XII CJ
XII
CJ
I’m back in my office after we have finally— finally —wrapped for the evening, and I need to get home to sleep before I’m back here tomorrow afternoon. I should be exhausted by the sheer number of hours we put in today, but I’m still coming down from the adrenaline spike of sparring with Timmy in front of the cast and crew. I kept my cool during our standoff—Brianna assured me, and I trust her to give it to me straight—but in the aftermath, my body is buzzing. Here in my little space, I’m able to process that I’m proud of myself. And not just for holding my own, but for knowing when to do it. I’ve learned from observing my bosses over the years to pick and choose your battles. And if you’re going to pick one, pick one you can win.
I look out at the piles and piles of stuff in my office and wonder if I’m better off crashing here, since Stuart is sleeping at the house and Agnes will be up making noise in a matter of hours.
A knock at the door interrupts my deliberation. At my “Yeah?” Jack steps through the frame, still in costume.
“Is everything OK?” I scan his form, looking for signs we’re being called back to set. That Timmy wants to shoot with those random bottle-green highball glasses after all. I can’t think of a reason why Jack isn’t already in a car home by now. But he looks wide awake, and when he flashes a smile, it’s like he’s got a secret to tell me.
“I just wanted to say... I thought you were really brilliant tonight.”
I blush at the compliment but brush it off, urging my cheeks to calm. “Oh please, that was nothing.” I don’t mean it.
“Oh, come on. Hardly any of us would’ve stood up to Timmy in that moment. I mean, I don’t think I would’ve. I was...” His eyes fall to his shoes. “Hey, would you want to get a drink?”
At this, the adrenaline that is already coursing through me finds a way to spike even higher. We’re at work. The temptation is colossal, and against the backdrop of all the coffee breaks Jack and I have shared over the last week and change, my brain starts to apply a murky logic and build its case: Those lattes were drinks, weren’t they? No , I have to shut it down. I’m tired, sitting here in front of a man who I find impossibly charming and talented and attractive—“impossibly” being the key word. The answer is obviously no.
“It’s after midnight in Los Angeles. Practically nothing’s open,” I say instead.
Jack reaches into Nick Carraway’s jacket without breaking eye contact and pulls out a bottle of Espolòn.
“Have you ever been to the Carlyle?” Jack asks me, settling into the seat at the faux Bemelmans that Boone occupied only an hour before.
“A few times to scout for this project. Right around when preproduction started, a theater in New York was doing a retrospective on Stuart’s films, so he, Agnes, and I flew out for it. But I haven’t spent much time in New York otherwise.”
“You haven’t?”
“What? Is that surprising?”
“I don’t know. There’s something worldly about you.”
“By worldly... do you mean old?”
Jack laughs. “I’m fairly certain we’re the same age.” It’s true; FamousBirthdays.com confirmed for me that Jack is thirty-four too.
I take a sip of the tequila we mixed with Sprite from the vending machine. I feel his eyes on my throat as I swallow.
He shifts his body toward me and rests his elbow on the bar. “I think I mean you’re... wise and grounded.”
“Maybe just compared to the people you know.”
He chuckles and makes a face feigning insult. “Fair point there.” He raises his glass toward me and holds my eyes. I don’t look away despite a sense that I should. I know the steps to this dance, and it’s starting to feel easier to repeat them than to learn a new one. Go home , half of my brain says.
But, the other half of my brain is at the wheel. “I’ve really only lived in or near LA.”
“You never wanted to leave? Try somewhere else?”
I shrug, both at him and at myself. “For most people, it takes so much courage to move to LA. Like, you have to hop off a plane and prove yourself immediately. Being from here and knowing how this city operates, how to get around, how to make it work for you, it almost feels like a superpower.”
“I don’t even know how to drive.” He blurts it out like a confession.
I laugh. “There are solutions to that, you know.” I rest my elbow on the bar too and my chin on my hand.
“Right, right. I’ve never really needed to learn though. In London, I have the Tube, and I’m never anywhere else long enough for it to matter. I don’t even have my flat anymore,” Jack says as though it’s only occurring to him now.
“You don’t? How come?”
“Initially, it was to save money—silly if I was barely there anyway—and then, well, with money no longer an issue”—his cheeks redden—“it became easier to stay in the places my team books for me. But I still consider London my home base. Even without a proper home there.”
“Why’s that?”
“I don’t know. London still feels more... like a real city to me. With real people. Normal.”
“First off,” I start, brandishing my pointer finger. The tequila has found its way into my bloodstream and activated my gesticulation muscles. “All cities are real cities, with real people.” Jack smirks, like he’s satisfied to have provoked such a passionate response. “Secondly, you don’t seem like someone who’s looking for a normal life.”
“What do you mean?” Jack seems genuinely surprised by this.
“Jack. You’re a movie star. Have you noticed? You’re always out at a party or being paparazzied on a date with Ginny Friedrich.” Dammit, that last bit. The filter I apply—especially around him—has called it a night.
“That’s not what you think.”
I raise a brow.
Jack sighs, nods. “OK. We were together, off and on, when we were filming, but it’s long over. We just sort of... put it on for appearances.”
“Why would you do that?”
“Because there’s so much competition. Always a hot new star for people to obsess about, and studios want actors who people are talking about. Being spotted at these events... especially with Ginny... was an easy way to stay top of mind. It feels like making movies is only half the job now that I absolutely refuse to get an Instagram, no matter how much Delia pressures me, but falling into a routine with Ginny felt like an easier assignment. It’s a way I could feed the beast without losing myself completely.”
“And all the other women you’ve been spotted with?” I may as well get the questions borne of my internet stalking out now before morning light and sobriety close whatever door we’ve opened. “The actresses, the influencers, the pop stars,” I rattle off, trying to play it like I’m razzing him.
“There have been no influencers!” He clutches his chest. “Some of that... might be what you think.” Jack looks down at the bar and knocks one of his knees against mine. Shots fired. “But some of it is just finding someone I know I can chat with at an event. Do you know how stale those things are? I’m not going to issue a correction or clarification every time someone with an iPhone catches me at a restaurant or chatting at an after-party.”
“That... makes sense,” I say slowly.
“I feel like it took me so long to get here. I don’t want to become a victim of it, but I don’t want to lose it either,” Jack says into his glass, like he doesn’t want to voice his insecurity directly to me.
“You won’t,” I reply with urgency. Sitting at the fake bar, our bodies are angled toward each other, my knee now pressing back against his with an affected casualness as artificial as our surroundings. “You’re really good.” The spot inside of my knee where our bodies are touching feels electrified, and the tingling current extends upward to my inner thigh, creating a dampness between my legs that feels hard to ignore.
“Yeah, well, it’s been ten years, and I still don’t feel like I understand this business at all.”
“Honestly, I think everyone feels that way.”
“Even you?”
My brows shoot up. “Especially me.”
“Then you hide it well.”
“I hide lots of things well,” I say with a shrug, but I know what I’m doing: I want Jack to know I want him, without having to acknowledge that in any real way. I want to get to sit here and flirt with him and have a too-late drink answering too-personal questions while still technically playing by the rules I made for myself.
Jack’s gaze darts from my eyes to my lips and back again, like he knows better than to say anything out loud. I set my glass down on the bar, and he sees that as the yes it is.
He angles his torso forward and presses his mouth to mine, his hand reaching for the back of my neck, his thumb brushing back and forth against my earlobe. After all of these years of imagining what it would be like to be with him again, kissing him feels like finding something that I was sure I’d lost forever. My nerves prickle, hyperaware of every sensation: the sugary soda on his tongue, the unlikely familiarity of the scent of tequila on his breath, the squeeze of my eyes as I try to experience this and only this, the brace of his leg as I lean in closer and he presses his warm palm into my upper thigh.
Jack’s other hand winds into my hair, and his mouth seeks out my ear and then my collarbone. I tilt my head to the side and peel my eyes open, and I see, suddenly, in sharp focus all around me the literal, physical evidence of everything I’ve built and worked toward.
What am I doing? Kissing this actor in the middle of the night?
If anyone we work with finds out about this, no one will take me seriously for the rest of the shoot. I’ll be that production designer who had a fling with one of the stars—on set, no less—and that reputation will follow for who knows how long. This might be the last biggest thing I ever do.
I tense as I spiral, and Jack feels me stiffen before I can get any words out.
“Hey, what’s wrong?” he asks, pulling his mouth away, keeping his hands on me.
“Jack, I’m sorry. I can’t do this.” My eyes sting, and tears threaten. I am not going to cry over this.
His puppy-dog eyes are back, shining at me. Pleading.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” I say as dispassionately as I can manage, standing up and clearing our glasses. I have to get out of here before I let this go any further.
When I look up at him, still frozen in his seat, I want to ignore the confusion in his features and what appears to be sadness mixed in too. “I really am sorry,” I say in an almost whisper, to myself as much as him, before kissing him gently on his cheekbone and briskly walking off the set.