But with her elimination on the horizon, I didn’t have that kind of time. Once she was in the Convent, her access toboth me and the game would be significantly limited, simply due to the geography of the set.
So instead of setting a longer fuse, I had to add more fireworks. I couldn’t wait for the pot to boil. I had to turn up the heat.
‘Of course I haven’t lost count.’ I kept my voice even.
‘I’ll make sure I focus some serious attention on her when I get down there.’ Lily laced her fingers together and stretched her arms over her head. ‘The fainter, that is.’
‘Don’t go too hard on Cece. She’s had a hell of a time. I don’t want you to ruin her life.’
‘I will go the appropriate amount of hard.’
I made a noise in the back of my throat, but I didn’t argue. There wasn’t any point. Anyway, it might generate some good content that would help me continue Cece’s storyline, in preparation for slingshotting her ontoWherefore Art Thou Romeo?orJuliet on the Beach.That kind of pre-existing audience investment in a character was golden when it came to getting eyeballs on a season.
‘Besides,’ Lily said, ‘I have to continue the legend of Lily Fireball somehow.’
Cece wasn’t the only one with her eyes on future seasons.
I thought about it before I pulled the trigger. Did an entire cost/benefit analysis in one and a half seconds. Was it too soon to apply pressure on my levers?
But Lily looked so much likeherself, sitting there across from me, leaning back in her conference room chair.
And I missed her so, so badly.
‘Do you?’ I asked.
She didn’t freeze, exactly, but she went still; the way an antelope goes still when it’s been wounded and can no longer move.
‘Do you really need to set Lily Fireball up for something long-term? Is that actually what you want?’
‘Murray,’ she said, ‘we’ve talked about this.’
‘And I listened to you. But are you listening to yourself?’
I gestured to the room. ‘You’re in here with me. Again. Backseat producing. Doesn’t that tell you something?’
‘I know what I’m doing.’
‘Yes, you do.’ I forced myself to keep my voice calm. ‘Because you’re a producer, Lily.’
She didn’t say anything.
‘I know Lily Fireball is fun. And I get that you wanted to be someone else for a while, I really do. But there’s a reason you decided to be someone elsehere.’ I tapped the table. ‘This is who you are. This is what you’re good at. You’re a fucking genius at this.’
There was the barest flutter of something across her face, so swift I didn’t know what it was, so slight I wasn’t sure if I had imagined it.
But it was something, so I risked pressing more. ‘I don’t know how we get you back from that side of the camera to this one, but we can figure it out, if we just put our heads together. We can do fucking anything, if we do it together.’
I wasn’t imagining it. That was definitely a waver.
I pressed harder. ‘I need you, Lily.’ I thumbed the dark circle under one of my eyes. ‘I need you so badly. I don’t know how to do this without you.’
Lily rose to her feet.
‘I’m looking forward to this.’ She waved her hand at my box of questions. ‘Adjudication Station was always fun.’
She left.
It was my turn to go still for a few moments, the way a lion goes still when it’s about to ambush its prey.
