Catch A Falling Superstar: A New Adult Erotic Romance (3 page)

“Hec will do the medium shots first for the monologue scene, then close-ups. He says to save the main emoting for that. There are no long shots for the scene.”

Archer seemed to go into business mode. He quickly signed papers, received things, gave some answers and orders. Then all the supplicants were gone as quickly as they had arrived.

“Yeah,” he said to me, “so ordinarily, my assistant would have handled all those messages and things. But she quit yesterday. Burned out. It's pretty exhausting work. And she worked too hard, which I told her time and time again.”

A young man with a wire from his ear, an iPad in his hand, a water bottle in his belt and a harried look on his face came over.

“We're technically on lockdown, Mister Stratton,” he said, with a significant look at me.

“Oh, this is.... this is Blue. She needs a medic. Alfredo clawed her. Take her there, please. And put her on the list.”

“Yes, Mister Stratton. I heard Kate quit?”

“She did. Burned out.”

Archer glanced at me.

“You can hang around and watch the shoot if you want. It's pretty boring, but you get to see me make a fool of myself. Always good for a laugh.” He winked jokingly and walked rapidly away

The man motioned for me to follow him, and he took out a pen.

“Blue what?”

“What?”

“I have to put your name on the list of people accepted on set during lockdown. So I need your name,” he said with strained patience.

“Oh, my name is Ashley.”

He wrote on the pad with a stylus.

“Okay, Ashley Blue?”

“No, not Blue. That's just something he started calling me. It's Ashley Davis.”

“Okay, Ashley Davis.” He pushed the stylus to a point on the pad.

“You're on the list now. You an extra?”

“No, I don't work here. The ocelot scratched me, and Archer feels that I need a tetanus shot.”

“Right. The medic trailer is outside, over by the big trucks, where the ambulance is.”

He walked me outside again and pointed, impatient to get on with his other tasks.

“You can handle that yourself, right?”

“I think so.”

He had already turned his back and was heading back into the studio.

I found the medics relaxing with a cup of coffee each. It struck me that they probably had the best job on the set, because everyone else I'd seen so far had been involved in some frantic activity.

I went over to them and showed them my arm.

“It's a good one. Not too deep. I recognize Alfredo's work by now,” the medic said when she carefully inspected the scratch. “You're the one they call Blue, right?”

I was momentarily stunned.

“What, am I wearing a sign or something?”

“Someone talked about you on the radio.” She pointed to a walkie-talkie on the table beside her. “You came in with Archie. That explains the Alfredo mark.”

“So I'm a news item now. Flattering.”

“Yeah...” she said absentmindedly as she prepared the syringe with practiced motions. “I imagine you're a little taken with our leading man, huh? Fold your sleeve up as far as you can.”

It was easy. That LuckyStop uniform had never fit me that well.

“I don't know about
taken with
. He seems very nice.”

She nodded. “Until he's maybe not so nice, as he would say.”

She swabbed my upper arm with cotton and alcohol.

“You sound like you have personal experience with that.”

“Oh no. Not really. But on a small set like this, where the talent sort of spend their entire days for weeks and weeks, you pick up on a few things.”

She got the syringe and gave me the shot smoothly and perfectly. I'm pretty sensitive to shots, but this one I hardly felt at all.

“Such as?”

She started cleaning the scratches and made a little band-aid ready.

“Just keep your eyes open, is all I'm saying. I can see that you're young and I can tell that you're from the outside. Outside the industry, I mean. You seem unguarded and open in a way that movie people never are. You awaken the mother instinct in me, I guess.”

She put her scissors and gauze down on the little table and continued in a quiet voice.

“So now it's known to everyone that Archer brought the LuckyStop girl called Blue on set for something that your local emergency room could have handled just fine. He's not supposed to do that
at all
. No one is. Hector is super secretive, even for a big shot director. Archie knows that very well. People here are already pretty pissed about you being let in, because the star openly challenging the director on a set that's already plenty stressed out can't be good for anyone.”

The other medic got up and sauntered over to the entrance to the site and started chatting with the guard. It seemed to me that he wanted to be out of earshot of what his colleague was saying. She glanced over at his turned back.

“Hey, it's not my place to say anything about it. I've said too much already. More than enough to get me fired. Just keep in mind that not everyone here are your friends. In fact, pretty much no one here is your friend. A movie set is a minefield, especially this far into the schedule. And
especially
for cute young girls brought in from the outside by the star against the director's expressed wishes.”

She finished putting the band-aid on my arm, lightly slapped it in a friendly manner and gave me a smile.

“Just so you're fairly warned, is all. Archie has his eyes on you, that much is clear. You have a fresh look to you. Enjoy your day, now, and if you can avoid coming back tomorrow, you'll probably have a much happier life. ”

I pulled down my sleeve and returned inside.

I
took up station in a place where I thought that no one would trip over me, but the set was very crowded and I was constantly having to get out of the way of people. I have never felt more superfluous in my life. Everyone was doing something, except me. I was only getting in their way.

People were moving all kinds of lighting equipment, sound recording equipment, endless rolls of extension cord, small and big black boxes by the hundreds and exotic things whose function I couldn't even take a guess at.

The medic had taken the wind out of my sails a little. Was this place really as bad as she made it seem? And had Archer really taken an interest in me? That didn't sound like such a bad thing to me. He was a super famous A-lister, sometimes called the new Steve McQueen by the media. And he was an Academy Award winner, as far as I could remember.

I decided to spend a dollar or two on researching him right away. My ancient iPhone did have a browser, and I was able to look him up on Wikipedia. His entry was very long, even though he was still only 26.

After some reading I had gathered that he had started as a kid doing commercials, then got his big breakthrough as a brooding but immensely soulful adolescent in the huge hit
The Pawn.
And that's where he got his Oscar.

He seemed to prefer roles that were not heavy on the dialog, but he had the unique quality of being able to convey both emotion and intent with a handful of words. His hallmark was to go through a whole movie just deadpanning and smirking, betraying no emotions, before he would suddenly have a scene where he would open up completely, seem to lay his soul bare and show an emotional intensity that caught everyone by surprise and captured the whole point of the movie in a line or two. He would sometimes come up with those lines on his own in the moment, which gave them an energy and spontaneity that no one else could imitate. His fan base was huge, especially among women, who saw in him the ideal of what a man should be.

I skipped down to his
Personal Life
.

He had been dating a string of famous actresses, who all experienced a boost in their careers while they were with him. That had not happened to the last one, because she was plenty successful before she met him. She was Johanne Wilhelmsen, the Norwegian beauty who had completely stunned everyone with her understated but powerful performance as a young Catherine the Great in
Golden Age
. Their romance had been the main storyline for every entertainment outlet for over a year. The press tried different names for them as a couple, like Archanne or the ridiculous Joharcher before they gave up and just called them “J and A”. And that was were the paragraph ended. No new girl to be seen.

Under
Filmography
there was only a couple of titles from the year before, very huge hits, and then two flops from this year. But that was in addition to the thing that had really launched him to superstardom: The
Quiller
series of spy movies, where he played the main role as the super secret agent Quiller, who which was rapidly becoming America's James Bond.

But I found no clue as to what movie this might be that he was making right in front of my eyes.

I saw him before he saw me. He was calmly walking onto the set, reading a sheaf of paper in his hand and taking a swig from a bottle of water. Then he raised his head and looked right at me. I must confess that my heart skipped a beat. When did his eyes become so green that I could see them from across the room? Almost like they were lit from inside. Green light, giving me the go-ahead. Well, we'll see, mister movie star.

He sauntered over to me.

“Sorry, I had to get the makeup touched up. Did you get your shot?”

I pointed to the band-aid on my arm. “Patched and inoculated. Good to go.”

“I see. And do you
want
to go? Not interested in watching the shoot for a while? I was hoping you might stick around.” His face was neutral, but he seemed sincere.

I had absolutely no intention of leaving if I was allowed to stay, but I saw no need to sell myself too cheaply.

“Okay. Well, I guess I can watch for a while. Might be fun,” I said, trying to sound nonchalant.

He nodded with a shade of that knowing smirk of his on his lips, lifting his eyebrows a miniscule amount. I felt myself starting to blush. He obviously looked right through me and my amateurish attempt at acting all cool and aloof. But he played along.

“Not your first time on a set?”

I had to come clean.

“No, it is. Sort of. My mother brought me to the taping of a kid's show once, in New York, but I don't remember much. Except that we were supposed to laugh and cheer on command. And we were pretty bored by the end of it.”

“Okay. So what will happen now is what they call blocking. It means placing all the actors on the set where they're supposed to be, so that the camera and the lights get the best angle. Then they'll adjust the lights a little, then we'll rehearse the scene, then we get our makeup touched up again, and then it's the first take.”

“You're in this scene, right?”

“Yep. Me and Lisa. It's actually a key scene of the movie, where she and I discuss suicide. Hec – that's the director – left it until almost the end of the shoot, because he wants us to have a certain spark between us. Lisa and me, that is. I'm not sure if it might have backfired. We'll see. Well, talk of the she-devil...”

He looked past me over my shoulder, toward the entrance to the sound stage. I turned around, just in time to see a young woman disappear behind a big, black light shade.

“Oh,” I said weakly, “
that
Lisa.”

Lisa Scalia was not as famous as Archer, because very few people were, but definitely A-list. And definitely high up on it. She was something as rare as a former Miss Universe who had been able to transform her otherworldly beauty into huge Hollywood fame. Her equally otherworldly talent helped, too.

“
That
Lisa,” Archer confirmed.

“So a seriously big time production, with you
and
her. What's the movie called?”

“The working title is
Cold Vengeance
. But it's based on something that you have probably heard of before. You know what, how about you try to guess what it is? What the original is called, I mean? Figure it out, and I'll buy you lunch at a place of your choosing. Somewhere in town. See that chair?”

He pointed over to one of those classic director's chairs that I had thought was just an old myth, but there really was a row of collapsible canvas chairs with names on them. I spotted his, and Lisa's, and even Melissa Scott's and Amadeo Higuita's. Those last two were nowhere to be seen.

“Yes,” I said.

“Use mine as much as you want. But pull it away from that row. You do
not
want to be sitting between Lisa and Amadeo. If he ever arrives. Okay, I better get over there. I see Hec is staring at us with murder in his eyes.”

He made an exaggeratedly murderous face at me, winked mischievously and stalked off. I couldn't help putting my hand in front of my mouth to stifle a delighted giggle. I'm such a girl sometimes.

He turned to me briefly, still walking away.

“Wait here, huh? I'll come over every chance I get. Look out for spotted cats with long claws. I hear they're up to no good!” The last part he yelled so loud that every head in the huge industrial sound stage turned to him. He just grinned happily to everyone.

I
remained where I was and just tried to draw even closer into the scenery. I was well behind the cameras, but also pretty close to the set, so I had a good view of what was happening. I saw Lisa and Archer, as well as Hector Matheson, the acclaimed director. Well, I was pretty sure he was acclaimed, because I actually knew his name when I saw him. And I only know the names of a handful of directors, like Spielberg and James Cameron, so he was in very good company there. I probably couldn't come up with any specific movie he'd made, but I knew I would be googling him when I got home, where net surfing was cheaper. I also knew that from now he would be “my” director; I would feel a special affinity for him because I had been on one of his sets. Damn, it felt completely unreal to be here and actually be looking at three world famous people in the same place.

It was like a huddle before a baseball game. Hector was in the middle, and he gave instructions to the crew, while Archer and Lisa were standing a little to the side, but pretty far apart. Lisa was intently studying something on her cell phone, while Archer lazily read some half-size pieces of paper that I guessed was the script.