    “Just a moment, please.”
    The phone seemed to ring for an eternity. Margaret could feel Evelyn’s hot breath on her neck. Her own gathered in droplets on the lip of the receiver. Finally, a woman answered. “Olympus Studios. How may I direct your call?”
    “Larry Julius’s office, please.”
    “One moment.”
    Another ring that felt like it lasted a lifetime. From the floor of the booth, Doris let out a little whimper of pain, which Evelyn silenced with a swift kick.
    “Ow!” Doris shrieked.
    “Larry Julius’s office.”
    “What’d she do that for?”
    “Doris, shhh! Hello? Owww!” A set of sharp teeth had just sunk into the flesh of Margaret’s ankle.
    “Sorry, Margie,” Doris whispered. “I was aiming for Evelyn.”
    “Be
quiet!
Um, is this—”
    “May I help you?” The woman sounded annoyed.
    “Yes!” Margaret practically shouted. “I mean, hello! I mean, um, who is this?”
    “This is Gladys, Mr. Julius’s secretary.”
    “Is Mr. Julius available?”
    There was a long, deliberative pause on the part of Gladys. Margaret couldn’t blame her. It must have sounded as though she’d just gotten a call from a cage at the zoo. “Who may I say is calling?”
    “Frobie! Tell him it’s Frooobiiieee!”
    “Evelyn, shut
up
!”
    “I beg your pardon?”
    “There must be something wrong with this connection,” Margaret said desperately.
Isn’t that the truth
. “Please tell him it’s Margaret Frobisher calling.”
    “Very well, Miss Frobisher. Please hold.” There was a brief pause before the woman came back on. “I’m afraid Mr. Julius doesn’t know anyone by that name.”
    Anxiously, Margaret glanced toward Evelyn, but this close, all she could see was teeth. Huge, curving, predatory teeth. “Tell him it’s the girl he met at Schwab’s last week,” she said. “The girl he rescued from Wally the jerky soda jerk. Tell him.”
    “I really don’t think—”
    “Tell him!”
    Gladys sighed. “One moment, please.”
    “Duchess!” Larry Julius’s voice came bubbling down the line, brighter and brasher than she remembered it, but Margaret didn’t care. She could have cried with relief. “Ain’t this a treat!