You’d think after all the scotch that Jessup drank last night, we might have a short morning. You would think wrong. Apparently, he must have built up a tolerance for the stuff, because he was ready to go this morning. You’d also expect that a guy who was now a star would be able to have his morning tea and oral sex while getting his makeup done. It’s all fun and games until they decide they’re behind on the shooting schedule and you actually have to get film in the can.
The good part about us being behind schedule was that there were fewer takes. I looked at the shooting schedule for today, and I was in every scene. It was almost as if someone figured out I’d be leaving after this week. The only problem with their genius plan was that I’d not been reading my updated scripts while I traveled. I’d noticed some emails but ignored them.
“Shit!” I said, frustrated.
“Cut!” Jessup called. “Come here.”
He pulled me off to the side.
“David, I realize you were busy last week. I want you to just forget about it, and we’ll consider it a lesson learned. What I want you to do is fake it if you don’t know the exact words. I need to get through these scenes. If you mess up too bad, we’ll cut it and reshoot you saying it correctly. Can you do that for me?” Jessup asked.
“I’m really sorry. I’ll do my best for you.”
“Good. Now, let’s get back to it. Time is money,” he said for the millionth time.
We got back to it and used Jessup’s new strategy. It allowed us to power through the morning scenes. I was happy when we finally took a break for lunch. I grabbed food at the buffet and took it to my trailer. Caryn was deep in conversation on her phone and pointed to a stack of papers where I found the script changes for this afternoon’s scenes. It was like the writers felt like they had to justify their existence.
I was reading them as I ate when my phone rang. It was Maria, my wannabe porn star.
“Hey,” I answered.
“What are you doing tonight?” she asked.
“Going out with you.”
“I swear, if you were a girl, you’d be easy.”
“What are we doing? You do plan to feed me before you take advantage of me,” I said.
“I’m having a party. If you come early, I’ll introduce you to my friends, and we can grill something.”
“You need me to bring anything?” I asked.
“Stuff to grill,” she admitted.
“How many are we feeding?” I asked.
“Can I call you back and let you know?”
“No, I’m on set all day. Call Caryn and tell her,” I said and gave her Caryn’s number.
I wrote Caryn a note and suggested that she have Fritz get everything. She only nodded as she talked on the phone.
◊◊◊
The afternoon was a blur. When I was finally done and returned to my trailer, Caryn and Fritz were nowhere to be found. I heard a knock on the door, and it was Flo.
“Fritz has a date tonight,” Flo said.
“Yeah, right. He just didn’t want to go to a teen party with me,” I said.
Flo blushed because I’d caught her.
“He did say that if I let you get into a fight, I’m fired, so please let me punch them if it comes to that,” she said.
“Are you still in trouble for the Pam incident?” I asked.
“Whenever the shit goes sideways, like it did that night, we’re supposed to be on top of it. That’s what we get paid for. I knew you weren’t in danger because I’ve sparred with you. I did what you wanted me to, which was to get Pam out of the situation. Fritz and the rest of the team walked me through it. We all agreed that I should never have left Tracy and you there. First of all, you could have really hurt someone. I should know better. Part of my job is to protect you from lawsuits, and injuring someone in a drunken brawl is at the top of the list of bad things that can happen.
“Something else they pointed out was that Tracy could’ve been hurt. Finally, the reason we wear the bodycams is to prevent stuff from being made up. When I left the room, I could no longer video the confrontation, and it became a ‘he said/she said’ situation.”
“So you plan on watching me
“In some ways, it might be best if I did, but privacy will be maintained. Otherwise, I might get rich selling your sex tapes in a few years.”
“Just make sure the lighting’s good. I want to be able to watch them and not be embarrassed,” I said with a straight face.
“I’m not watching you have sex,” she said and then realized I was teasing her. “Maybe I’ll let them punch you a couple of times before I break it up.”
“If you do, you better not get in the way of me killing them,” I said in all seriousness.
“Boys! I swear you never grow up. Think of it this way: would it be more embarrassing for someone if you kicked their ass, or if you had a girl kick their ass for you?” she asked.
I thought about Cassidy, and the surprised looks guys had when she took them down. A little grin must have crept onto my face.
“I see you like the idea. Just let me do my job. I don’t want Fritz to have to fire me again.”
“What, he fired you before?” I asked.
