Chapter Three

WHEN Drew dragged himself into the makeup trailer Monday morning, Steve was already in the other chair, looking bemused as Nina and Chantelle discussed his goatee.

“He’s supposed to be older than Scotty and Tony. The goatee lends gravitas.”

“Sure, but look at his bone structure,” Chantelle countered. “And he has nice skin.”

Drew plopped down, content to be ignored, and watched the show, cracking open the yogurt he’d picked up from craft services.

“He has a nice beard!”

“Clean-shaven would be more typical of the genre.”

“No one’s going to say that gay men don’t have beards, are they?” Steve put in at this impasse. He seemed resigned to outside influences deciding the fate of his facial hair.

Drew pulled the spoon out of his mouth. “Definitely not me.”

For a brief second, he had everyone’s attention. Steve nodded. “Cheers.”

Drew acknowledged him with another bite of yogurt.

“No beard would be better if there’s going to be kissing.”

Through years of training, Drew avoided choking.

“Is there going to be kissing?” Nina asked.

Okay, Drew wanted to know that too. It was killing him not knowing how this story was going to end. “Yeah,” he chimed in with an impish grin. “Is there going to be kissing?”

Steve shot him an indecipherable look. “Shave it,” he said after a few more beats. “I can grow it back if I need to hide from paparazzi.”

Drew grinned around his yogurt spoon. Facial hair as a disguise never worked, but it seemed like it would be cruel to say so now.

That set the tone for their morning. With no further delay, Chantelle and her assistant got them made-up and ready for Wardrobe. With the script only partially finished, they were filming more or less in chronological order, so shooting opened with Scotty convincing Morgan to road-trip to Vegas to liberate Roxy—renamed for Drew’s old costar—from the evil Lila.

They nailed it in three takes.

“Cut!” Nina yelled, and Drew broke into a grin that Steve answered readily.

“Don’t look too pleased with yourselves,” Nina warned cheerfully. “Schedule’s tight. Drew, Wardrobe! Steve, you’ve got half an hour until your scene with Trevor.”

Steve’s stomach growled so loud Drew could hear it.

“No rest for the wicked,” Drew said wryly. “Duty calls.”

As it turned out, duty meant a strange echo of Steve’s debate earlier that morning.

Drew stood shirtless in the wardrobe trailer while Nina and Will debated the line of hair that led down from his navel.

“Well, he’s vain as hell,” Will pointed out, brandishing the clippers.

“But lazy,” Nina countered.

Drew took a seat on the trailer’s only stool and hooked his feet under the rungs. He had no horse in this race. He’d shaved and waxed and manscaped for so many movies his body hair didn’t even feel like his own.

At least the consensus on lazy meant he didn’t have to get up at five and lift weights for an hour. Though, all right, Drew wasn’t exactly innocent of vanity either. He tended toward lean muscle, and he swam or ran in the evenings to make sure it stayed that way.

When it didn’t seem like Will and Nina were going to come to a consensus, he pointed out, “We’re on a schedule.”

They turned to look at him.

Drew shrugged. “Shit takes time. Gotta keep it up if there’s going to be continuity. What if I have to be naked later?” He didn’t think the script was heading toward a steamy sex scene, but who knew?

Besides, hair regrowth itched like a son of a bitch.

Will shrugged, defeated. “Okay.”

Wardrobe was maybe a bit of an overstatement. Drew left the trailer wearing slides and a bathrobe he’d be ditching at the set of Scotty’s apartment. Chantelle floofed his hair and touched up his makeup, and then he had just enough time to get on set for his call.

Steve, Nina, and the two camera infants, Mel and Adam, were waiting for him at the door. Nina whistled as he flashed some calf through the opening in the robe.

“That’s harassment!” Drew said cheerfully.

“I’ll call my lawyer,” Nina told him. “You ready to talk business?”

He waved his script, then realized he still had Steve’s costume change in his other arm and started with that. “Here. Saving you a trip, per Will’s instructions.”

“I never realized being a movie star would be so glamorous.” Steve draped the polo shirt over his shoulder and started taking off his button-down.

“Careful you don’t smudge your makeup when you put that on.” Nina patted him on the shoulder as he slid his shirt off. “So let’s talk about this scene. Morgan, Scotty convinced you yesterday to road-trip to Vegas to pick up your brother’s dog from his ex-girlfriend’s new place. But when you show up to get him….”

“I did write the scene,” Steve pointed out, getting ready to pull his polo on over his undershirt.

Nina fixed him with a deadpan look.

Steve paused and made an apologetic face. “Sorry. Carry on.”

“Thank you. Although point taken. Mel, Adam—Morgan’s face when the door opens is key to setting the tone for the rest of the movie. I need you to get it on the first shot, or we’re going to have to have Drew strip naked.”

“Hey!” Steve protested. Drew and Nina looked at him, and he shrugged. “Give me some credit. I’m an amateur, but I think I can fake attraction to—” He gestured to Drew.

Fake? Damn. But, well, it wasn’t like Drew dated anyway. “Ouch.” He pressed a hand to his chest.

“Check your ego,” Nina admonished. “Not everyone wants to see you in the buff. Now let’s get this set up. Where’s that extra?”

“Here!” Another guy, also wearing a robe from Wardrobe that wouldn’t make it into the film, slipped past them onto the set.

“Good.” Nina shooed Drew toward the other side of the door. “Don’t forget your lines. And you.” She turned to Steve. “Remember: you’re gay.”

Drew met Steve’s eyes over the top of Nina’s head. He looked baffled. “Thanks for reminding me?”

Nina opened her mouth, then seemed to think better of whatever she was going to say and muttered under her breath instead. “The two of you, I swear to God. I came out of retirement for this.” Then she clapped her hands. “Let’s go! We’re wasting daylight.”

The cameras set up their shots, the door closed, and the Wardrobe assistant came by with Steve’s shirt on a hanger, collected for continuity, and to check Drew’s wardrobe tape. “Good to go,” she chirped, and then she was gone, taking their bathrobes with her.

Drew and the extra found their marks—Drew a few feet from the door, his character’s flavor of the evening just visible through the doorway to the bedroom. Scotty was a slob with a dive apartment, but that didn’t stop him from bringing his pickups home.

“Action!”

Drew counted to ten after he heard the knock. Scotty would have just woken up; he’d be bleary and come-dumb and not particularly motivated by someone pounding on his door—even if that someone was his best friend’s brother coming to pick him up. Even if Scotty was late.

“Scotty! Come on, are you home? If we don’t leave, we’re going to hit—”

Drew opened the door, rubbing his face with the back of his other hand before running his fingers through his hair. Slowly he raised his eyes to meet Steve’s.

Except he didn’t. Because Steve was standing frozen, hand still raised like he was going to keep pounding on the door, his gaze fixed on Drew’s tiny black boxer briefs. Then on his stomach. Then his bare chest.

Either Steve was a better actor than anyone had given him credit for, or he’d forgotten his line.

Fortunately Drew was a professional, and he kept any recognition of the stare out of his expression and body language. Scotty would be too fuzzy to notice.

Finally Steve recovered. “—traffic.” Then he frowned as the extra started making noise in the bedroom. “Did you—really? You’re late for your own dog rescue party because you were getting laid?” His nostrils flared and he recoiled. “Are you drunk?”

Drew blinked lethargically, then squinted when Steve moved and the light shone in his eyes. “Lemme get my sunglasses.”