Paris/Sedaris

It's a breezy Monday in WeHo, the kind that makes you believe anything is possible. My partner, Angela, and I rush down Santa Monica Boulevard to A Different Light bookstore. We're going to meet David Sedaris. Angela seems content to jog, but I'm all-out sprinting. "Hurry up! His reading starts in two hours."

The extra time allows me to fantasize about meeting him. I'll be sitting in the front row, all genderqueer with my faux-hawk and faded Diesel jeans, just boyish enough to catch David's eye, at which point he'll say to me, in his demure Truman Capote-esque voice, "Tania Katan? People compare me to you all the time. I hear you have a new book coming out--can I give you a quote for the cover?"

Oh, the quote. See, my new memoir is coming out, and my strategy is to get Mr. Sedaris to sign Me Talk Pretty One Day.

Then I can take what he's written and tailor it to fit my book-cover needs.

David arrives early. There are only 10 of us. It's like an intimate dinner party. I take a deep breath: "Hi, David. I love your writing." I hand him my worn copy of Me Talk Pretty to sign.

"Could you spell your name?" he says.

"T-a-n-i-a. I'm a writer too."

"You've got a lot of energy." David leans in to my book and scrawls: "Tania, you are a firecracker! Keep up the writing! Love, David Sedaris."

So many options for a cover quote: "A firecracker up the Sedaris!" "Tania, you are David Sedaris!" Could life get better than this?

Yes, in fact. We're skipping out of the bookstore when Angela mouths, "Paris Hilton." Paris is clutching the hand of the other white Paris and heading toward us.

"Hey, Paris," I say. Angela scampers away, scared of what I might do. Paris shoots me a sideways smile and presses her sandaled toes into the cement, as if putting out a cigarette. I'm pretty sure she wants to make out with me.

"First David Sedaris, now you," I say, watching her eyes glaze over with lack of recognition.

"That's hot," she offers.

Then it hits me: Paris Hilton is a funny memoirist too. I mean, who hasn't read Confessions of an Heiress? Well, I haven't. But with Paris and Sedaris on my book cover, I'm bound to have a best seller. I rummage through my courier bag in search of a receipt, a Band-Aid, anything. And then the god of book sales shines his light on me. "Paris, could you sign something?" I ask.

"Sure," she says, lifting her coltlike face to stare coyly into my eager blue eyes.

I hand her a yellow plastic-wrapped maxi pad. "Make it out to Tania."

Paris looks at me as if I've asked her to do her own taxes. But as she leaves, she does scribble something on the smooth plastic wrapper. Afterward I try to make it out. It could be her name. Or maybe it's her phone number. For the book cover, I think I'll just go with the quote she gave me in person: "That's hot."