Page 56 of Love Scenes

More of what we worked on yesterday?

Yes. Make sure you’re prepared.

I will be.

Until then, I may as well enjoy the view. Headfirst, no panicking, coasting on exhilaration.

Joseph is waiting in his car when I pull onto the lot. “Good morning, Sloane,” he says in the most professional voice I’ve ever heard him use.

“Hello, Joseph.”

We walk side by side to his trailer, literally talking about the weather, breaking down the difference between cumulus and cirrus clouds. Too much time has passed since our bodies were smashed together.

His trailer door shuts behind us, and Joseph presses against me before I can even set down my coffee. Not that I need it. Caffeine could never wake me up this quickly. His mouth settles on mine and his hands run over my body, roaming along the sides of my waist. One hand moves to my chest. I let out a little yip of satisfaction and he decides to further explore, kissing his way down to my clavicle.

“So,” he starts. “I’ve been thinking, and I suspect Calvin is holding something back from Elise.”

“Is that so?”

He works at the bottom edge of my tank top, starting to lift it up. “Nothing that’s in the script. Just a personal theory. It’s small. Like a memory he has that he’s not ready for her to know.” He pauses to get my shirt over my head. Steps back to relish me in this very casual, certainly-not-overly-complicated yellow lace bra.

I run my finger from his Adam’s apple all the way down to the buckle of his jeans. “You wore a belt today. Bad choice.”

He looks at me in my bra and my yoga pants. “You didn’t, though.”

Soon his shirt’s gone too.

When we press together again, the cold of his dog tag necklacegives me a little shock. This dance between us fluctuates between something primal and something tender. I know which side scares me more, and still I find myself riveted, not able to comprehend how it is we’re chest to chest, holding each other in a soft embrace.

“Why do you think he hasn’t told her?” I ask.

My hands tuck into the back pocket of his jeans. His breath smells fresh, like copious amounts of mouthwash, which strikes me as sweet considering the conversation we once had aboutA Little Luck.I like picturing him getting ready this morning, leaning over the sink with a robe wrapped around his hips, spitting a second round of spearmint Scope down the drain.

“It’s something he has to wait to say. He has to be sure it’s the right time, or it will ruin everything between them.”

Today we’re shooting the midway point in the movie. Calvin and Elise sit at her desk, talking about a story she’s been writing. The first crackle of something more between them really shines through as Calvin helps Elise break a plot point that’s been eluding her.

“Crucial foreplay,” as Guy calls it.

Horizonshas lots of important conversations and slow glances, particularly in the first half. Today’s scene is when everything shifts, and the pace picks up as we work toward that first chaste kiss, then the deep, climactic kiss and ensuing love scene.

Teasingly, I whisper in his ear. “Does she know by the end of the movie?”

“Oh yeah. But not by the scene we’re doing today. Maybe right after.”

I know he means Calvin. This is truly the exact way we’ve always talked about these characters.

Still, all I hear is us talking about ourselves.

Soon my leggings are on the floor and his hands are on my inner thighs and his mouth is working so fast and so well that there’s not much to think about at all.

In between takes,we hatch a plan to meet in his trailer during our dinner break. It’s risky. The both of us gone for dinner might raise suspicion. Our solution is to have Joseph leave first. I’ll sit down and eat a little bit, then “remember” that I’ve left my phone in my trailer.

When the time comes, Joseph winks at me before he says to no one in particular, “I need to do a little reading,” holding one of his World War II novels in his hand and tipping his head toward the outside.

“Joe! Joe!” Out of nowhere, Guy catches Joseph’s arm to stop him. “Hold on a minute. I’ve had an epiphany, and I need to talk it over with my core players!”

“Right now?” Joseph gives him a look best described as deadly.