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I’d never been on television before, and despite my chat with Wyatt, I was unprepared for how self-conscious I’d feel, knowing that every movement I made would be recorded from multiple angles. The cameras were huge machines and their wide blank lenses made me feel like I was being watched by giant unblinking eyes.
Wyatt hadn’t been kidding about stage fright.
Dean sat across the table, watching me with his intense blue eyes, and when Preston called, “Action!” my mind went blank.
“I — I…” I stammered, and Preston snapped, “Cut!” before I’d had the chance to gather my thoughts.
He glared at me as he adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose. They were old man glasses with steel frames, and they made him look like a middle-aged nerd.
“Do you know the lines or not?”
“I know them, I promise.” I sank into my chair, trying not to let the intense embarrassment I felt from screwing up in front of Dean show on my face.
To his credit, instead of snapping at me to learn my lines like he had with Brooke, Dean leaned over the table and gave me a sympathetic look.
“Breathe,” he said. “You’re doing great.” I could tell he intended to calm me down, but the half-smile he gave made my heart race, which only made memoreself-conscious.
You’ve got this, I told myself.You know every line.
“Take two,” Preston called. “Roll camera. Action.”
This time, I was ready.
“I can’t believe we’re stuck here because of you.” It felt good to know that I was able to be an actress. I didn’t falter once, despite how weird it felt to be talking to one of the most famous men in the world. This time, the take went smoothly and, unlike Brooke, I delivered my lines word-for-word like they were in the script.
“Cut!” Preston called, and I sat back in my chair proudly, waiting for him to say we were moving on to the next scene. But instead, he looked at me and said, “Stop touching your hair. It’s distracting.”
“Oh.” I froze. I hadn’t even realized I was playing with my hair, but my fingers were tangled in the strands right now. Dean looked unimpressed as I extracted them and clasped my hands firmly in my lap. “Sorry.”
We shot another take where I spoke over the top of Dean, then another where I dropped my teacup on the table. I knew the lines, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get the other components of the scene right. The words began to feel wooden and meaningless and by what must have been the fiftieth take, I was doing everything I could to hold back my tears. Acting looked so easy when the others did it and I interacted with people in a cafe every day. Why was this so hard for me?
“Let’s take a break,” Preston said. “I’m sure we can find something we can use in the editing room.”
“Don’t you want to film it again?” I asked hopefully, wanting one more chance to redeem myself. I would absolutely die of embarrassment if my friends and family paid for a movie ticket, only to see me stammering and dropping my cup in the final cut.
“We’ll focus more on Dean,” Preston said. “We only need a few seconds of footage with you. Brooke’s stunt has put us behind schedule — we need to push this thing out.”
I swallowed. If I was directing this movie, I would have kept filming until I was sure it was perfect. Preston’s near-enough-is-good-enough attitude bothered me. I wanted to redo the scene. Hell, I wanted to redo the whole day.
On top of that, now that we’d finished filming, Dean was acting like I didn’t exist. His eyes, which had seemed so intense only a few seconds earlier, seemed to be looking everywhere except at me.
I knew he was in a relationship with Brooke, so it wasn’t like I expected him to be the same charismatic playboy he played in his movies, but being ignored stung.
“How do you think that went?” I asked him, trying to break the ice.
Dean gave me an uninterested look as he stood up and tucked his chair under the table.
“If Preston thinks he’s got the footage he needs, that’s enough for me.”
Message received. The day was over and I needed to leave him alone now. I could do that.
I tucked in my own chair and joined April. Unlike Dean, she was ecstatic and bounced on the balls of her feet as I told her how it felt to interact with him. But she was less interested in the fifty takes and more interested in Dean as a man.
“How does he smell?” Her face was flushed with excitement.
The question took me aback.
“What?”
