Page 5 of Love Scenes

“Okay.” He cannot possibly expect me to give him credit. Not after what we’ve been through.

“It’s coming from a small spot over on Magnolia in the Valley. They do a proper spread.”

“Nice.”

“It’s the least I could do,” he says.

“Most definitely.”

“I hope you know I’m really grateful for this job.”

I can’t help but stare at him. Silent. Processing.

Stewing.

“Sloane, I know this’ll sound like a joke, but I’m not who I used to be,” he says finally. His eyes cut into me so deep I almost believe him.

Then I remember what an incredible actor he is. Emmy nominated just last year.

Nothing good comes from believing a man like Joseph Donovan.

I stumble away from him, nearly knocking over a set wall in the process.

“You forgot your banana,” he calls out.

“No I didn’t,” I call back.

This is exactly why I should’ve trusted my instincts when I first said I didn’t want any part in making this movie. Because here I am. Headfirst. And silently panicking.

2

Mom waves off the green-apple cloud of poison she’s blown into the air. “I know, I know,” she says, surprised to have been discovered behind the actor trailers. “At least it isn’t a cigarette.”

“We need to talk about Joseph.” After hours of waiting for a chance to corner one of my family members alone, the moment is finally here. “He’s going to ruin this movie.”

Mom swallows a laugh. Takes her vape pen back out, this time luxuriating in her pull. “You’ve mentioned that once or twice before.” She holds her exhale. “Has he done something today?”

She releases a puff of sweet-smelling smoke slowly, like hissing out a kiss of death. She’s always been a force of nature in a work setting. It’s impossible for anyone to trip her up. Her power lies in her disorientation tactics, like being this brazen with the habit she supposedly gave up years ago.

The difference is, she’s never been like thiswith me.And the change is so startling it’s got me forgetting how to stand up straight.

In a stroke of genius, I decide to disorient her right back. “When you asked me to play Elise, you knew that I had a major conflict with my show schedule then,” I say, shifting gears without warning.“There was literally no way I could have made bothThe Seekerand this movie work.”

“Obviously we would have moved production for you,” she dares to argue back.

“That’s not what you told me then.”

She shrugs her shoulders. “And you told me you’d never do a period piece.”

She’d pitched the project to me over the phone, running late to a laser hair removal session and unable to answer a single question I had. Thirty minutes later there was a Deadline article up announcing Joseph Donovan as the male lead of the new Guy Cicero romantic war drama.

Until that very moment, I’d figured if my family was going to write a role for me opposite the guy who almost made me quit the business, someone might have mentioned it in the group chat once or twice.

And when it comes to me and period pieces, she knows full well that conversation is delicate.

Her attention shifts to my upper thigh. “Hold on. There’s a stain on your pants.” She licks her finger and hunches over to try to remove the crimson-colored blob on my jeans.

Avoiding another encounter with Joseph at craft services, pointedly ignoring his catered spread, I Postmated myself an anti-inflammatory smoothie filled with beets and strawberries and whatever else is supposed to keep me anti-inflamed. Now I’m wearing part of it, and of course this stain looks like blood spatter to me.