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- I take one one one cause you left me and
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- Two two two for my family and
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- Three three three for my heartache and
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- Four four four for my headaches and
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- Five five five for my lonely and
Dearest Ms. Buckett,
What the hell were they doing, calling her dearest? It was probably that stupid, flirty Rainbow Clinic worker who wrote the letters. Just her luck. Anyone who whined about wanting to be attractive obviously hadn't the faintest idea what being attractive was like. At least he had restrained himself from making the shocked exclamations that used to be normal whenever Honey did so much as peek out from behind the navy blue drapes of her motel window.
Key phrase being used to be. That was all over now. Well, not all over. Not quite. But as long as Honey kept on fulfilling her objectives. She hadn't the foggiest idea how or why, but whoever it was that ran the entire Rainbow operation seemed to have complete control over the universe. Everyone on earth, including Honey, was their play-toy, and they had finally given a few of the toys a chance at happiness. It was an awe-inspiring act of magnanimity, but not so awe-inspiring to keep her from performing whatever task they asked of her, despite the fact that the entire situation was even more suspicious than it was awe-inspiring. But, as there was virtually no way of finding out the truth behind the Rainbow Cycle, Honey decided to accept a quasi-religious yet somewhat credible explanation generated by her mind. It was the most religion she had ever condoned, really, and it wasn't even a legitimate religion. In fact, she was pretty sure that what she was doing would be frowned on by most of the prominent religions already in existence.
Not that Honey cared, as long as they stuck to frowning rather than coming up and asking for autographs or whispering slanderous rumours from the latest issue of Star magazine just loud enough and bitchy enough for her to hear them and be annoyed. She knew there was nothing to be gained by suing those trash-talking magazines. Their lawyers earned themselves some pretty pennies by tying up celebrity lawsuits so long that they were eventually dropped. Besides, she hadn't gone around suing all the people that had called her white trash and made fun of her in school, so why should she start playing the lawsuit game now?
Three months into her service for the Rainbow Cycle, Honey didn't need to worry about things like that. At least, not twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. No, she actually had time to herself. No hordes of people with cameras and camcorders lying in wait outside of her motel room. No one interrupting her in the middle of eating or going for a walk, even sitting in the park reading, for autographs. No purposely indiscreet conversations about what a b***h she most likely was and all the scandalous thing she had done over the course of the past week. For perhaps the first time in her life, Honey Buckett was being left alone, and it was the most glorious thing she had ever experienced.
Or, it had been in the beginning. Now, she wasn't so sure. She was beginning to notice things that she had been to preoccupied to see before, like the fact that she had no friends. She had never had any friends past her siblings, and Lord knew where they had all wandered off to. They certainly weren't staying with their crazy parents. Even Paint had moved out the moment he turned sixteen and got a job, she was sure. Possibly even earlier.
But she wasn't going to think about her family. She had a new objective, the completion of which would bring her that much closer to complete bliss. Who knew? Maybe the people at the Rainbow Clinic would give her a friend after this objective. Or maybe something even more substantial, but she wasn't about to get high hopes and have them shot down. One friend would be more than satisfactory at this point.
Objective
Go to Christie Hall at 6:00 P.M. on May 26th.
Talk to Kenan MacAllistair.
This objective was unlike any she had received before. Was she supposed to become friends with Kenan MacAllistair? Was it even possible to be friends with Kenan MacAllistair? Everything she had ever heard about him pointed to no. It wasn't just a pack of rumours, either: the photographer for one of her shoots had apparently met MacAllistair before. According to the photographer, he wasn't exactly the most vivid of social butterflies. Well, if the Rainbow Crew wanted her to make him be social, then goddamnit, he would be social.
Suddenly, a buzzer went off. Honey assumed it was just in her head, since she had just come up with the idea that perhaps Kenan MacAllistair was going to tell her something important, and that was why she needed to talk to him at Christie Hall. She had no clue what he could possibly tell her that was so important, but it was the most plausible answer she had come up with, and--
There was the buzzer again. She hadn't had a new idea this time, though, so it was crucial that the noise receive a new cause. The fire alarm! What if it was the fire alarm? No, it didn't fit fire alarm standards in frequency. It couldn't be the oven, because not only did ovens usually make dinging noises, but Honey wasn't the world's best cook and liked to leave the oven to its own devices, lest it should be angered by her missteps in the baking process.
"Honeyyy! It's me, open up!" a voice called, slicing through her now-food-related thoughts. It was her agent, Derek Hayes. Honey barely suppressed a groan.
"I'll be right there, Derek!" she called, heading for the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator, retrieved a bottle of sherry, and poured herself a glass, which quickly disappeared down her throat. If she was going to go to a party and force an antisocial multi-millionaire into a conversation, she would have to be tipsy at the very least. After one more drink, she padded over to the door and let Derek in. As she was closing the door, it finally hit her that the noise she had heard before had been the door buzzer. No one ever used it, so she hadn't recognized the sound it made.
"What're you drinkin' for?"
Honey turned her attention to the agent who had wandered into the living room and caught a glance of the sherry bottle sitting on her kitchen counter. "Preparing myself for the party at Christie Hall, of course."
"Huh. I thought I was gonna have to beg and plead to get you to go to that, and here you are already planning on it. What gives?"
"I guess I finally got wise to your PR strategies, Derek," said Honey, hastily snatching the letter from the Rainbow Clinic off of the coffee table as her agent sat down on the couch. She could only imagine what he would say if he found out about that whole thing. And, more importantly, what would the people at the Rainbow Clinic say?
- Dearest?
What the hell were they doing, calling her dearest? It was probably that stupid, flirty Rainbow Clinic worker who wrote the letters. Just her luck. Anyone who whined about wanting to be attractive obviously hadn't the faintest idea what being attractive was like. At least he had restrained himself from making the shocked exclamations that used to be normal whenever Honey did so much as peek out from behind the navy blue drapes of her motel window.
Key phrase being used to be. That was all over now. Well, not all over. Not quite. But as long as Honey kept on fulfilling her objectives. She hadn't the foggiest idea how or why, but whoever it was that ran the entire Rainbow operation seemed to have complete control over the universe. Everyone on earth, including Honey, was their play-toy, and they had finally given a few of the toys a chance at happiness. It was an awe-inspiring act of magnanimity, but not so awe-inspiring to keep her from performing whatever task they asked of her, despite the fact that the entire situation was even more suspicious than it was awe-inspiring. But, as there was virtually no way of finding out the truth behind the Rainbow Cycle, Honey decided to accept a quasi-religious yet somewhat credible explanation generated by her mind. It was the most religion she had ever condoned, really, and it wasn't even a legitimate religion. In fact, she was pretty sure that what she was doing would be frowned on by most of the prominent religions already in existence.
Not that Honey cared, as long as they stuck to frowning rather than coming up and asking for autographs or whispering slanderous rumours from the latest issue of Star magazine just loud enough and bitchy enough for her to hear them and be annoyed. She knew there was nothing to be gained by suing those trash-talking magazines. Their lawyers earned themselves some pretty pennies by tying up celebrity lawsuits so long that they were eventually dropped. Besides, she hadn't gone around suing all the people that had called her white trash and made fun of her in school, so why should she start playing the lawsuit game now?
Three months into her service for the Rainbow Cycle, Honey didn't need to worry about things like that. At least, not twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. No, she actually had time to herself. No hordes of people with cameras and camcorders lying in wait outside of her motel room. No one interrupting her in the middle of eating or going for a walk, even sitting in the park reading, for autographs. No purposely indiscreet conversations about what a b***h she most likely was and all the scandalous thing she had done over the course of the past week. For perhaps the first time in her life, Honey Buckett was being left alone, and it was the most glorious thing she had ever experienced.
Or, it had been in the beginning. Now, she wasn't so sure. She was beginning to notice things that she had been to preoccupied to see before, like the fact that she had no friends. She had never had any friends past her siblings, and Lord knew where they had all wandered off to. They certainly weren't staying with their crazy parents. Even Paint had moved out the moment he turned sixteen and got a job, she was sure. Possibly even earlier.
But she wasn't going to think about her family. She had a new objective, the completion of which would bring her that much closer to complete bliss. Who knew? Maybe the people at the Rainbow Clinic would give her a friend after this objective. Or maybe something even more substantial, but she wasn't about to get high hopes and have them shot down. One friend would be more than satisfactory at this point.
Objective
Go to Christie Hall at 6:00 P.M. on May 26th.
Talk to Kenan MacAllistair.
- "What the hell?"
This objective was unlike any she had received before. Was she supposed to become friends with Kenan MacAllistair? Was it even possible to be friends with Kenan MacAllistair? Everything she had ever heard about him pointed to no. It wasn't just a pack of rumours, either: the photographer for one of her shoots had apparently met MacAllistair before. According to the photographer, he wasn't exactly the most vivid of social butterflies. Well, if the Rainbow Crew wanted her to make him be social, then goddamnit, he would be social.
Suddenly, a buzzer went off. Honey assumed it was just in her head, since she had just come up with the idea that perhaps Kenan MacAllistair was going to tell her something important, and that was why she needed to talk to him at Christie Hall. She had no clue what he could possibly tell her that was so important, but it was the most plausible answer she had come up with, and--
There was the buzzer again. She hadn't had a new idea this time, though, so it was crucial that the noise receive a new cause. The fire alarm! What if it was the fire alarm? No, it didn't fit fire alarm standards in frequency. It couldn't be the oven, because not only did ovens usually make dinging noises, but Honey wasn't the world's best cook and liked to leave the oven to its own devices, lest it should be angered by her missteps in the baking process.
"Honeyyy! It's me, open up!" a voice called, slicing through her now-food-related thoughts. It was her agent, Derek Hayes. Honey barely suppressed a groan.
"I'll be right there, Derek!" she called, heading for the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator, retrieved a bottle of sherry, and poured herself a glass, which quickly disappeared down her throat. If she was going to go to a party and force an antisocial multi-millionaire into a conversation, she would have to be tipsy at the very least. After one more drink, she padded over to the door and let Derek in. As she was closing the door, it finally hit her that the noise she had heard before had been the door buzzer. No one ever used it, so she hadn't recognized the sound it made.
"What're you drinkin' for?"
Honey turned her attention to the agent who had wandered into the living room and caught a glance of the sherry bottle sitting on her kitchen counter. "Preparing myself for the party at Christie Hall, of course."
"Huh. I thought I was gonna have to beg and plead to get you to go to that, and here you are already planning on it. What gives?"
"I guess I finally got wise to your PR strategies, Derek," said Honey, hastily snatching the letter from the Rainbow Clinic off of the coffee table as her agent sat down on the couch. She could only imagine what he would say if he found out about that whole thing. And, more importantly, what would the people at the Rainbow Clinic say?
It was 6:00 when Honey and Derek finally left, and Honey had had quite a few more glasses of sherry. Luckily, she wasn't required to drive, as usual. There was a sleek, black limousine that Derek had called about ten minutes before waiting for them outside. The driver was a temp; Honey had never met him before. He explained that one of the children of the usual driver, Jerry, was sick, and the group lapsed into only slightly awkward silence for the rest of the drive.
Only when she had already entered the vast hall did Honey realize that she had a problem: she had never seen Kenan MacAllistair before. He could be any man in the room: the fat man hovering near the kitchen, waiting impatiently for dinner to start; the man sitting at the bar, chatting up a seemingly uninterested lady; the man standing near the piano, doing Lord-knows-what; the man following the piano man around like a lost puppy... it was hopeless just picking one out at random. It could take her all night.
So she resigned herself to the horror of dinner. Basically, it was just hours of sitting, pretending to be having a good time, making pointless conversation, and drinking plenty of wine. Derek wouldn't let her eat too much, anyway. Couldn't go gaining weight, or her career would be shot. Honey didn't object too much -- she had no other career options, after all. Her only skills were modelling and acting. If no one wanted her for those, she was screwed. Of course, Honey had never considered settling down and being a stay-at-home wife. Then she could get as fat as she wanted. Not that she wanted to get fat.
This train of thought was interrupted by an announcement. A toast. Honey hated toasts. Hardly anyone could give really good ones, and even if it was a good one, you still had to wait for ages just for one drink. So, naturally, she phased out whatever was being said. It wasn't until later that she realized that she should have been listening. The people at her table were going on as they had been throughout the meal, talking about things that didn't catch her interest at all, until she heard two words that she found profoundly interesting: Kenan MacAllistair.
"Who?" she inquired discreetly of Derek while the others were talking amongst themselves. If she had known that Derek knew who Kenan MacAllistair was, she would have asked hours before! Maybe she needed to start reading celebrity gossip magazines more. At least she wouldn't be stuck in the dinner party that wouldn't end, looking for someone she had never seen before.
"The guy who gave the toast. Pay attention, Hon. And stop drinking so much wine! People'll think you're an alcoholic, and no one wants to hire an alcoholic."
Honey rolled her eyes and took another drink of wine. Once Derek had gone back to conversing, though, she stole a glance at Kenan. If only she had an entire table to herself like he did. But no, she was stuck with these gossip hounds. So, he was alone. Judging from that, the photographer hadn't been far off on the solitary thing. The second thing she noticed was that he was surprisingly handsome. She was almost positive that it wasn't just the alcohol making her think so, too. Even if he did turn out to be an antisocial b*****d, at least she would have something pretty to look at while she was forcing him into socializing.
As soon as people started to leave their tables, Honey blurted out something about having to use the bathroom and escaped her mind-numbingly dull tablemates. At first, it took nearly all of her concentration to keep from wobbling around while she walked, but she eventually found a good place to stay, leaning against the wall so that she had a clear view of all the guests who passed by.
Finally, there he was. Next to the piano again, go figure. Maybe he played piano. Or maybe he was planning on buying that particular piano. Or maybe both. She would never find out just standing there. So, after smoothing out the slinky, dark blue dress that clung to her hips and hung just off her shoulders, running a hand through her hair, and steadying herself in order to walk properly, she approached Kenan.
"Hi," she said. She had already forgotten what she'd planned on saying earlier. If she had even bothered to plan something. Oh well. She'd just have to let the booze take over some and hope she didn't say anything too embarrassing. "Superlatively boring party, isn't it?"
Only when she had already entered the vast hall did Honey realize that she had a problem: she had never seen Kenan MacAllistair before. He could be any man in the room: the fat man hovering near the kitchen, waiting impatiently for dinner to start; the man sitting at the bar, chatting up a seemingly uninterested lady; the man standing near the piano, doing Lord-knows-what; the man following the piano man around like a lost puppy... it was hopeless just picking one out at random. It could take her all night.
So she resigned herself to the horror of dinner. Basically, it was just hours of sitting, pretending to be having a good time, making pointless conversation, and drinking plenty of wine. Derek wouldn't let her eat too much, anyway. Couldn't go gaining weight, or her career would be shot. Honey didn't object too much -- she had no other career options, after all. Her only skills were modelling and acting. If no one wanted her for those, she was screwed. Of course, Honey had never considered settling down and being a stay-at-home wife. Then she could get as fat as she wanted. Not that she wanted to get fat.
This train of thought was interrupted by an announcement. A toast. Honey hated toasts. Hardly anyone could give really good ones, and even if it was a good one, you still had to wait for ages just for one drink. So, naturally, she phased out whatever was being said. It wasn't until later that she realized that she should have been listening. The people at her table were going on as they had been throughout the meal, talking about things that didn't catch her interest at all, until she heard two words that she found profoundly interesting: Kenan MacAllistair.
"Who?" she inquired discreetly of Derek while the others were talking amongst themselves. If she had known that Derek knew who Kenan MacAllistair was, she would have asked hours before! Maybe she needed to start reading celebrity gossip magazines more. At least she wouldn't be stuck in the dinner party that wouldn't end, looking for someone she had never seen before.
"The guy who gave the toast. Pay attention, Hon. And stop drinking so much wine! People'll think you're an alcoholic, and no one wants to hire an alcoholic."
Honey rolled her eyes and took another drink of wine. Once Derek had gone back to conversing, though, she stole a glance at Kenan. If only she had an entire table to herself like he did. But no, she was stuck with these gossip hounds. So, he was alone. Judging from that, the photographer hadn't been far off on the solitary thing. The second thing she noticed was that he was surprisingly handsome. She was almost positive that it wasn't just the alcohol making her think so, too. Even if he did turn out to be an antisocial b*****d, at least she would have something pretty to look at while she was forcing him into socializing.
As soon as people started to leave their tables, Honey blurted out something about having to use the bathroom and escaped her mind-numbingly dull tablemates. At first, it took nearly all of her concentration to keep from wobbling around while she walked, but she eventually found a good place to stay, leaning against the wall so that she had a clear view of all the guests who passed by.
Finally, there he was. Next to the piano again, go figure. Maybe he played piano. Or maybe he was planning on buying that particular piano. Or maybe both. She would never find out just standing there. So, after smoothing out the slinky, dark blue dress that clung to her hips and hung just off her shoulders, running a hand through her hair, and steadying herself in order to walk properly, she approached Kenan.
"Hi," she said. She had already forgotten what she'd planned on saying earlier. If she had even bothered to plan something. Oh well. She'd just have to let the booze take over some and hope she didn't say anything too embarrassing. "Superlatively boring party, isn't it?"
- Six six six for my sorrow and
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- Seven seven for n-n-n-n-no tomorrow and
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- Eight eight I forget what eight was for but
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- Nine nine nine for a lost God and
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- Ten ten ten ten for everything
everything everything everything
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