CHAPTER FIVE

THE ELLEN SHOW WAS FILMED IN FRONT OF A LIVE STUDIO AUDIENCE

Gogh rocked back and forth on his feet, waiting for the backstage manager to send he and Kate out onto the set of Ellen's show. He had only met her in passing, but he was enamored with the boisterous talk show host and was more than excited to meet her.

To his left, Kate was serious faced but beautiful as always, trying to adjust the mic on her back without disrupting the setup. Gogh watched her struggle with it for a moment before offering to take over for her. She accepted, and he quickly adjusted it just as they were waved onstage.

"Alright everybody, welcome Kate Winslet and Gogh whose-last-name-I-can't-pronounce!"

The audience roared their approval, and Gogh laughed good naturedly at the slight jab. He stepped forward to hug the host, and stepped aside so Kate could do the same.

"So Gogh—" Ellen paused, leaning forward slightly, "that is how you pronounce it, right?"

Gogh smiled as he and Kate took their seats. She hadn't really pronounced his first name correctly, but no one ever did so he let it go without correcting her.

"Yeah, Gogh Akkersdijk." He said it slowly, and Ellen repeated it back, seemingly proud when he gave his nod of approval.

"That's a very Dutch name you've got." Ellen said, smiling cheekily.

Gogh nodded in agreement, but continued on the other of conversation before it could be changed, "Akkersdijk is actually my mom's last name; it was the more pronounceable of the two so my dad changed his name."

"Really?" Ellen asked, knowing that the audience would interested with the tidbit of information— both Gogh and his sister were very quiet about their private lives.

"Yeah," Gogh nodded, putting an arm on the couch behind Kate's shoulders.

"What's your father's last name?"

Gogh opened his mouth to respond but found himself cut off by Ellen, "Wait wait wait— let's play a game with this."

She beckoned for an assistant in the wings to bring her a marker and pad, and promptly held them out for Gogh to take, "Okay we're going to play a game." She addressed the audience, smiling cheerfully.

"Gogh is going to write down his father's original last name, Kate and I are going to go around the audience and see if anyone can pronounce it. If you can, you'll win a prize!"

Gogh, shrugged, and in thick print spelled out 'BEZUIDENHOUT'.

Kate and Ellen stared at the name for a minute, sharing a knowing look, and then, Ellen was leading Kate away into the crowd.

The game was fairly simple; Kate would point someone out, that person would try to pronounce the name, and Ellen would jokingly harass them when Gogh said they were wrong.

Eventually a young teenage girl named Elise managed to pronounce it properly, carefully enunciating each syllable. If her t-shirt ( bearing Gogh's face ) was any indication, she was some kind of super fan. So, when Ellen looked at him expectantly to say what the prize was supposed to be ( tickets to the premiere of Titanic ) he said that, and then tacked his own special gift on; he was taking them out to dinner after the show finished taping. The girl's beaming smile was enough for Gogh to know he had made the right decision, and they continued on with the show.

...

By the time Gogh arrived at his apartment ( with Kate in tow), the sun was low in the sky, and his sister Monet was waiting in the living room with an empty pizza box.

"You were supposed to make me dinner." She said, arms crossed against her chest.

"You seem to have managed all by yourself." Gogh said, picking up the pizza box and inspecting it's contents.

"You two went out to dinner?" Monet asked, noticing Kate, who had been taking her shoes off in the entrance way.

"We took this mom and daughter out after we finished taping Ellen." Kate explained, striding off towards Gogh's bedroom, probably to change out of her outfit.

Monet turned to watch her disappear, then whipped her head back around to her brother, "So that post..." she started, sliding over on the couch so that he could sit next to her.

"None of your business." Gogh took a piece of pizza out of the box and put his feet up on the coffee table.

"We're going to be living together soon, so if I have to live with the consequences of your drunk mistakes I think I deserve to at least know what they are." Monet took the pizza from his hand, "And you still owe me dinner."

so basically the way that everyone

pronounces gogh is "go" which is the

american pronunciation but my baby

boy is dutch and that is NOT how they

say it. but don't look it up or anything

it'll come up in the plot later. for those

of you who think akkersdijk sounds like

a sneeze (cough cough nya cough) it's

pronounced ackers-dīk it's actually really

straightforward you just replace the j in

most dutch names with a y okay bye