Chapter 36 Cynthie
The love scene is being filmed on a closed set.
That means Jasmine, Logan, and a very small crew, as well as Nisha, the intimacy coordinator.
Brooke and Declan have been allowed in as well, but they’re not permitted to film any footage of Jack and I once the clothes come off, only the process behind the camera.
It feels like an exercise in trust all around.
“Right,” Nisha says, her voice soft and sweet. “So first we’ll run through the scene without removing any clothing. We’ll check in at every point to make sure that you’re both comfortable. If either of you experience any unease, then please say and we’ll make adjustments. Okay?”
Jack and I both nod while Logan pipes up.
“Anything at all, guys, anything . We want this to be a totally safe space, okay? It’s important that you know you can talk to us about any concerns, any issues.
Particularly you, Cynthie. This is a vulnerable experience, and I think it’s important that we all acknowledge that, right? ” He looks around at everyone.
“Logan, I think they’ve got it,” Jasmine says wearily. “Why don’t you let Nisha do her job?”
Logan’s eyes widen. “Oh, Nisha! I’m sorry. I certainly don’t want my voice to be the only one in the room. It’s important to listen, isn’t it? I just want to be an active listener. You’re the expert here. I defer to you, completely.”
Logan always seems to have a lot to say about active listening, but usually, if left alone, he manages to wind himself down like a toddler wearing themselves out.
“Thank you, Logan,” Nisha says calmly. “If everyone’s ready, we’ll begin?”
Jack and I run through the scene, and Nisha takes us through every moment of contact between the two of us.
It’s not my first time working with an intimacy coordinator, but I find myself even more grateful than usual for her presence.
After what happened in my trailer, it helps to have an air of calm efficiency to the whole business.
I currently have the events of this morning locked up tight in a little box.
There isn’t time or space to think about it now, despite the fact that my body still hums with pleasure, that I can still taste Jack on my tongue.
If Brooke hadn’t interrupted… Nope, not thinking about it.
I force myself to focus on Nisha. This is very different from the first sex scene I filmed a decade ago. Intimacy coordinators weren’t exactly a common presence on set then, and I’d fumbled my way through the thing the best I could, sick with nerves and never totally comfortable with the result.
“And at this point, Jack will remove Cynthie’s chemise,” Nisha says. “Are you happy with that, Cynthie?”
I nod. Funnily enough, despite the heated moment we’ve just shared, I’d be hard-pressed to name someone I feel safer with than Jack. It’s not just Nisha who checks in with me at every step; he does too, sometimes with a look, often with words, and I make sure I return the favor.
“So let’s get up on the bed,” Nisha says. “When we’re filming, Jack will lift Cynthie up and place her on the mattress, is that right?”
“That’s right,” Jasmine jumps in before Logan can get started. “We want this to feel very tender, romantic. It’s been a long time coming for these two. There’s passion, but also a lot of feeling, and some nerves too, particularly for Emilia.”
“I don’t know,” Jack says, “I think Edward’s probably nervous too. He may not be a virgin, but he’s loved Emilia for over a decade. She’s the only woman he’s ever loved, and now he finally gets to touch her. He’ll be worried about hurting her, worried about pleasing her.”
“Good, good,” Jasmine agrees, her voice low. We’re all talking in the same hushed tones, like we’re in a museum, like this is a solemn occasion.
To his credit, Logan restrains himself from jumping in with explicit directions about tongues and breasts, which I think actually does show some growth on his part. I can only imagine what it would have been like trying to film this the first time around.
We get up on the mattress and run through the rest of the scene.
It’s impossible for a sex scene not to be awkward.
I don’t care how professional everyone involved is; you’re still performing for an audience without your clothes on.
Actors might be more au fait than the general public when it comes to displaying our bodies, but we’re still human.
“Perfect,” Nisha says finally. “So now we’ll go through it, and this time we’ll take the clothes off and make sure we’re all feeling confident about the angles.”
Jack and I move slowly through the scene, and if my hand trembles a little as I undo his cravat, or if his breath catches when he slips my chemise from my shoulders, I tell myself it’s because we’re in character.
It might even be true… I realize this is what Jack was really trying to say this morning, that what I’m feeling matches what Emilia is feeling so closely that the boundaries are even hazier than usual.
Brooke’s and Declan’s presence adds a further complication.
It’s nothing like the two of us being all over each other a couple of hours ago.
There are people watching us, and they’re very interested in the exact angle of our bodies, the perfect, suggestive positioning of the bedsheets.
They see us as a collection of photogenic limbs, and the longer the rehearsal drags on, the easier it is to think of my own body with a similar level of detachment.
But we’re still skin to skin. He’s still running his hands over me, and I still like it.
Jack was right. It’s complicated.
By the time we run the scene for real, I’m feeling relaxed enough about the movement to focus more on the actual acting. I sink further into Emilia, her desire, her emotional turmoil.
“Action,” Jasmine calls, and then Jack has me up against the wall, kissing me, kissing my throat, as I tug at his necktie.
We move across the room, shedding clothes at carefully planned intervals.
When we’re down to our Regency appropriate underwear, Jack scoops me up into his arms and I laugh.
He places me gently on the bed, on top of the scattering of handwritten love letters that he wrote me thirteen years ago, the ones he just found out I’ve kept ever since.
The paper crinkles under me as he runs a hand up my calf, pushing the thin white linen of my chemise up and over my thighs. He groans, burying his face in the side of my neck, and I clutch at his hair, my heart beating hard, overwhelmed and yes, a little nervous.
My hand runs tentatively down the muscular line of his bare back. His face comes up, above mine.
“Are you certain, love?” he asks, the words rough with lust and tenderness in equal measure.
I look into his eyes, and it’s like the scene wavers, like I’m falling out of it.
I’m looking at Jack, and I feel overwhelmed by sensation.
The room is hot, the lights so bright. I can feel the eyes on me, the cameras.
My breath catches and it’s not acting. There’s a familiar and dreaded tightening in my chest.
Jack’s eyes widen. “Cynthie?” he says, pulling away from me in an instant, and I think that later I’ll be grateful for that, for the way he knew at once that there was something wrong. But for now, all I feel is panic.
Not now, not now, not now, I think as my breathing falters.
“Cut,” Jasmine says crisply.
I push myself up off the bed. Thankfully, I’m still wearing the chemise because I want out of this room as soon as possible.
“I’m sorry,” I manage. “I feel a bit dizzy. I think I’d better get some air.”
Without waiting for any further conversation I hurry through the door, ducking around people without making eye contact.
When I’m out in the corridor, away from the lights, the temperature feels more bearable. I move into an empty room farther down, and sit on the floor, my back against the wall, my knees pulled up to my chest, as I try and ride out the storm raging inside me.
When there’s a gentle knock, I expect it to be Jack, but instead, Jasmine walks through the door.
“I’m sorry,” I manage. “I don’t know what happened. It came on so suddenly, just out of nowhere.”
“Sometimes that happens,” she agrees, sliding down to sit on the floor beside me.
We sit quietly for a moment.
“You know if you’re not comfortable with shooting the scene then there are a million ways we can work around it,” she says finally. “We can use a body double, make cuts. No pressure, no judgment, no second-guessing. You say the word and that’s what we’ll do.”
Tears sting my eyes, and something eases off me. I realize I’d been braced for an attack, not empathy. I battle the instinct telling me that abandoning the scene would be a failure, would make me a failure.
“I appreciate that,” I say, finally. “But it’s not the scene. It wasn’t that I felt unsafe. I’ve filmed scenes where I was far less comfortable with what was going on.”
“That’s not the solid argument you think it is.” Jasmine sighs. “Being uncomfortable shouldn’t be normal. As a director it’s my job to make sure that doesn’t happen. It’s not my job to torture a performance out of you.”
Oof. That hits a little close to home .
Jasmine nods like she knows what I’m thinking. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Of course.”
“Have you been thinking about getting into directing?”
It’s the last thing I was expecting her to ask. In fact, it seems so wildly off topic that I give her an unguarded answer. “Yes.”
She nods. “I thought so. The way you’ve been approaching the scenes, your notes. The way you talk to the crew. It feels like you have a more complete vision.”
“Why did you ask that now?” I’m puzzled. “I haven’t mentioned anything about directing to anyone.” Well, almost anyone.
“Because directing puts you in a position of power. The dynamics are tricky. For me, it’s a priority that you feel safe on set. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that we’d want that for you. If you want to direct you need to think about what you’d do with that power, how you’d want to use it.”
Something about the way she says this has the back of my neck prickling. “Are you…” I hesitate, thinking perhaps her roundabout question wasn’t that roundabout at all, that she was leading the conversation here. “Are you talking about Shawn?”
For the first time, she looks away. “Let’s just say that Shawn Hardy has a certain reputation with women in this industry.”
I straighten. “What?” I stare at her, but she turns back to me, her gaze steady. “I mean, I know he has a reputation for being difficult to work with,” I continue slowly, “but are you saying that he’s…”
“A predator?” Jasmine’s mouth pulls up ruefully. “I’m afraid so. Isn’t it hell that there are so many of them out there? And they look just like the good guys too.”
“You don’t have to say it like I’ve never run into any of them,” I snap, unsettled.
“Of course you have,” she agrees mildly.
“How could you not in this game? It’s just that Shawn Hardy is a special sort of manipulative, controlling dirtbag.
You probably hadn’t heard about it because he tends to target much more junior crew or cast members, the sort who won’t dare make a fuss.
Plus, there are dozens of NDAs on the go.
” She tilts her head, considering me. “You were something of an anomaly. He almost blew his cover there. Very quick to cast you as the wicked seductress, wasn’t he?
Really did a bang-up job of turning Hollywood’s golden girl into an unreliable narrator. ”
Puzzle pieces start to fall horribly into place.
“It wasn’t your fault, Cynthie,” Jasmine says quietly.
“Whatever he did. I can guarantee it wasn’t your fault.
You shouldn’t have to carry it around. If you want to talk, then you can talk to me.
I actually know a couple of people who’ve worked with him and had difficult experiences, so maybe you’d prefer to speak with them.
It’s your call. You know best what you need. ”
It’s an unexpected offer from a woman who has always seemed remote and self-contained, and I appreciate it, even as I’m not sure if I could ever take her up on it.
“I told Shawn that I was interested in directing,” I say distantly.
“I hadn’t mentioned it to anyone else. It was how things started between us.
I hoped he’d be a sort of mentor. At first it was like that…
like he really believed in me, then we started sleeping together and things changed.
He made me feel foolish that I’d even considered it, like I needed to stay in my lane. By the end, I believed him.”
Jasmine sighs heavily. “Fucking hell, Cynthie, you run a long con, don’t you?”
“What do you mean?” I ask, startled.
She gives me a very small smile. “Thirteen years ago, I told you I wasn’t here to be your mentor or your friend. Now it looks like I might end up being both.”
And then, against all odds, I find myself laughing.