Finding June (4 page)

“But do
you
think I did it?” I asked,
this time with my voice barely above a whisper. I stared up at him
in silent awe, waiting for his next line.

His big blue eyes were so easy to get lost
in, and I forgot that there was a whole desk of people watching us
until Mr. Hill said, “That’s all that matters to me.” It instantly
tore my attention away from Lukas.

“What?” I asked, looking over at Mr.
Hill.

“That’s your next line,” he said with a
raised eyebrow.

“Oh, right! Sorry,” I said quickly, turning
back to Lukas and trying to get back into the moment. I thought I
saw frustration pass over his face, but the emotion disappeared so
fast that I couldn’t be sure. I took another breath and moved my
expression back to one of distress. Lukas instantly brought his
hand to my cheek and resumed caressing my cheekbone with his thumb
once more. I could feel blood rising to my face and I hoped I
wasn’t turning red. That was the last thing I needed right now.

“That’s all that matters to me,” I went on,
saying my line with a voice full of emotion. I took advantage of
what assets I had, knowing that in the presence of this perfect
man, I didn’t have many. I widened my dark, soulful eyes, looking
up at him with a gaze full of intensity. I thought I saw a flicker
of a smile pass over his full lips, though I didn’t know why that
would have made him smile.

“Maybe this will answer your question,” he
said so quietly that I wondered if the camera had caught his line.
I tried desperately to remember what came next, hoping I hadn’t
forgotten a line again. But as Lukas moved his hand from my cheek
to the back of my head I instantly knew what was coming. He moved
his face closer to mine, making my breath catch in my chest.

This couldn’t actually be happening.

I held my breath, waiting for him to close
the now-minuscule gap between us, when Mr. Hill loudly announced,
“Thank you Lukas, that’s perfect.”

I couldn’t believe it.

I had been so close to actually kissing Lukas
Leighton. I mean, I could actually feel the warmth from his lips
right before he pulled away. If I had gotten a small shiver, we
would have been kissing. That’s how close we were. And the magical
moment was stolen away from me by "Mr. Casting Director." Wasn’t he
the one who wanted to see if we "fit"? What better way to tell? I
thought of bringing this up in a moment of sheer desperation, but
luckily someone else spoke before I could make the suggestion.

“We’ll see you on Thursday, Lukas,” the woman
in the purple top said.

“Thanks guys,” he said quickly, dropping his
hand from my head and walking out the door without so much as a
glance in my direction. The whole thing happened so fast that I
couldn’t really tell if he was being rude or if he genuinely looked
like he was in a hurry. Maybe I was just so worked up that
everything seemed to move in fast forward. That was probably it.
Lukas was a gentleman and I knew he wouldn’t just leave like that
if he didn’t really need to.

“Well, June, that was marvelous. Now let’s
talk business.”

CHAPTER 4

The rest of the meeting was a bit of a blur.
I tried to take in all of the instructions the casting directors
were giving me, but it was so hard to get that image of Lukas out
of my head. The look on his face right before he was supposed to
kiss me could have melted butter in the dead of winter.

From what I could recall (between daydreams
of Lukas Leighton), I had gotten the part and they were very happy
with my performance. The team gave me a packet full of filming
times, paperwork to sign, and some general information. They also
gave me a script, background information on my character, and
pretty much everything else I needed to know to be ready for our
read on Thursday. In exchange, I gave them my measurements for the
costume department and some other schooling information they’d need
to get me a studio teacher.

When Gran pulled onto Pullman Avenue where we
lived, I saw Joseph’s forest green car parked outside of the
house.

“That boy has been calling every five seconds
to ask if you’re out of the audition yet,” Gran said with slight
exasperation, even though I knew she loved Joseph. I smiled at
Joseph’s interest and couldn’t wait to tell him I got the part . .
. and all of the other exciting things that had happened that day.
“I think he likes you,” Gran said mischievously.

“Gran, I only met him today,” I said with a
grin, but I secretly hoped she was right. Lukas did look very
passionate when he was about to kiss me. Never mind that he had
been duped by Mr. Hill.

“I meant Joseph, Bliss,” she said with a roll
of her eyes. “Don’t you get all wrapped up in Lukas Leighton. It’s
never a good idea to date someone you work with. Besides, you just
can’t trust actors,” she said knowingly.

“But you’re an actor . . . and I’m an actor .
. . and Joseph’s an actor,” I said, ticking each of us off on my
fingers. Gran simply shot me a silencing look.

“You know what I mean, Bliss.”

I smiled at her and jumped out of the car the
second we pulled into the garage. Joseph scrambled out of his own
car, holding a miniature cooler and searching my face
tentatively.

“I brought you ice cream,” he said
carefully.

“What kind?” I asked.

“Both.”

We were silent for a moment while I let the
suspense build. Joseph knew me so well that it was scary. Whenever
I was sad, I ate my weight in Praline Pecan ice cream. Whenever I
was happy, I ate my weight in Huckleberry ice cream. Either way, I
probably shouldn’t be eating my weight in ice cream no matter what
my mood was, but that wasn’t the point. The point was that Joseph
thought of everything.

He continued to look at me with his dark
brown eyes, practically pleading with me to tell him what had
happened.

“Break out the Huckleberry,” I said with a
grin.

“No way,” he exclaimed, dropping the cooler
onto the ground and picking me up in a tight embrace. “No way,” he
just kept saying over and over again while I laughed like a maniac.
I was sure anyone driving by would think we had completely lost our
minds. When he finally released me from the hug he just held me at
arms length and smiled. “I can’t believe this,” he finally
said.

“How do you think I felt when they told me?”
I said breathlessly. “I’m actually going to be on
Forensic
Faculty
! And from the scripts they gave me, I’ll be on at least
four episodes. Maybe more if they decide they really like me.”

“June, this is a really big deal,” he told
me, as if I needed reminding. “I say we go inside, you eat the
Huckleberry and I’ll eat the sad ice cream and we go over your
lines.”

“I think that’s a perfect idea,” I said,
linking my arm through his. As we walked inside, Joseph said hello
to Gran for a moment while I grabbed two spoons from the drawer and
raced him up to my room. We didn’t bother with bowls on special
occasions; we just ate the whole pint right out of the carton.

“All right, where do you want to start?”
Joseph asked, skimming the pages of the script and scooping a huge
amount of ice cream up with his spoon.

“Honestly, I don’t really say much until my
scene with Lukas that I auditioned with today. Most of my scenes
before that are just a few angry lines that I yell at Charles, but
I’d rather practice those on my own. Angry lines are always kind of
embarrassing to practice in front of someone,” I said with a
shrug.

“Agreed,” he replied. “All right, so you
start here, right?” he asked, pointing halfway down a page in the
script.

“Yep.” I took a deep breath, trying to get
myself back to the heightened emotional state I was in this
afternoon. Joseph and I sat side by side on the ground, our backs
against my bed and our shoulders touching lightly. I cleared my
throat and began the lines I had already gone over today in the
audition and about a thousand times in my head on the drive
home.

“Cutter, I know all the evidence points to me
and you really have no reason to believe me, but . . . you can’t
think I’m capable of something so . . . so horrible,” I began, the
dialogue sending a chill up my spine as I remembered the look in
Lukas’s eyes.

“Listen, I know Charles can be kind of
intense, but he means well,” Joseph said, smiling as he read the
lines. “I just can’t get over the fact that you’ll be saying these
lines on the show,” he said with a grin.

“So unprofessional, breaking character like
that,” I said in mock seriousness, shaking my head and closing my
eyes. Joseph pulled a face at me and went on reading his lines.
Joseph and Lukas definitely approached acting differently. Lukas
seemed like he stayed in character and didn’t really like to break
it when reading his lines. Joseph, on the other hand, was all fun
and games until the second he had to be in character, when he
somehow magically turned into someone else completely.

“He just has to follow through with every
possible lead. If he got distracted by every pretty suspect we had,
he wouldn’t be a very good detective, now would he?” At this line
Joseph tried to suppress a laugh but ended up snorting.

“What?” I demanded, wondering what he could
possibly find so funny.

“You didn’t tell me Cutter was going to be
all smooth toward you on the show. It’s a little disturbing,” he
said with a shudder.

“What’s wrong with it?” I asked, now a little
defensive.

“Well, for one thing, his character is named
Cutter. I don’t really need to expand on that. And for another
thing, aren’t you supposed to be a murderer? Isn’t he the good
guy?”

“I am not the murderer!” I exclaimed, trying
to defend myself as if Joseph were actually accusing me of being a
killer. “They just suspect me. A suspect and a murderer are not the
same thing.”

“My mistake,” Joseph replied, though I could
still see the smile in his eyes. He was teasing me. “Sorry. Back
into character now,” he said, his face instantly melting into an
expression of the utmost seriousness. I followed suit and went
on.

“But do
you
think I did it?” I asked
Joseph, now turning to him and gazing into his eyes. The moment
didn’t hold the passion of my audition, but that probably had
something to do with the fact that Lukas wasn’t in the room,
sending chills up my spine every time he breathed. “That’s all that
matters to me.”

Joseph held my gaze for a moment before
looking back down at the paper to read his line. “Maybe this will
answer your question,” he said before pausing abruptly. A look of
great concern passed over his face and he looked up at me
questioningly. For some reason the look made me very
uncomfortable.

“Don’t worry, Joseph, you don’t actually have
to kiss me. We’re just reading through the lines,” I said, trying
to play off how heavy the room had suddenly gotten.

“This is the scene you did today?” he asked.
I nodded silently, not sure why that mattered. “With Lukas
Leighton?” I nodded again, this time with a grin spreading across
my face. “You kissed him?”

“No, I didn’t kiss him,” I said, as if that
were the most obvious thing in the world. Joseph visibly relaxed at
that news. “I was so close though,” I said sighing and laying back
against the foot of my bed, closing my eyes. “I know you’re a guy
so you don’t care, but it was honestly the most exciting experience
ever. We were this close,” I said, turning and showing him an
almost nonexistent space between my finger and thumb.

“Great,” he said with at least some
enthusiasm. I should have known not to bring it up to Joseph—he was
such a guy about things sometimes. But he was my best friend also,
so it felt like he should be the one I told about this kind of
stuff. Maybe I’d just have to suck up my pride and tell Xani
tomorrow morning. Letting out a deep breath, I closed my eyes once
more and laid my head on Joseph’s shoulder.

“This part is going to be so great,” I
breathed. Joseph tilted his head down against mine, but didn’t say
anything.

CHAPTER 5

The next morning Joseph and I were late to
theatre because we were held up by dozens of questions from kids in
our seminary class. Somehow word had gotten out about my audition
going well. I had no doubt Gran had something to do with the news
leak, but at that moment, I wasn’t exactly angry. Instead, I was
reveling in all of the questions and the fact that I suddenly
seemed very important.

As Joseph and I ran into the auditorium for
zero period theatre, Mr. Carroll gave a slow applaud, causing the
other people in the class to join in. I blushed a deep shade of
scarlet and tried to look modest while Joseph just beamed over at
me like a proud parent.

“As I’m sure some of you know, our very own
June Laurie just got a part on the TV show
Forensic
Faculty
,” Mr. Carroll announced happily. I imagined this was
every theatre teacher’s dream come true—to feel like they’d
contributed to helping someone reach their goal with acting. I
simply continued to smile as Joseph and I took a seat in the
audience of the auditorium with the rest of the students. Xani soon
appeared next to Joseph, flashing him her perfectly bleached
teeth.

“Now, getting on to business. I’ve decided
that I’m going to break the class into groups for our next acting
assignment,” Mr. Carroll began. “I’m going to have each group
perform a skit for the rest of the class that will require a great
range of emotion. I’m talking tears, laughter, panic . . . the
whole shebang,” he said with a wide gesture of his hands. “I’ve
assigned the groups and the skits, so I’ll pass these out right now
while you turn in your play analysis from last week.”

As I scrambled through my backpack to find my
play analysis, Xani leaned in to Joseph and whispered something
that made him go white. It instantly brought a smile to my face. It
really wasn’t that I liked to see my friend constantly embarrassed
by Xani’s attention—I just liked that he was so surprised to be
getting attention from a girl. Joseph didn’t realize his potential
no matter how many times I reminded him of it.