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I make a strangled yelp of protest.
“Sorry, JJ! Forgive me!” Reeve says, and everyone laughs. “We started with a vital foundation in the work of Ms. Jane Austen…”
“Thank you!” I call.
He grins. “What I mean is that we started with no movie, and now—after a few million hours editing—we’ll have something people can watch forever. I hope you all carry that act of creation with you and remember how we did this: Together.”
Fraser squeezes my hand, and I smile back at him, emotional.Together.
Reeve steps down, and the party kicks into gear, but I pause there a moment, just taking it all in. A few months ago, none of this was a part of my life: the movie business, my consulting job, new friends like Hugo and Max…
And, of course, Fraser. Somehow, fate, coincidence, and the faulty English plumbing conspired to bring us back together again for a second chance at love—and this time, I’m grabbing hold tightly with both hands. It may have taken an epic road trip to show us that we belonged together, but I know, our real journey is only just beginning.
And this time, we’re going to make it last.
REEVE
“Reeve Donavan, you need a vacation.”
My sister plants herself down beside me, with a bottle of champagne in one hand, and a hunk of cake in the other. The wrap party is still raging, and I’m sitting on the edge of the crowd, nursing a beer and feeling damn pleased with myself after everything it took to get it here. Making a movie is an epic battle, and I’m the General, trying to rally, cajole, and occasionally bribe the troops into making it happen.
“You need a vacation, and a girlfriend,” she says again. “In that order.”
I sigh. “We literally just wrapped. Which means I have months of editing ahead of me, turning thousands of hours of footage into an actual ninety-minute movie.”
“The fact that’s all you’re thinking about now, and not, say, how to celebrate on a beach somewhere with a couple of Victoria Secrets models tells me just how much of a perfectionist workaholic you’ve become.”
“Become?” I tease Hazel. “I’ve always been this way. Or are you forgetting my fifth-grade social studies project?”
She snorts with laughter. “You mean, the professional documentary you turned in, while everyone else drew a family tree. It didn’t make your A-grade count for any more than theirs.”
“Yeah, but I was proud of it, and that’s what matters. Just the way I want this movie to be perfect, too.”
You’d have thought my sister would come to admire my work ethic and commitment to my craft—you’d be wrong. Hazel shakes her head, smirking. “You’ll burn out,” she reminds me. “And, no offense, but you’re getting more tense and tightly wound by the day. The least you could do is go get laid and stop taking it out on the rest of us.”
“I get laid!” I protest. Then I pause, searching my memory. My distant memory. “There was that girl from the gym. Kayla? Krista? And whatshername, the tennis pro.”
“The tennis pro, and Krista from the gym. My, those are some heart-wrenching love stories, right there,” Hazel laughs.
“I don’t have time for love,” I reply, taking a swig of beer. “Making a movie is a 24/7 undertaking. I’m married to my art.”
“And how are those film canisters doing keeping you warm at night?”
“Not half as well as my temperature-controlled thermal pillows,” I banter back.
Hazel smiles, gazing out over the party. “There isn’t a part of you that wants it?” she asks, nodding to where JJ and Fraser are slow-dancing together, gazing into each other’s eyes. “The great love you write about in your scripts, that singular chemistry you try and capture in all your movies? You’re forgetting I grew up in the same house as you, little brother. You didn’t wear out your copy ofHis Girl FridayandThe Thin Manbecause you were studying the director's choice of shots.”
“Show me where I can find my Katherine Hepburn, or Myrna Loy, and I’m all in.” I quip.
“Good luck finding her, if you lock yourself in that editing suite and don’t go out looking,” she counters, getting to her feet again. “Think about it, little brother. After all, how are you going to write your next great screenplay, if you don’t have something great to write about…?”
Hazel disappears back into the crowd, leaving me mulling her words. Sure, I want to fall madly in love. Who doesn’t? But I’ve been building my career. Making a name for myself. Waiting to be hit by a thunderbolt by the right woman one day—and keeping myself amused with Krista and the tennis pros in the meantime.
And how’s that working out for you?
I check my phone. A hundred and eighty-two unread emails. Sixteen voicemails. And another two-dozen texts, all waiting for me.
‘NEXT PROJECT – CALL ME!’ my agent texts, in all caps.
