Chapter 5
Violet
Violet’s stomach nearly dropped out. Jesus, news travelled fast. Had Mark made a complaint about her?
She narrowed her eyes. Had Finn managed to, in the few moments since she had last seen him?
Now Rachael thought she was an incompetent idiot who couldn’t be trusted with basic tasks.
Which, to be fair, it seemed she couldn’t.
She took a deep breath and pressed the button to reply.
‘Um, yes, Rachael, I am so, so sorry. It won’t happen again.’
‘I hope not,’ came the clipped reply. ‘Please read the names on the trailers, like I told you.’
‘Yes, of course. Apologies again.’
Violet let go of the radio button and bent double, her hands on her knees.
She had thought the worst thing she might do on her first day might be getting the jargon wrong, not knowing where to go, or putting sugar in the wrong person’s tea.
Not walking in on a semi-naked cast member, with another cast member in tow.
It was Finn. It had all been fine until he showed up and threw her off her game. And he wasn’t just here in any capacity. He was the star of the show.
She bent over double, hands braced on her knees.
She was hyperventilating now, breath coming in short puffs.
She was the thirty-four-year-old trainee AD who would be fetching his lunch, handing him his sides and showing him where the loos are on location.
And if she wasn’t careful, she’d be the thirty-four-year-old unemployed woman who foolishly left a great career in theatre because she thought the grass was greener.
She straightened up and smacked herself on the cheek. Come on, Hathersay, pull yourself together!
‘Violet?’
The radio fired off in her ear. She snapped her head up and fumbled for the radio cord, lost in the folds of her scarf.
‘Fuck fuck fuckity fuck,’ she muttered as her fingers delved into the fluffy fabric.
‘Violet, come in,’ came the voice again, now sounding a little less patient.
Violet’s fingers finally found the button.
‘Yes, Violet here. I mean,’ she corrected herself, ‘go for Violet.’
‘No need to take Mark to costume, his standby has gone to his trailer.’ Violet heaved a sigh of relief not to have to see Mark again right now.
‘Jennifer is finished in makeup,’ Rachael’s voice crackled down the line.
‘Can you meet her and take her back to her trailer, please. Her costume standby, Caitlin, will meet her there in two minutes.’
‘Copy that,’ Violet said, in a tone she hoped conveyed calm and control.
She knew from the call sheet that Jennifer was the name of the lead actress, Finn’s - correction, Nathanial’s - love interest. She hoped she had permanent garlic breath and gave him oral herpes.
So now she had to get Jennifer from makeup - wherever that was - and also get Finn a coffee - wherever that was - and resist the urge to spit in it. All at the same time.
With no real idea where the makeup trailer was, Violet picked a walkway between the maze of white trailers and set off at a march, peering at signs as she went until she saw the one she needed.
After the chill of the dark morning, the make-up trailer was a warm fug of perfumed air, thick with aerosols and ammonia, and bright lights.
Perched on a stool in a corner was a woman with a cloud of salt and pepper hair pinned up in a messy top knot.
Across from her, a young woman wearing oversized acid-green dungarees over a pink zebra print t-shirt was combing out a wig.
The smell of hairspray lingered in the air, not quite masked by the herbal scents emanating from a diffuser that puffed away in the corner.
Violet raised a hand in greeting and opened her mouth to explain why she was there, when a ridiculously pretty twenty-something actress twirled in her chair and fixed a pair of bright blue eyes on Violet.
‘Oh, are you here for me? Lovely.’ She stood, unfolding her willowy frame from the chair. ‘I’m Jennifer,’ she said with a smile, flashing small, even white teeth.
Creamy blonde ringlets framed her face, and her cheekbones arched away from her small, pink, rosebud mouth. Her alabaster skin seemed to be lit from within, by what Violet assumed was a combination of good health, exercise and ruinously expensive skincare products.
Violet shrank three inches and gained ten pounds just looking at her.
She pulled her shoulders back and clenched her buttocks, as if that would make up for the burgers and pizzas and late-night crisp binges.
Jennifer tightened her dressing gown belt and Violet was sure her waist was smaller than the top of Violet’s thigh.
‘Yes, I’m Violet, I—’
‘Would you mind grabbing that for me, sweetheart?’ Jennifer said, gesturing to an iPad, as she palmed her phone. Violet dutifully picked up the device and turned back towards the door.
‘Thank you, ladies, see you soon!’ Jennifer trilled to the make-up team as she descended the steps.
Jennifer chatted as Violet led her back to her trailer, having memorised the route - two rows down, three trailers across.
‘This wig is sooo heavy,’ Jennifer said, gesturing to the elaborate Victorian chignon and curls.
‘But at least it keeps me warm! And the costumes,’ she cooed.
‘They are stunn-ing, of course.’ She made ‘stunning’ sound like two separate words.
‘But they weigh a ton,’ she chortled, tapping Violet on her shoulder.
‘By the time you have the corset, the hooped petticoat,’ she was listing on her fingers, ‘the other petticoats and the dress itself, it must all weigh thirty pounds or more!’
‘That can’t be easy to be in all day,’ Violet offered.
‘No, I don’t think it will be,’ Jennifer replied earnestly. ‘Ask me at wrap, and I’ll tell you what it’s like!’
Violet quietly thought she’d swap skivvying after everyone all day for being helped in and out of beautiful costumes and wigs but kept it to herself. Relieved to see Jennifer’s name neatly pinned to the side of the trailer they were alongside, she reached for the door. ‘Here we are,’ she said.
‘Thank you, sweetheart,’ Jennifer said as she mounted the steps and slipped into the trailer.
As Violet closed the door over, she heard Jennifer squeal, ‘Caitlin! I’m so excited. I can’t wait to get into this, it’s so beautiful.’
The door latch clicked into place, and the voices muted to an excited blur. Violet puffed her cheeks and blew out a long breath.
One down, one more to go.
She could do this.
‘Rachael for Violet.’
‘Go for Violet.’
‘Violet, Finn is due in makeup. As it’s his first day, he won’t know where to go. Can you walk him, please?’
She could not do this.
‘Copy that,’ Violet said into the radio.
As soon as she had let go of the button, she swore under her breath.
Fuck fuckity fuck.
For a few happy moments, she had forgotten Finn was here.
Finn’s half of the two-way trailer he shared with Jennifer was right beside her. Five strides and she’d be at the door. She sighed. She was coffee-less and had to face him empty-handed.
Seeing Finn again was a shock. In the years after they left college, she knew he was working successfully as an actor.
His name popped up in trade publications from time to time when cast lists for shows were announced.
Once, a few years ago, she had seen him from across the room at an industry awards show.
As an actor, he was recognised and celebrated, a flow of people constantly appearing to talk to him.
She was nominated for a technical award as part of a team, so stood out about as much as the dusty looking faux ferns dotted around the room.
After years of making sure their paths would never cross in what was, after all, a surprisingly small industry, here she was, in the very worst position imaginable.
Not as a Stage Manager, able to hold her own against him as a cast member in theatre.
No. She was the most junior person on the show, one step above clueless about what her actual job was, and expected to wait on him and tend to his needs.
She was his—gulp—beck-and-call girl. Clearly, the Universe hated her and had it in for her.
She shuddered, reached up over her head and knocked on the door.
‘Come in!’ Finn called. Violet climbed the steps up into the trailer and pulled open the door. Finn sat on the small sofa, with one ankle hooked over his opposite knee and a rumpled script on the seat beside him. Violet caught a glimpse of highlighted words and coloured index tabs.
‘Oh. It’s you,’ he said, flipping the script over. ‘You didn’t want to burst in to try to catch me in my pants?’
Okay, enough was enough. Violet closed the door smartly behind her and stepped into the little space.
‘All right, Finn, let’s get it out there.’ She planted her hands on her hips. ‘This has been a surprise,’ she corrected herself, ‘I mean, a shock for both of us.’
Finn snorted, leaned back and linked his hands behind his head. Violet barrelled on.
‘But it seems we have to work together.’ She gritted her teeth and her fingers dug into her hips through her coat. ‘I can be civil and professional if you can be and—’
‘Violet, dearie, if this is you being civil, it’s not a good start. You look like you’re chewing a wasp.’
Finn calling her dearie was designed to piss her off, she knew that. Unfortunately, it was effective.
‘Well, sweetie, we have to work together, like it or not, so we—’
‘Like it or not, eh?’ Finn mused, pulling his arms back in front of him and twiddling his thumbs.
‘I’m not sure you’re quite right there, Vi dearie.
See, I am top cast, and you, in a delightful twist of events, are a thirty-something train-eee.
’ He stretched the word out, chuckled to himself and shook his head.
Getting to his feet in one languid movement, he crossed the short distance between them.
His sudden proximity was unsettling. Violet shifted her weight onto her heels but held her ground.