MAX

“You seem distracted,” Colleen says as she pulls her hand from my turtleneck the next night. “Everything okay? Am I not doing it right?”

“No, you’re great,” I mutter, walking to my coffee table and dropping the script. “My head isn’t here right now. I’m sorry. Just give me a second.”

Her tone is reassuring, “Sure. We don’t have to rehearse tonight.”

My frown slides from the script to her. “You okay with that?”

“Of course!” She smiles and walks closer. “We could just…talk.” Her hand slides up my shirt again, only this time not in character.

I clasp it, stop its trail. “Colleen.”

“Max, I see how you look at me.”

My lips part from surprise. “Never meant to give you that impression.”

“Right, because you’re the director and it wouldn’t be professional. But people have off screen affairs all the time,” she purrs, stroking my chest. What she doesn’t know is the scratches are healing and that caress kinda hurts. “I don’t mean affairs like cheating. But you know, a love affair.”

My eyebrows pierce together as I return her hand back to her. “I’m sorry if I gave you the impression that I wanted this, but this isn’t good for the project.”

Clearly not used to being turned down, my lead actress blinks in shock and takes a vulnerable step back. “Oh, wow, God, I feel like an idiot. Are you into men?”

“No. I’ve just put every dime I’ve saved my entire working life into this film and I don’t want to screw it up.”

Colleen nods, processing it, opens her beautiful lips but closes them again. I’ve stumped her. “Oh I see!” She brightens up, and approaches me one final time. Those gorgeous doe eyes widen like we’re in on a secret she just figured out. “We’ll stay like this until the shoot is over.” Her hand waves between us, indicating distance. “And then as soon as we’re wrapped, we can have fun.”

Chewing my lip I’m speechless. But there’s no way I’m turning this offer down. We begin shooting next week. If she feels rejected she might walk. So I give a smile that deserves my own Oscar. “That’s a great plan.”

“Isn’t it?”

“I love it.”

Proud of herself she rises on her tiptoes and kisses me. I’m frozen, and don’t return it. The peck goes unanswered but this girl is not deterred. She can write off my unresponsiveness to ambition and maybe even strength of character.

Really, I’m just not interested.

“Max, I’m going to go home and I’ll be thinking of you.” Her head tilts. Then she grabs my crotch out of the blue. “And I want you to think of me, too.” Smiling she releases my package and picks up her scarf, her white coat, the matching clutch purse. Natalie dresses nice, too, but she doesn’t look like a walking cotton ball.

Stop it, Max.

Keep Colleen on the actor-pedastal.

Don’t let what just happened fuck with your directing her.

Forcing a smile I walk her to the door, feeling not nearly as in love with this creative relationship as I did. “You get home okay now,” I offer.

“You’re so cute.”

My smile thins and I shove my hands in my pockets. “Night.”

“Goodnight, Max.” The girl glides to her car like the world is her runway.

You own the world.

When her headlights light up I give her a wave for good manners. She blows me a kiss from behind her steering wheel. Blows me a fucking kiss.

As soon as I deadbolt the door, I groan, “Oh fuck, no no no to all of that.”

Kicking off my sneakers I head for the bathroom that used to be my father’s, and wash my face with water as cold as I can get it. Drying off I open my eyes wide and stare at myself a second before digging out my phone and walking back into the loft.

“Max,” Dad answers, a question in his voice. “It’s after ten. Everything okay? You never call this late on a Saturday.”

“Yeah, Dad, I’m good. What, are you sleeping already? Don’t get old on me.”

He chuckles and corrects me, “I meant I’d expect you to be out. Isn’t this the night the women are running after you?”

I mutter, raking my hair back, “I just had to turn one down right here in my own home.”

“You’re kidding. Did you get her all the way to bed before you changed your mind?”

“Nah. It’s complicated. Didn’t call about that though. Dad, I just had a thought. When you were finally done with Bernie, were you disgusted with her?”

He’s silent. “Are you really doing a film about me?”

“I told you I was.”

“Max,” he sighs. “Do I have to watch this thing?”

“You probably won’t want to.”

A dry chuckle comes through the phone. “I can guarantee I won’t. Why are you doing this?”

“Can you tell me how you felt. Were you disgusted? Because I just got a glimpse of how a good feeling can switch just like that.”

Resolved to answer as honestly as he can, my father huffs his resistance out his nose and begins, “Yes, I guess in a way I was. But mostly at myself. Maybe at Bernie, too. You know, when you’re in love with someone and they keep hurting you, you can only take it for so long. In the beginning of the downfall, I cried in my car. Then I got hard and cold, no feelings. After a while, yes, I became disgusted. But a lot of that was at the disease. It’s a disease, Max, make sure you put that in your film. It’s important.”

“I have,” I whisper, kicking the wall with my toes. “Thank you for explaining all of that. But—”

He interrupts me, “One other thing. When your mother came into the picture, that’s when my feelings for Bernie really shifted. She’d been to my place, where you live now, high and begging for help before. But when she showed up when Sarah was there I wanted her gone in a big way. I didn’t want anyone coming between this feeling I had for your mother. But she was a saint, Max. Total saint. Never ceases to impress me how she handled that situation.” He pauses, voice changing, more clinical, less thoughtful. “So if you’re looking for a way for your lead character to be done with Bernie, have him meet someone who makes him realize what’s possible. That answer your question, son?”

“Yeah, thanks Dad.”

“I probably won’t see your film.”

Walking to my jacket I ask, “What’s Hunter up to tonight? Any idea?”

“If I knew I’d win a spying medal. Your brother is as evasive as hell.”

I glance to my watch, tap it a couple times to turn down the lights in my home. “Dad, I’ve gotta go. Thanks for everything.”

“Love you.”

“I love you, too.” We hang up and I scan for my keys, hurry to snatch them from the coffee table, and dash out to my Jeep.

The phone rings and Hunter’s voice comes through my car’s sound system. “You looking for me?”

“What the fuck, you have my place bugged?”

“Dad called.”

“That quick?”

“We never talk long.”

“Want to go to a strip club?”

Dude still has no emotion in his voice as he deadpans, “Sure. Name it.”

“Ah fuck, I don’t know which she’s working at tonight.”

“This that stripper who’s producing your film?”

My lip curls. “That’s what we’re going to find out.”

“If she’s producing—”

“NO, if she’s a stripper!”

“What do you care if she is or not?”

“Just Google The Dollhouse and Southern Comfort, and pick one.”

“Don’t need to Google them. I know where all of them are.”

“If I wasn’t so irritated I’d laugh.”

Hunter picks the first one and says, “Come get me. I’m at my apartment.”

“On my way.”

No more lame rehearsals where I’m not mentally present. I’ve worked too hard and I’m blowing it because Natalie is walking through my brain at all hours of the day.

It’s like she left her scent in my home.

Everywhere I turn I smell her.

It’s in my damn head, I know it.

But it feels so real.