“So,” Cody asked, down on one knee and holding a rose up to Maria in the middle of the
hallway, “Will you be my girlfriend?” A brief, awkward moment passed where no one said
anything. After that uncomfortably long break, Maria managed to say, “W-w-well…” all while
Cody’s face looked more and more panicked. Maria was the most popular girl at Cedar Rapids
High School in Iowa, and everyone knew that she was way out of his league. “I really only date
like…movie stars and stuff, you know?” she said with an innocent smile, “I just like you better
as a…well you’re not my friend, so…I guess I just like you better as a stranger.” With that, she
gave Cody a pitiful pat on the shoulder and continued walking, never once looking back to see
him, a statue, offering his love to the thin air.
As he sat in the middle of the hallway, still kneeling, a thought began to articulate in his head. “I
know, I’ll become a movie star!” He yelled, unaware that his thoughts were actually words. A
few laughs followed, but Cody wouldn’t let that discourage him. He knew what he had to do to
win Maria’s love.
At the dinner table that night, Cody’s dad asked one of his usual intrusive questions: “So, did
you ask that girl out today?” “What girl?” Cody said glumly while massacring his broccoli with
a fork. “You know, that girl you’re always talking about. What’s her name again? Mindy?
Molly?” “Maria. It’s Maria, dad,” Cody said, his eyes moving to the ceiling, looking past to the
stars, trying to examine his purpose in the universe. “I take it that things didn’t go too well?”
dad pried, which got a glare, “Well there’s always more fish in the sea, son.” “No. She’s the
one, dad. She’s the only girl for me. She’s the girl of my dreams, dad, can’t you see?” “Well, uh
son,” his dad interjected, until he was stopped by a description of Maria’s features that seemed
to last at least twenty minutes, complete with lines about her “silky, golden hair” and her
“warm, angelic skin”.
“Wait, so you’ve felt this silky, angelic hair of hers?”
“Only in my dreams,” Cody muttered as he stared off into space, gone for at least another hour.
Taking his cue, Cody’s dad stood up and began to wash the dishes, shaking his head and
wondering how his son could be such a damn fool sometimes.
As everyone knows, movie stars aren’t made in Iowa. After everyone was asleep, Cody stole
away to the garage, hopped in the family minivan, and sped away into the night. According to
his map, the trip from Cedar Rapids to Hollywood was 24 hours long. Yes! It’ll only take me a
day to get there, he thought, ever the optimist. Hyped up on Red Bull and Mountain Dew, he
drove all through the night and the next day, until he finally arrived at the door of the United
Talent Agency at dusk. The door wouldn’t open, and so Cody got back in the van, put it in
reverse for a few feet, then rammed it through the entryway. “Ah, that seemed to do the trick,”
Cody said, dusting his hands off as he walked through the gaping hole he made.
“Hello? Anybody here?” he yelled out into the dark room, peering past the reception desk
down one of the many monochromatic hallways. “I already told you, Daryl, the 22 year old
can’t pass as one of Anna Kendrick’s acapella star children in the new Pitch Perfect reboot,” a
man said as he emerged from his cubicle, scribbling profusely on a clipboard, “Oh, you’re not
Daryl.”
“I’m Cody Smith! Now who here can turn me into a movie star?” Cody said, putting his hands
on his hips triumphantly.
“Oh, you’re one of those. You see, we get ones like you all the time. You waltz in here acting
like you own the place, when in reality you’re just a dumb kid looking to make it big in
Hollywood. I’m sorry, sir, but we’re closed for the day, so if you could maybe come back
tomorrow for a formal audition, then we can talk.”
“Formal audition? What? I thought you turned people into movie stars? You know, like a fairy
godmother for fame and wealth or something?”
“Sir, I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, but I wish you the best of luck in the
audition process. Bye now,” the agent said as he shoved Cody out the hole in the front of the
building. Defeated, Cody walked back to his van in shame, hopped in the backseat, and fell
asleep there.
4
The next morning, Cody strolled into the agency, right past the executives standing around
what used to be the doorway with shocked looks on their faces, and up to the tired-looking 40
year old woman at the reception desk. “Hello, my name is Debra, what can I do for you today?”
she asked without looking up. “Hi Debra, my name is Cody Smith. Can you turn me into a
movie star?” “Sir, here at Universal Talent Agency, we believe that everyone can be a star,” she
said with the least enthusiastic jazz hands that have ever been performed, “Just go upstairs
and get in line, and they’ll tell you where to go.”
The line stretched down the staircase and into the main lobby. After a long 12 hours, 14
minutes, and 33 seconds, Cody finally got to talk to the talent agent. “Hello sir, I’m here to see
about possibly getting an audition? You see, I’ve dreamt of being a movie star for at least the
past 48 hours, and it would mean the world to me if you could fit me into your busy, busy
schedule” he said. Well, first we have to run some tests to see if you’re even worth considering.
The agent pulled out a scanner that he held up to Cody’s face. “Checking for facial
symmetry…Checking for facial symmetry,” it chirped, “Facial Symmetry 99.9%. Proceed.”
Cody was ushered into a beige room with a panel of four middle aged men, all leaned back
grumpily.
“Hello, I’m Cody Smith. You know, everyone back home says I look just like Timothee
Chalamet,” he said with a very slight laugh, but no one changed their expression. He cleared
his throat nervously and shook himself, then launched into a reenactment of his proposal to
Maria. By the end, all four men were in tears. “Here, just sign right here and you will have a
5
contract with UTA,” one of the men blubbered. Cody spent a few moments examining the fine
print. “What’s this line about you all owning me for the rest of my life and stuff?” he asked while
pointing to a few words in a sea. “Oh, don’t worry about that. Everyone knows that the fine
print never really matters, right?” the oldest looking man said and gave the others a little
nudge, causing a chorus of “Everyone knows that…nothing to worry about”s. “O-Ok, I guess
this is what I’ve always dreamed of,” he said, and signed his name in big, bold lettering on the
dotted line.
His contract came with a signing bonus of two million dollars, which he promptly spent on a
Lamborghini and a house in Beverly Hills. When he walked back into the UTA with a fresh suit
and a golden watch, everyone treated him somewhat differently: “Hello Mr. Smith, how are you
today?”, “Mr. Smith, pleasure to be in your company on this fine Tuesday”, and “Oh Mr. Smith,
you look stunning as ever today” were only a fraction of the pleasantries he was doused with
when he entered.
Years passed, and he churned out blockbuster after blockbuster. He had to continually
upgrade houses, not because he needed the room, but because he ran out of space in his
garage for all of his cars. There was always a line of models extending down his front walk and
into the street, and they stood there and waited their turn until Cody let them in. He grew
accustomed to sleeping with the low drone of a news helicopter in the background. Close to
four years had gone by when he realized that he had lost sight of what he cared about most:
Maria. While beautiful, the endless stream of models never satisfied him in the way he knew
6
she would. He resolved to go back to Iowa the next day and bring his princess back to his
castle.
He flew down the desert-lined highway in his lime green Lamborghini at breakneck speed.
Every time a cop tried to pull him over, he just turned around and gave them one of his famous,
million dollar smiles, and they were too dazed to keep up the chase. The Aventador pulled
down his old street before eight that night. His family hadn’t heard from him in all this time, and
they were overjoyed to see him, suspiciously even more so than the time that he had survived a
life-threatening car accident a few years prior. After all the smiling and hugging ceased, he
asked where Maria lived now. His family pointed him just down the street to a blue house with
a small, quaint light on the porch.
He drove his car the small 200 feet between the houses, revving his engine the whole way.
Each step he took as he walked up to the porch felt colossal, like every moment of the past
four years of his life had led to this moment in time. After a moment’s hesitation, he reached up
and rang the doorbell. A male voice came from inside, which was followed by a woman’s reply.
The door swung open. There stood Maria, angelic in the cold moonlight, the features of her
face painted their glowing hues by the light that the moon had so graciously cast on them.
“What can I do for you?” Maria asked. With a small, almost imperceptible shudder, Cody
replied, “You don’t know who I am? Cody Smith? Movie Star?” “Hmm, it doesn’t seem to ring
any bells…” she trailed off, lost in thought, “Is there a reason that you’re on my porch right
7
now?”
“Well, you may not remember, but I went to your high school. In fact, we knew each
other,” he said, waiting expectantly for her to figure out who he was and beg him to marry her.
“Still not sure. I knew a Cody in high school. That Cody even asked me out once, but I turned
him down. He was such a dork! He even got down on one knee in the middle of the hallway
and offered me a rose!” she said with a laugh, “Can you believe it?” “Oh, wow! He must’ve
really cared about you,” he said uneasily. A silent understanding passed between the two. “Oh
god, that was you! Oh, I’m so, so sorry! I feel like such an idiot!” she said with her hand
covering her mouth, as if it would stop her words from reaching him.
“Everything ok out there honey?” came a voice from the living room. “It’s fine Todd, don’t worry
about it” Maria said with a cursory glance over her shoulder. “That was my husband,” she said,
eyes down on the ground. Each word was like a bomb to Cody, a bomb was planted years
before, just now exploding. “Oh” was all he could say as he stumbled back off the porch and
into his neon Aventador. He drove down Interstate 80 through Iowa and Nebraska, tears
streaking down his perfectly symmetrical face the whole way. His house was no longer a home
when he returned, as he couldn’t fill it with dancing visions of Maria. He cut off all contact with
the outside world, which only made the vultures bear down on him harder. When his cleaning
lady came in to vacuum the carpets, she found him dangling from the ceiling, a rope of
hundred dollar bills around his neck.