Page 60 of Director's Cut

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Somehow, I’ve managed to make it to January fourth. Maeve’s lying in my bed in the Cosabella pajama set I got her for Hanukkah, humming along to the German Beatles covers I put on as a joke as I finish up reading her latest paper on her laptop.

“Done,” I announce.

She bounces up and takes her laptop back from me gingerly. I have a bolt of realization: I’m dating a noncelebrity for the first time in years. Maybe that’s part of the reason I’m amazed by how gentle she is with every expensive thing she owns. I almost feel bad about getting her an expensive Hanukkah present; she’s asked me like ten times how to properly wash these pajamas. And she hand-painted me ceramic bowls, which takes way more effort than driving to Bloomingdale’s.

“The abstract sounds great,” I say.

She asked for my opinion, but considering the proposal is due tomorrow, I know she doesn’t really want it. Still, I’m not lying when I tell her I like it. I look over her shoulder and see she’s still working on a new paper.

She gives me a tiny smile, scooting an inch closer to me on the bed as she sets the laptop back on her stomach. “Thanks for reading this. I’m sure it’s eye-bleedingly boring for you.”

I shake my head. “Nothing you write is boring.”

And I genuinely mean it. Reading drafts of Maeve’s latest conference entry, a study of I Killed My Mother and Xavier Dolan’s early work, has brought a joy back into my life I haven’t felt since Oxford. Back when I’d read Emily’s papers for her, I’d write little jokes and questions in the margins that I always made her answer in the paper to appeal to the lowest common denominator in any academic audience. She got tired of the comments by the end of our relationship, but the light in Maeve’s eyes as she reads my margin notes is something I wish I could etch into my heart forever. Maeve and I haven’t exactly had the girlfriend talk yet, but I think our status is clear in the little things, like Maeve saying she can’t wait to see my comments on her next paper, Maeve and I watching sapphic TV in small doses while we form theories together about future episodes, Maeve video chatting with me when she was home for Hanukkah with her family, letting me talk to her little brothers.

I get a pang of regret. I can’t keep putting off telling her I’ll potentially have to bail on her this semester. What we have is too perfect for me to be this dumb. Yet I can’t shake that raw fear from the Emily days, that I’m one wrong move from losing her. I barely handled it last time; I can’t go through it again, I just can’t. And what I might risk is so much bigger than Maeve’s ego.

“So what’s your dream paper?” I ask.

Maeve purses her lips. “I’d love to do a paper on queer representation in modern genre film.” She shrugs. “Just wish there were, you know, actual films.”

I laugh. “Mason Wu and I are working on it.”

Mason kind of kept me from spiraling into a deep depressive episode when we met. She went from being the only director in Hollywood who knew I was gay to one of my best friends. Before I came out, she was the only person I could do press with who’d make me act, well, like myself. I’m almost looking forward to doing press for Goodbye, Richard! 2 just because I’ll have to hang out with her again for extended periods of time. She may be the only force in Hollywood who can save me from the gay pigeonholing. She also responds to my every Maeve update in under thirty seconds. So far, she hasn’t said anything about Leonard complaining to her about my turning down the HBO role, but I’m waiting for it, certain the news will hit me when I’m least expecting it. I wish there was a world where I only ever had to work with her, but it’s a fantasy, a numbing cream on an open wound more than any real solution.

“What’s on her slate? I’d genuinely write a paper on it.”

“She has this really cool semi-autobiographical coming-of-age indie filming this year. It’s based on her experience being a Chinese American literary magazine gay in high school in OC. It’s set in that nebulous time when you know you’re gay but you still haven’t figured out enough about yourself to try to date. The script is hilarious.”

“Who would you play?”

I narrow my eyes as I think. “I wanna say we decided I’d play her white therapist who she had a crush on, but I was also up for white biology teacher who ran off to Florida with the Spanish teacher she also had a crush on.”

Maeve laughs. “Oh my god, is Mason a Libra?”

I gasp. “I’m a Libra!”

“Yes, I know. I still like you very much.” She touches my nose. Maeve’s a Cancer/Leo cusp, and yes, I was very relieved to learn we were still somehow compatible on Co–Star.

“She’s a Gemini.”

“This explains so much about Goodbye, Richard!” She studies me a moment. “Is your character gay?”

I smile back at her. Mason and I have been bouncing this question around for a year now doing press for the film, and finally having the opportunity to answer it honestly is like throwing a nineties kid into Chuck E. Cheese. “Yes. So the reason I got Aurora is because I whispered in Mason’s ear during an audition that I was gay. She trusted me to put out what we called ‘gay signs for idiots.’ The studio heads were super nervous about canonical gay characters for a comic franchise, but Mason and I just knew Aurora was gay. We figured we’d just act like she was and have her do everything but say the word and kiss ladies. The way I walked, talked, looked at women, listened to men, everything was deliberate.”

“Is anything changing for Goodbye, Richard! 2?”

“Mason is fighting for Aurora and Lacey to have a sex scene.”

Maeve raises her brows. “Oh, okay.”

I’d forgotten how good it feels to talk about this franchise. The playfulness of the film has always spilled into the way we talk about it, the way everyone on set treated one another—it’s like telling someone about your favorite year at summer camp.

I laugh. “I mean, a PG-thirteen one. There’s gonna be a scene where Lacey and Aurora check into a hotel, and then there’s another scene—a major one—where they talk in bed. We know we can have them snuggling in pajamas, but Mason is hoping we can have a scene in the middle where they have one of those silent, bedroom-eyes, bodies-thrown-against-the-door-kiss-to-implied-sex scenes.”

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