I can’t be more than four years old. I am eating a piece of cake with my hand, looking directly into the camera, as my mother holds me and my father has his arm around us. Most people still called me by my first name, Elizabeth, back then. Elizabeth Monique Grant.

My mom assumed I’d grow up to be a Liz or a Lizzy. But my father had always loved the name Monique and couldn’t help but call me by it. I would often remind him that my name was Elizabeth and he would tell me that my name was whatever I wanted it to be. When he passed away, it became clear to both my mother and me that I should be Monique. It eased our pain ever so slightly to honor every last thing about him. So my pet name became my real name. And my mother often reminds me that my name was a gift from my father.

Looking at this picture, I am struck by how beautiful my parents were together. James and Angela. I know what it cost them to build a life, to have me. A white woman and a black man in the early ’80s, neither of their families being particularly thrilled with the arrangement. We moved around a lot before my father died, trying to find a neighborhood where my parents felt at ease, at home. My mother didn’t feel welcome in Baldwin Hills. My father didn’t feel comfortable in Brentwood.

I was in school before I met another person who looked like me. Her name was Yael. Her father was Dominican, and her mother was from Israel. She liked to play soccer. I liked to play dress-up. We could rarely agree on anything. But I liked that when someone asked her if she was Jewish, she said, “I’m half Jewish.” No one else I knew was half something.

For so long, I felt like two halves.

And then my father died, and I felt like I was one-half my mother and one-half lost. A half that I feel so torn from, so incomplete without.

But looking at this picture now, the three of us together in 1986, me in overalls, my father in a polo, my mother in a denim jacket, we look like we belong together. I don’t look like I am half of one thing and half of another but rather one whole thing, theirs. Loved.

I miss my dad. I miss him all the time. But it’s moments like this, when I’m on the precipice of finally doing work that might just expand my heart, that I wish I could at least send him a letter, telling him what I’m doing. And I wish that he could send me one back.

I already know what he would write. Something like “I’m proud of you. I love you.” But still, I’d like to get one anyway.

* * *

“ALL RIGHT,” I say. My spot at Evelyn’s desk has become my second home. I’ve come to rely on Grace’s morning coffee. It has replaced my usual Starbucks habit. “Let’s pick up where we left off yesterday. You’re about to start Little Women. Go.”

Evelyn laughs. “You’ve become an old hand at this,” she says.

“I learn quickly.”

A WEEK INTO REHEARSALS, DON and I were lying in bed. He was asking how it was going, and I admitted that Celia was just as good as I’d thought she’d be.

“Well, The People of Montgomery County is going to be number one again this week. I’m at the top of my game again. And my contract is up at the end of this year. Ari Sullivan is willing to do whatever I want to make me happy. So just say the word, baby, and poof, she’s out of there.”

“No,” I said to him, putting my hand on his chest and my head on his shoulder. “It’s OK. I’m the lead. She’s supporting. I’m not going to worry too much. And anyway, there’s something I like about her.”

“There’s something I like about you,” he said, pulling me on top of him. And for a moment, all my worries completely disappeared.

The next day, when we broke for lunch, Joy and Ruby went off to get turkey salads. Celia caught my eye. “There’s no chance you’d want to cut out and grab a milk shake, is there?” she asked.

The nutritionist at Sunset would not have liked me getting a milk shake. But what he didn’t know wouldn’t kill him.

Ten minutes later, we were in Celia’s baby-pink 1956 Chevy, making our way to Hollywood Boulevard. Celia was a terrible driver. I gripped the door handle as if it was capable of saving my life.

Celia stopped at the light at Sunset Boulevard and Cahuenga. “I’m thinking Schwab’s,” she said with a grin.

Schwab’s was the place everybody hung around during the day back then. And everybody knew that Sidney Skolsky, from Photoplay, worked out of Schwab’s almost every day.

Celia wanted to be seen there. She wanted to be seen there with me.

“What kind of game are you playing?” I asked.

“I’m not playing any game,” she said, falsely insulted that I’d suggest such a thing.

“Oh, Celia,” I said, dismissing her with a wave of my hand. “I’ve been at this a few more years than you. You’re the one who just fell off the turnip truck. Don’t confuse us.”

The light turned green, and Celia gunned it.

“I’m from Georgia,” she said. “Just outside of Savannah.”

“So?”

“I’m just saying, I didn’t fall off a turnip truck. I was scouted by a guy from Paramount back home.”

I found it somewhat intimidating—maybe even threatening—that someone had flown out to woo her. I had made my way to town through my own blood, sweat, and tears, and Celia had Hollywood running to her before she was even somebody.

“That may be so,” I said. “But I still know what game you’re running, honey. Nobody goes to Schwab’s for the milk shakes.”

“Listen,” she said, the tone of her voice changing slightly, becoming more sincere. “I could use a story or two. If I’m going to star in my own movie soon, I need some name recognition.”

“And this milk shake business is all just a ruse to be seen with me?” I found it insulting. Both being used and being underestimated.

Celia shook her head. “No, not at all. I wanted to go get a milk shake with you. And then, when we pulled out of the lot, I thought, We should go to Schwab’s.’ ”

Celia stopped abruptly at the light at Sunset and Highland. I realized at that point that was just how she drove. A lead foot on both the gas and the brake.

“Take a right,” I said.

“What?”

“Take a right.”

“Why?”

“Celia, take the goddamn right before I open this car door and throw myself out of it.”

She looked at me like I was nuts, which was fair. I had just threatened to kill myself if she didn’t put on her blinker.

She turned right on Highland.

“Take a left at the light,” I said.

She didn’t ask questions. She just put on her blinker. And then she spun onto Hollywood Boulevard. I instructed her to park the car on a side road. We walked to CC Brown’s.

“They have better ice cream,” I said as we walked in.

I was putting her in her place. I wasn’t going to be photographed with her unless I wanted to be, unless it was my idea. I certainly wasn’t going to be pushed around by somebody less famous than I was.

Celia nodded, feeling the sting.

The two of us sat down, and the guy behind the counter came up to us, momentarily speechless.

“Uh . . .” he said. “Do you want menus?”

I shook my head. “I know what I want. Celia?”

She looked at him. “Chocolate malt, please.”

I watched the way his eyes fixed on her, the way she bent forward slightly with her arms together, emphasizing her chest. She seemed unaware of what she was doing, and that mesmerized him even more.

“And I’ll have a strawberry milk shake,” I said.

When he looked at me, I saw his eyes open wider, as if he wanted to see as much of me as he could at one time.

“Are you . . . Evelyn Hugo?”

“No,” I said, and then I smiled and looked him right in the eye. It was ironic and teasing, with the same tone and inflection I’d used countless times when I was recognized around town.

He scattered away.

“Cheer up, buttercup,” I said as I looked at Celia. She was staring down at the glossy counter. “You’re getting a better milk shake out of the deal.”