Final Edit (Lights, Camera, Love! #1)

Chapter 1

ONE

SAWYER

“I thought I might find you here,” said a familiar voice. I turned and smiled at my former professor.

“Uncanny. Especially because you messaged me asking me to be here at this time today. I think Eugene and Joe are wearing off on you.”

Charles Thurston was married to a former student named Joe, but they were both in a relationship with a man named Eugene. I’d never be able to wrap my head around how that worked, so I just left it alone. They were happy, and I was happy for them.

As another one of Thurston’s former students, we’d struck up a sort of a friendship after I graduated.

Thurston had been a source of support since my early college days when the pressure my family put on me threatened to make me crumble into dust. It was Thurston who was there for me as a guide and an inspiration.

He’d believed in me even when I hadn’t believed in myself.

It was the reason I’d readily agreed when he called the night before and asked me to meet him in the park near campus.

It had been too long since I’d visited this place.

In the warmer weather, it was a popular place for students to come who wanted a quiet place to study.

Full of thick-trunked trees, the leaves offered plenty of shade from the sun in the summer.

In a few months, this place would be crawling with students.

For now, it was quiet. The early spring trees had yet to bud, and the grass was far too wet to think of sitting on.

Being back here brought me a sense of peace, and I motioned to Thurston. “Let’s walk.”

He fell into step next to me, and for a few minutes we silently enjoyed each other’s company.

“And how are the husbands?” I asked.

There was a special gleam in Thurston’s eye when he answered. “Beautiful and bratty. Just how I like them. And how are you, Sawyer? I see the book is still selling exceedingly well.”

“It is. Thank you. I’m good. I’m okay. Everything is… well, it’s… fine.”

Thurston tossed me some serious side-eye.

He clearly saw through my flimsy bullshit.

I wasn’t fine. My debut book had been a massive success; that much was true.

But it hadn’t mattered to my family, who barely acknowledged my existence as it was.

And the success of the first book had given me some sort of task paralysis when it came to the second.

What if it wasn’t as good? What if I only had one book in me?

A million doubts had climbed into my skin and made themselves at home in my bones.

I pulled my hand from the pocket of my peacoat and ran it through my hair. I tried not to do that. I’d spent far too long in the mirror every day trying to get my short blond strands to fall just the right way.

“Recently, I was approached by a friend of Eugene’s interested in having someone write his autobiography for him.

I think he’d wanted me to do it, and he seemed a bit disappointed when I told him that I already had my hands full with teaching.

But then he asked if I knew anyone who might want the job.

” Thurston cut his gaze over to me. “And I said I might.”

“An autobiography?” I felt my forehead crease. “I hate to sound like an asshole, but most people aren’t interesting enough for other people to want to read about their lives.”

Thurston’s dry chuckle made me feel better about my statement. “Normally, I wouldn’t disagree, but he’s been a friend of Eugene’s for a few years now, and while I don’t know his whole story, I know enough. I think the project would be good for you.”

“What does this friend do?”

“Currently, he directs. But he used to be an actor.”

There was something shifty in his tone, like he was leaving something out.

“He’s not done anything illegal, has he? I don’t want to start writing this and discover he’s committed fourteen felonies.”

Thurston slung an arm over my shoulder and gave me a side hug. “I’d never steer you into anything I thought you might regret or that might get you in trouble.”

When his arm fell away, I immediately missed it. I lived a pretty solitary life, especially since graduating college and leaving dorm life behind.

“I understand if you’re busy. It would be a big disruption in your schedule. You’d have to meet with him and talk about his life and discuss the book. It’s not a small task.”

“I’ll do it. Meet with him, I mean.” The idea of saying no and going home and committing myself to an endless stretch of solitude was too much for me to bear.

“Are you sure?” Thurston seemed surprised by my acceptance. “I didn’t mean to make you feel pressured.”

“You didn’t.” I gave him my best, brightest, hopefully least fake smile I could. “I think it will be good for me. Something different. I’ve never written any biographical content before. It’ll be a challenge.”

“I’ll pass along your contact info then, and he’ll be in touch. The name he uses for professional purposes is Lukas Knight.”

“And you’d tell me his real name, but then you’d have to kill me, right?”

Thurston’s smile was wry. “That’s a Eugene comment if I ever heard one. I think he’s influencing you.”

A timer on Thurston’s phone went off, and he grimaced. “I have to get going. I’m meeting the boys for lunch.” His gaze met mine and his eyes lit up with an idea. “You should come.”

“Oh, I don’t want to be a fourth wheel.”

“Nonsense. Besides, you’d be doing me a favor.

They behave better when there’s company.

” Thurston slung his arm over my shoulder again.

He was old enough to be my dad, but I never felt that kind of bond between us.

He was more like an older brother who was really cool and knew all sorts of things I’d never know, but he’d never hold it against me.

The idea of slinking back to my townhouse to eat alone held less than no appeal, so I let Thurston think he was twisting my arm into going for lunch with them. Eugene and Joe were waiting at a restaurant just around the corner, and I grinned at Thurston when I realized where we were going.

“Do you live your entire life in a three-block radius of campus?”

“It’s convenient.” He glanced at me as he pulled the door open. “Don’t pretend like you get out much.”

“Ouch, Thurston. Right for the jugular,” I said as we made a beeline for the table where Eugene and Joe were already seated.

“Is he being cruel, Sawyer?” Eugene stood and shook my hand. He clapped me on the shoulder and then motioned for me to sit. “Just give me the word, and I’ll get back at him for you.”

Joe got up and pulled my chair out for me, earning him a sappy look of approval from Thurston.

They were open about the dynamics of their relationship, that it was some kind of hierarchy they all enjoyed.

I’d never been interested in the specifics of it, to be honest. Growing up, it was almost unheard of for my parents to show affection to each other or to my brother and me.

Things like approval and affection were hard won, and I’d long ago given up on earning either from them.

Maybe it was my upbringing and its lack of warmth, or maybe there were other reasons, but whatever they were, I’d had a hard time exploring my own sexuality.

By the time I came out, I was in my early twenties.

Sure, I’d dated a bit and I wasn’t a virgin, but I’d been called closed-off and uptight by more than one partner.

You’d think it would fascinate me to watch three men who were freely affectionate and in tune with one another, but instead it only reminded me of all my shortcomings.

Uptight. Awkward. Geeky. Sure, I’d gotten the braces off before college, and I’d filled out my frame a little, but I still wasn’t anything special. Not by anyone’s standards.

“So, are you going to do it?” Eugene asked partway through lunch.

Up until that point, the conversation had drifted around, touching on different things like the weather, the new dean of students, all kinds of things related to the university. The sudden shift in topic caught me off-guard, and I gaped at Eugene.

“Sorry?”

“The book.” he prompted.

“Eugene, that’s not your business.” Thurston admonished, but I waved his comment away.

“It’s fine. I’m—ah—I’m going to meet with him. The rest will depend on that, I suppose, but if it works out, yes.”

“Why doesn’t he write it himself?” Joe asked. “Wouldn’t it be harder to have someone else do it?”

“Well, writing a book is hard. And if you’ve never written one before, it’s even harder. It’s not something everyone can do,” I told Joe, who flushed with embarrassment.

“Oh. Sorry.”

“No need to apologize,” I assured him. I liked Joe.

He was my age, which made him younger than both his partners, but the relationship suited him.

There was a softness about Joe that made me want to shield him, and I didn’t get that feeling about just anyone.

I wasn’t the protector kind of guy, so I could only imagine the fierce protectiveness that Joe made Eugene and Thurston feel.

“He’s going to be so excited. He’s tried to find someone for this project for months now, but people keep backing out.” Eugene pulled his phone out. “Let me text him really quick.”

Thurston reached out and put his hand over Eugene’s phone screen, but it was me he made eye contact with. “If it’s okay with you, Sawyer? I’d planned to speak with him later, and I still can, if you prefer.”

“No, it’s fine. Eugene can give him my contact info.

” Excitement made my blood rush to my head.

A paying gig would go a long way to making me feel like I wasn’t wasting my life chasing a pipedream.

Sure, unless I’d been hired by the pope or the president, it was unlikely to impress my parents, but I told myself that didn’t matter.

They had my older brother, the doctor, if they wanted a child they could be proud of.

Thurston removed his hand, and Eugene shot me a triumphant smile as he fired a text off to his friend. I hadn’t expected my phone to buzz with a text so quickly, but it wasn’t more than a minute or so later when a message from an unknown number came through.

Hi, this is Lukas, Eugene’s friend. Let me know when it’s convenient for you to meet, and I’ll make it work. You pick the place. Thanks for agreeing to meet with me.

I exhaled a shaky breath and typed out a reply, telling him that I’d connect the next day. For convenience, I picked the same off-campus restaurant we were currently sitting in and told him to meet me here for lunch, if that worked for him.

I tucked my phone away after receiving his confirmation and then turned my attention back to Thurston.

“We’re meeting tomorrow,” I told him, suddenly nervous about the whole thing. What if Lukas hated me? Or my writing? What if I spent months on this, and then he ended up hating it?

“You’ll do fine,” Thurston told me. “I had a long think about who would be the best person for this job, and it was your name that came to mind first and stuck there. I have every bit of faith in you.”

That made one of us. But Thurston’s endorsement did ease some of the initial rush of insecurity and made me believe that everything was going to work out just fine.