It’s been just over a week since we had the win with the behind-the-scenes photo, and we seem to have hit our stride, because it’s been sort of smooth sailing since then.
I say sort of, because Luke and I have been treading lightly, not wanting to be overly confident about the situation quite yet.
Translation: We don’t want to jinx it.
But so far, so good. Since the table-read picture, we’ve posted photos from a wardrobe fitting—spoiler-free, of course—and Victoria even let us post a short video of Bailey and River doing a choreography rehearsal for an upcoming fight scene. She nixed the video of them rehearsing lines, saying it was too much.
At our weekly mandatory meeting over Zoom, she commended us for doing a good job. It wasn’t so much a compliment as it was aPlease keep this up,but I took it as one anyway.
The fans are eating up everything, though. The online chatter has been moving away from Bailey and River and back to their characters, and even You Oughta Know didn’t have too much to say about the posts. She grudgingly admitted in her annoying, nasally voice that she wasn’t celebrating anything yet, but that she was watching. Luke and I both reported her account for being obnoxious. It won’t do anything, because that’s not a reason accounts get shut down, but it felt cathartic.
Luke and I have been working together every day this past week, coordinating posts and gathering ideas. The more we work together, the more it’s feeling like old times. But better somehow. With two years of experience under our belts following Luke’s departure from Harrow & Finch, we’ve both learned a great deal and are more capable in our roles.
It also helps that I don’t hate him as much these days. And I’ve caught his appreciative gazes when we’re working together. But I still have a hard time accepting his praise. I’m always waiting for the other shoe to drop, for him to tell me he’s kidding. He never does, though.
In all, it’s been a pretty good week. Tessa is still finding some negative posts focused on Bailey and River’s breakup, but none of them have gone too viral. For the most part, the behind-the-scenesposts are doing the trick. And with media day coming up next week, where the cast sits down with the press, we’ll have plenty more material to work with, and then it will almost be time to start shooting.
But for now, things are calm. And that means I can do something I haven’t done in a while: I’m going on a date.
His name is . . . actually, I can’t remember. Crap. I think it was Cal, maybe? No, that’s not it. It’s a common name. Jason? No. Dang it. We met online on Tuesday and hit it off, and he asked me out for Friday. We’re meeting at a Mexican restaurant he suggested. I better look up his info before I get there.
Wow, Claire.
I’ve just been giving Sam an update on the successful post we dropped yesterday, while she watches me get ready for my date, leaning on the doorframe of my bathroom.
“So Luke and I are cautiously optimistic,” I tell her while putting another coat of mascara on.
“That’s good,” she says, and then the corner of her mouth pulls upward. “And how is the handsome Luke Wilder?”
I press my lips together. “He’s . . . Luke.”
“Yes. Luke. The only man you talk about and the one you’ve been spending all your time with lately.”
I stop mid–mascara stroke. “Because we are working together right now.” I say the words slowly and deliberately so maybe it will get through her pretty little head.
Sam seems to have a one-track mind when it comes to Luke and all the time we’ve spent together recently. She has even been referring to our celebratory dinner last week as a “date.”
Just because he paid—or rather, said Pulse was covering it—and the conversation flowed easily and he opened every single door, does not make it a date. On paper, maybe. But it was two colleagues having dinner after a win. That’s all it was.
The door thing was weird, though. Those kinds of gestures have become sort of old-school chivalry in the dating world, and even though I’m fully capable of opening my own doors, it was kind of nice to let him do it. He even opened the passenger-side door of his car for me when we left the restaurant and insisted on parking and walking me to my car afterward instead of just dropping me off. Then he waited for me to drive away.
What I didn’t admit to Sam, because she would have read into it, was that even though it wasn’t a date, it was fun. Possibly the most fun I’ve had in a long time. It probably was just the euphoria from the win with our clients and the studio.
“And I think you should be doing more than working together.” She wiggles her eyebrows up and down in the mirror.
I fix her with a stare. “We’ve been over this.”
She sighs. “Yes, I know. You work with him and you have your boring rules.”
“They’re not boring,” I say. “I have a very good reason.”
I walk out of the bathroom, and she follows me into my room.
“It’s just that I’ve never heard you talk about a guy so much,” she says. “And you get this look on your face whenever you do.”
“Yes, it’s an annoyed one,” I say, giving her the same face because she’s being incredibly annoying right now.
“It’s not, though. It’s . . . I don’t know how to explain it.”
