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Mia does get the part. This time, when Mia leaves Los Angeles, she is triumphant at winning the part (finally! a part, and what a part!) and full of hope for the future. This is her shot, and she’s not throwing it away. This opportunity could mean everything. And on the off chance that it doesn’t work, that the film’s a dud, and this as far as the dream goes, at least Mia could say that she tried. That she didn’t give up on the dream.
After the safety spiel is done, after all the tray tables up, and the seat backs are in the full upright position, Mia puts in her headphones and flips through the options on the onboard music stations. She flips past a channels of oldies, of pop and rap, and settles on one that’s playing jazz. Mia can’t pretend that she wasn’t forever changed by Sebastian, nor would she want to.
He offered to take her to the airport, but Mia took an Uber instead. It would be too hard to say goodbye; even now, she is fighting back tears thinking of him. True love stories aren’t supposed to be sad, or have unhappy endings. Last night, they said their goodbyes, and Mia kissed Sebastian one last time. It felt like a final goodbye. And maybe it was.
But perhaps it isn’t over. Mia is hopeful for the future; and she is way beyond anywhere that she would have though she’d be a year ago….who knows what the next year….the next five years will bring? And even if her feelings for the soul eyed piano player changed…or if his feelings changed for her…nothing would take away Mia’s love for jazz.
In an incredible wave of irony, it is jazz that brings Mia to the man who would become her husband. She meets him at a tribute to the legendary Del Paxton in New York (Mia could never picture Sebastian in New York, but that doesn’t keep her from looking in the corner of every jazz joint she visits).
On this night, ten months after she left LA, when she’s celebrating a very lucrative offer to star in her own Big Apple set HBO drama, the man she meets is the exact opposite of Sebastian (save for their feelings for jazz). He smiles at her and offers to buy her a drink, and though Mia is generally in the habit of refusing such offers. His name is David Patterson, and on that night with the music of Del Paxton in the background, she gains a friend.
“Musical talent,” David explains, “runs in my family- my grandparents, my parents, my brothers and sisters, even my cousins were born with musical talent to spare. I’m the squib in the family, destined to be just a fan and not a musician.” “Seriously, it can’t be that bad.” Mia grins, and heart skips a beat when David smiles back.
“My grandfather was in a rock band when he was young, playing the drums. They had a top ten hit on the Billboard Charts back in 1964. They were one hit wonders. After that, he did session music for awhile, even played on a record with Del Paxton, which is why I had to come here tonight. After Gramps married Gram, they moved to Washington and started a musical conservatory, which is embarrassingly famous. My father is a band director and my mother was first chair violin in our local orchestra. I can’t carry a tune in a bucket. Pigeons flee in fear of my voice. In High School, I was only in the band because my Dad was the director…and I was the equipment manager. Never played a note of music on the field, but handled a hell of a lot of flip books, reeds, and plumes.”
From that moment on, David is a part of her life. She can’t put her finger on it, exactly where, and exactly when, but little by little she falls for him, and feelings of friendship turn to love. The face she looks for in dusty and crowded corners isn’t Sebastian’s…but David.
For in an amazing way, their dreams mesh and mold together. Sure, there are tough times, but they are in this for the long haul, and if she starts to run away or get worried, David chases behind her.
“Aren’t you worried that all this moving, this crazy life is going to tear us apart? That being with me is going to get in the way of your dreams?” She asks during a manic moment when she is absolutely sure it’s not going to work between them.
“You are my dream, Mia.” David responds. He’s telling the truth, she can tell.
When he proposes on a trip to visit his family in Washington state, Mia eagerly accepts. She loves his family, especially his grandparents. Gramps doesn’t talk much about his days in the rock band, but Grams Patterson is enthusiastic about sharing memories and pictures, even showing clips of the VH1 One Hit Wonders special that was taped in the early 2000’s.
Grams gets a kick out of the fact that Mia has the same maiden name as she had- even after Mia’s temporary panic that the love of her life would turn out to be her kissing cousin. Both Faye and Mia were raised Dolans, but there is no relation, just a shared weakness for men named Patterson. David looks astonishingly like his Gramps did back in the 60’s. She’ll never stop teasing David about that. “That Thing You Do!” becomes Mia’s ringtone and she’s not even a little bit sorry.
Mia’s life takes her to places she would not have thought to dream of, back when she was young and struggling in L.A. She has her pick of film roles, and wins more than a few awards (truth be told, she even gets a kick out of having a Razzie). Now, when she is on the Warner Brother’s lot, she is a star, not a barista. Mia never accepts a full drink, and always tips ridiculously.
Sometimes when she is restless and sleepless, she thinks of Sebastian. Considers googling him, wondering if he ever got Chicken on a Stick off the ground. Wonders if his dreams came true. It is easier, Mia finds, to leave Sebastian a ghost in her past, the one who got away. She always closes out the browser window before pressing enter.
Life is not a fairy tale, and there are hard times to weather too, the hardest of which was the sudden unexpected passing of Grams days before Mia gives birth to a daughter. They name her Faye Aurora Patterson; the first name after Grams, the middle name for the fond feelings that Mia cannot escape for the stars. Faye is brighter than a star, quickly becoming Mia’s galaxy.
Mia moves back to Los Angeles five years after she left. Faye will start school sooner than later, and she needs a schedule, solidity. And Los Angeles is perfect for an actress; even if it seems so much different now from how it had felt when she was younger.
Fate brings life about in funny ways, and on one night, her journey comes full circle.
Jazz.
When she sees the symbol for the club—the symbol she’d drawn when she was much younger and punch drunk on the first throes of love—she knows that Sebastian has reached his dreams too. Mia pauses for a second, knowing the odds are- knowing that he has to be—inside. She’s not sure that she can face Sebastian, not now, not after all this time.
Sebastian’s eyes meet hers, and for a second that old electric spark of the two of them and only the two of them being in the room, flames back up. Sebastian plays their song, and a wave of nostalgia overpowers Mia. She imagines a world where things were different, where they had a happily ever after. Somehow, she knows he’s thinking the same.
The song ends, and the spell is broken.
David asks if she wants to stay for another number.
“No” she says, even though there is a small part of her who wants to stay. The part of the girl who ran away from a fancy dinner to meet a boy at a showing of ”Rebel Without A Cause” and dance around the Griffith Observatory. That little rebellious piece of her heart is still there, but overruled by a woman fully and happily in love with her husband a child.
When she says goodbye to Sebastian this time, it is not with words, but with a look.
They still love each other. They always will.
But their story is not a love story.
It is so much more.