Page 5 of Falling Like Stars

The only sound after that is my breath rasping in my nose as the want starts to well upwards, out of my gut and into my veins. Pulsing, thundering, filling me with a need so deep and old, my eyes fill. I can’t contain it.

Why wasn’t I enough for you, Eva?

Behind me, the AD calls action and the loneliness of not being enough comes flooding out on a tide of dialogue. Zachary Butler disappears into Boyd Shelton, and the pain of having everything I wanted and then losing it is finally released. I’m free.

Chapter Two

THE ENTIRE HOUSE—the entirety of southern California—is holding its breath. I don’t get dazzled by the glitz of show business often, but both these guys are the real deal. There is no more Javier or Zachary. Just Hugo and Boyd. I feel like I should call 911 and save the professor from the madman that Zachary has become. He circles Javier in his chair like a shark coming in for the kill, his hazel eyes black and empty of everything but a hunger. A feeding frenzy is about to begin. I’ve read the script and yet I have no fucking idea what’s about to happen.

“What do y-you want?” Hugo asks, pleading. He’s afraid to take his eyes off Boyd; we all are.

“What do I want?” Boyd muses almost casually, and the hair on the back of my neck stands up. He drags his rubber crowbar along the wooden floor. The foley artist will scrape a real metal crowbar against beams of wood in post-production. Fake or not, it’s scary as hell.

Boyd leans over Hugo, and places his hands on the armrests, forcing the older man to lean back.

“What I want…” The intensity in his voice rises, his breath like a bull about to charge. The veins in his neck bulge and the crowbar comes up. “IS EVERYTHING!”

It takes me a few seconds to realize it’s over. Eight takes, one after another, with short reset times, and we’re done for the day. I take a step back and nearly trip on one of the runners on the carpet that protects it from miles of cable.

“Can we get some water, please?”

The first AD motions me over. I’ve already grabbed two bottles from a cooler in my corner of the living room. I jog over to where Javier is in the chair, looking as handsome as ever, considering Boyd supposedly just beat him into a pulp. (They’ll do the bloody bits tomorrow). He’s leaning over Zachary who’s sitting on the floor in front of him, his hand on his shoulder.

Zachary is shaking his head. “No, I don’t have it. It’s not there yet. It’s not fucking there.”

“Not there?” Javier blows air out his cheeks and takes one of the bottles I’ve soundlessly offered. “Are you shitting me? That last take…Zach, you got it.”

I’m still offering water to Zach, but he’s scrubbing his hands over his head.

“Tell him, Sam,” Javier says to the director who’s made his way over. “Tell him, we got it.”

I’m too close to the action, so I set the bottle on the floor beside Zachary and melt into the background. Throughout the six-week shoot, I’ve watched Sam Jenkins and Zachary Butler form a tight director/actor union. Sam knows what he has in Zachary and isn’t about to stand in the way. I thought Zachary was going to blow the roof off, but if he says it’s not there, they’re going to go again.

Not that I know anything about it. I’m just a lowly PA. I’m like a prop—still and silent until called upon.

“Rowan!”

Like now.

The second AD, Ted Grimms, is in the hallway and motioning me over with a hard look on his face.

Shit. I loitered too close to the talent.

I hurry to Ted who’s with two other production assistants. They cower like a pair of kids about to be sent to the principal’s office.

“Suddenly, no one knows where generator batteries are,” Ted gripes. “Even though I specifically said—”

“Mark has them,” I say. “He mentioned yesterday we might need them.”

Ted sighs with relief. “Thank God someone is paying attention. Would you go track Mark down and get them over here?”

“No problem.”

Okay, so I may be a lowly PA, but I’m good at my job. Not that it’s hard. Pay attention, anticipate needs, be willing to work crazy hours. All three are super easy to do if you don’t have a real life to speak of.

I find Mark, who’s busy rolling cable outside. I get the battery pack and bring it back to Ted. He takes it wordlessly, engrossed in a conversation with the key grip, but shoots me an appreciative nod.

In the living room, Sam and Zachary are still talking. The water bottle is still on the floor. Not a good look for the PA who leaves shit on set. A rogue water bottle isn’t the same level of “yikes” as the infamous Starbucks cup/Game of Thrones Fiasco of 2019, but I take pride in my work. That never would’ve happened on my watch, and I’m not about to let it happen now.

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