Chapter 9
Violet
The cafe door banged open, and Anna tumbled in, pushing back her hood and shaking the rain off her coat. Violet waved, and Anna weaved through the crowded tables of brunch-hungry people towards her.
‘Sorry I’m late,’ she said, unwinding a long, knitted scarf from around her neck and shrugging off her damp coat. ‘How were your first couple of weeks?’ she asked, crashing down heavily into her chair.
Anna looked pretty much as she always looked, whether she was at work or not.
Boots, jeans, an oversized jumper, her thick, pale honey-coloured hair piled lopsidedly on top of her head, looking like a giant melting ice-cream.
Spending so much of her time outside, in all weathers, suited her.
Her eyes were bright, despite the faint blue-grey shadows of tiredness beneath them, and her skin had a dewy freshness no make-up could achieve.
Violet noted the envious sideways glances from a table of well-heeled and heavily made-up women to their right. You couldn’t bottle what Anna had.
Closing her menu, Violet replied, ‘You mean apart from the world’s worst first day, finding that I am basically a skivvy for my college nemesis, walking in on a half-naked actor, then overhearing the ADs talk about what an old granny of a trainee I am?’
Anna cackled, then tried to smother the laugh as Violet glowered at her.
‘Oh dear,’ Anna said in a placating voice that didn’t match the grin around her eyes. ‘But I thought you said it got better after that?’
‘Only because it couldn’t actually get worse.’
Anna picked up a menu and held it in front of her face. Violet could see her shoulders shaking. Violet grabbed the menu and slapped it down on the table.
‘Anna! This is serious,’ she hissed. ‘I have possibly just ruined a perfectly good career chasing a pipe dream. I should have stayed in my lane,’ she muttered.
‘And Finn, ugh! He could probably get me fired at any moment, so that’s not great.
’ Violet sighed. ‘I have to be subservient and sweet and polite to him, and he doesn’t have to return the favour. ’
Anna looked amused rather than worried. ‘Violet, as a runner, you pretty much have to be like that with all actors,’ she said with a grin.
‘You look after what they need, so the whole shoot stays to time. In theory,’ she said cheerfully, as she opened the menu, ‘any one of them could get you fired.’
‘Yes, but Finn’s the only one I know might actually do it,’ Violet grumbled.
‘You know, I was wondering how things were in general. You know, how you’re getting on with Rachael and Jake and the team,’ Anna raised her eyebrows. ‘But if it’s Finn on your mind…’
‘Finn is not on my mind,’ Violet said irritably, snapping her menu shut.
‘It was a shock to the system to find out he was on the show, that’s all.
It threw me. I’m pretty sure if he hadn’t stepped out of that car that Monday morning and thrown me for a loop, my entire first day would have been different. ’
Anna lifted her head from her menu. ‘So, you’re saying that it’s Finn’s fault that you walked in on an actor and the ADs think you’re a bit older?’
‘Let’s just order some food,’ Violet muttered.
She was keen to move on from the subject of Finn and not give him any more airtime than he deserved.
After her disastrous first day, things had calmed down.
She actually hadn’t seen much of Finn in the couple of days following - except on set, from a distance.
Chloe took care of base and Violet had mainly done red light and bell, swapping in and out with Leanne.
She had glanced across set one day as she delivered coffee to the director and 1stAD and found him watching her, but as soon as their eyes met, he looked away.
He couldn’t even bear to make eye contact.
Well, good, neither could she. But she could bear to watch him work.
Sometimes she was positioned away from the entrance to the set itself and could only hear him, but on a few days, she had been positioned somewhere where she could watch the actors during takes.
He was a good actor. A great actor, in fact.
Then yesterday, they had shot a confrontation between Nathanial and Lord Hawarden, Beatrice’s father.
It was an angry, raw scene, with emotions running high and as much lying heavy in the subtext as was said aloud.
It ended with a warning shot fired—quite literally—by Lord Hawarden and a painting crashing down from the wall.
The crew let out a collective breath after the first take, and the relief on set was palpable.
After the director called cut, Finn had shrugged and rolled his shoulders as if shaking off the scene, then looked up directly at her.
His face was red, his mouth tight, and his brow still furrowed in anger from the performance.
Violet, lips parted slightly from the shock of the scene, stared at him.
For a moment, their eyes locked. Finn’s face softened, the lines fading away.
They stood like that, metres apart and unable to look away for what felt to Violet like minutes but was probably barely two seconds.
Then the director slapped Finn on the shoulder and started congratulating him on the performance, and the odd moment was over.
‘It’s a good-looking cast, isn’t it?’ Anna said, interrupting Violet’s reverie.
‘Yes. Well. It’s a historic romance,’ Violet said. ‘I suppose we’re all supposed to fall for them.’
‘Finn is very handsome,’ Anna mused, fiddling with the saltshaker. ‘I mean, he was cute at college, but he has aged like a fine wine. Looks great in that open shirt and those boots.’
Violet felt an unexpected flush creep over her cheeks and shifted in her seat.
‘Uh huh,’ she grunted in response, eyes down on the menu.
‘I told him so when I saw him the other day. I’m not sure he remembered me, though, so he just thinks I’m a random crew member lusting after him.’
‘Great,’ Violet muttered.
‘I saw him swinging an axe the other day,’ Anna continued. ‘As Nathanial, I mean.’
‘Did you?’
Violet sighed, the menu items going in and out of focus.
‘Yes. Really hitting that wood.’
Violet dropped the men. ‘Okay, Anna! What are you trying to say?’
‘Nothing!’ Anna’s eyes were wide as she grinned. ‘Just that… you have some big emotions when it comes to Finn.’ Her eyebrows shot up in a question. ‘You always have done.’
‘Okay then.’ Violet leaned across the table. ‘Let’s talk about you and Ben.’
Anna knocked the saltshaker over and hurriedly tried to clear up the spilled salt.
‘Pfft, we’re just friends, you know that. Let’s order, shall we?’ she said, raising her menu in front of her face.
The arrival of the waitress abruptly ended the conversation, and they ordered enough food for four people and a pitcher of margaritas to wash it down with.
‘Keep them coming,’ Anna urged the waitress with a flash of white teeth.
When they both had ice-cold margaritas in front of them, Violet asked, ‘How long did it take you to feel like you knew what you were doing?’
Anna laughed.
‘Violet, that’s an ongoing process. I know the principles of my job, but the execution changes from place to place.
I’m always learning more. My role is still relatively junior.
If I want to someday lead a locations department on a show like Huxton, I’ve got a long way to go.
You’ll see,’ she grinned. ‘We’re on location next week, so you’ll start to see just how much work goes into getting sites ready for the crew. ’
‘Oh yes,’ Violet brightened. ‘We’re shooting at the village, aren’t we?’
Anna nodded, her face lighting up.
‘Yep. It looks great,’ she said, leaning over the table towards Violet, strands of honey hair working their way loose from her bun.
‘The art department has done such an amazing job, and most people in the village are quite excited to have us filming there, though,’ she wrinkled her nose, ‘they really don’t understand how disruptive it can be to have a hundred or so crew descend on them.
But we’ve been working really closely with them for months, and some are even going to be extras in the show, so hopefully it’ll all be okay.
I’ll probably see a lot more of you next week because the ADs will work with locations to make sure cast have the green rooms they need by set, to lock off certain routes when we’re rolling, stuff like that. ’
Despite all her doubts, Violet felt excitement bubble up.
After her terrible first day and a two-week stretch in the studios, maybe a new week and being on location would be what she needed.
Hopefully, she would finally fall in love with this new job and feel validated in her decision to take an entry-level role to make the move from theatre to television.
And the thought of seeing Anna more regularly felt like a comfort blanket in this strange new world.
‘It’s going to be great to meet more of the cast, and see the extras all dressed up,’ Violet admitted, with a grin.
‘The truth is,’ she said, once the table was piled high with eggs Benedict and waffles and pancakes.
‘I am wondering if I’ve made the right decision.
And it’s not just because of Finn,’ she added quickly.
‘Anna, it’s harder than I thought. I don’t understand half of what they talk about, the whole thing feels completely alien to me.
Half the time I feel like I’m in some fever dream,’ she said.
‘I was someone in theatre. People wanted me to work with them. I had directors ask for me. Now I am this clueless old woman, apparently.’ Anna scoffed at this.
‘I am,’ Violet insisted. ‘You know that most trainees are straight out of college or uni. And here I am, in my mid-thirties, taking instruction from Ethan, who hasn’t started shaving yet, and Leanne, who… Oh, Leanne’s fine.’
Anna crossed her arms and sat back in her chair.
‘They are both perfectly nice,’ Violet conceded.
‘I knew taking this job would mean learning new things and having new experiences. I just didn’t think one of those new experiences would be feeling quite so old and stupid.
I was good at being a stage manager, Anna.
And this job… Honestly, I don’t even know what it is.
Most of the time, apart from the drama on my first day, it’s just boring.
’ She dropped her head into her hands and pushed her fingers into her hair.
‘I think I might have made an awful mistake.’
‘Violet,’ Anna said, her voice loaded with patience and tequila. ‘It’s been two weeks.’
Violet said nothing but poked at the sugar sachets on the table.
‘Remember during a tech in theatre, when you’re waiting for the technicians to sort something?
That’s pretty boring. Or when rehearsals grind to a halt because an actor keeps forgetting their lines or needs constant reassurance from the director.
Or when it’s the sixtieth performance, and you know all the lines and cues by heart, and you’re in your own personal Groundhog Day? ’
Violet gave a small nod.
‘That’s why you left, Violet - you were bored.
Don’t romanticise your old job because you’ve had a rough start in this one,’ Anna advised.
‘You didn’t make this decision lightly. It was months in the making.
You did research, courses, training,’ Anna reminded her.
‘You nagged me to death. Give it time. You are right at the very beginning of this.’
Violet squirmed in her seat and rubbed at the condensation on her glass.
‘Thing is, Anna, just before you arrived, I had a message from a producer of a new production of Hedda Gabler that’s in rehearsal,’ she said, glancing up at her friend. ‘Their SM has walked out, and they need someone to start ASAP. She’s offering good money. But she needs to know today.’
Anna sat back in her seat, one hand resting on her full belly, the other holding a margarita aloft.
‘Well,’ she took a sip and licked salt from the glass. ‘If you really want out, I suppose this is your opportunity.’
Yes, this was an opportunity. The dignity and comfort of a theatre job as a respected professional, or life as a drudge fetching drinks and taking instruction from Ethan. And Finn.
Finn.
Everything still felt so precarious. She didn’t think Finn would deliberately try to get her fired, but she wasn’t sure she was doing the best job of being nice.
She was pretty sure she sounded sarcastic most of the time.
What if she paid her dues, worked hard, and then, at the end of it all, she still hadn’t made a good enough impression for Rachael or Jake to want her with them on another job?
They were the extent of her film and TV network at present.
If they didn’t ask her back or recommend her to others, she was stumped before she started.
It all still felt like a huge gamble, as if she had thrown a coin up in the air and was watching it spin and fall in slow motion with no way to know if it would land in her favour.
‘Well,’ Anna pressed, topping up their glasses. ‘You won’t get a clearer choice than this. What are you going to do?’
It was a sign, Violet thought. Sure, she could press forward with the traineeship, see what fresh perspective a week on location would bring.
But every day she’d still be taking lunch orders, or fetching drinks, or dealing with Finn.
This offer was a way out, back to all that was familiar, all that she had worked so hard to build, then abruptly walked away from.
As she prevaricated and fidgeted, her napkin slid off her lap and onto the floor.
Hunching down to retrieve it from under the table, her eyes fell on her new boots.
Per advice from Anna and the AD team, she had bought waterproof walking boots ahead of their first stint on location.
She had been wearing them around the studio for the last few days to break them in, and today she had worn them to test them out in the rain.
They were so clean. They had barely been anywhere yet.
No mud or grime caked on them to signify adventures had been had, no grass fronds stuck in the laces.
Just squeaky clean, barely-out-of-the-box boots, untested.
Violet righted herself, took a deep breath, and started tapping a message in reply.