Page 2 of Pink Ink

“Hold.”

The thick pink liquid gurgles from my neck, pooling around my twitching body. It seeps into my hair and sticks to my skin. I lie still, unblinking, as footsteps sound around me. A beady black eye appears before my blurry vision. The shutter of a camera fills the silence to capture the moment I meet the grim reaper.

He kneels beside my head and moves my arm to point a single finger toward the lens as if I were reaching for God like inThe Creation of Adam.

Then he rises to his feet and leaves me on the floor.

Five.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One.

“Andcut,” Nicole calls.

I slump against the tile and stare at the ceiling. Two seconds is all I give myself before untying my wrists.

I’m exhausted to the bone.

Everyone in the room starts murmuring, and someone in my periphery slaps my dickhead of a co-star’s back as ifhewere the one who had to pretend to die. That takes some serious skill, and I’m not the theater major here. I should be the onebehindthe camera.

“Hold up.”

I freeze.Please, for the love of God, no more.

We’ve been filming for thirteen hours, and this is the fifth time we’ve had to redo this scene. My back hurts, I have a rope burn, and I think I’m developing an allergic reaction to one of the products the SFX artist used. To top it off, there wasn’t enough pizza for me to have a slice.

If I have to sit throughanotherround of hair and makeup to reshoot the scene, I’m going to nose-dive straight into hysterics.

I need food, solitude, and sleep. Immediately.

“Wait, nope. We’re good,” Nicole says, reviewing the tape even though it’s meant to be my job since this is for my assignment. We take turns being on the other side of the camera whenever we have a project due for this class.

Biting back a yawn, I attempt to untie myself, silently cursing Chad and the SFX artist he’s chatting up. Was he a Boy Scout or something? We aren’tactuallytrying to hold me hostage here. The least this dimwit could do is give me a hand.

Look, I get it. It’s been a long day, and my call sheet hasn’t exactly been followed to a T. But the sooner I say the holyWword, the sooner we can get home, and I can wash the goddamn glitter out of my hair.

I regret letting Kimi sprinkle glitter into the fake pink blood to take pictures for her portfolio. It went everywhere. That’s poor planning on my part because I’ve spent the whole day sparkling in certain lights—which could’ve ruined my tapes. If any of it shows up in my footage, I’ll have to claim it’s an Edward Cullen moment.

When I’m less tired, I’ll come up with a metaphor that will make Professor Bradford raise a single bushy brow, hum, and then go back to pretending I don’t exist.

OrI could spend an unholy number of hours editing it out in post.

Right now, I prefer the sound of the former.

Kimi rushes to my side with a towel in hand and easily undoes the rope. “They’re talking about going out after this, but the only shot I’m planning on taking is a diazepam,” my roommate whispers, glaring at Chad, who’s still flirting with the beautician I’d rather not lose.

I snort, rubbing the towel into my hair to absorb as much of the pink blood as possible. “Lucky for some. I have a hot date with hours’ worth of film.”And an essay I’ve procrastinated on for far too long.

Plus another online quiz, and a wedding video I still need to deliver.

Nicole yawns, swaying slightly as she rewatches the A-roll. If you had told me thirteen hours ago that she’d stay the whole time, I’d have calledyou a liar. Yet here she is, spending her entire day assisting on a project she won’t receive any credits for.

Fair’s fair. She had me waist-deep in a lake three weeks ago when I was helping her with her assignment that Professor Bradford hailed as a masterpiece, proving that heiscapable of giving out A’s. Just not to me.