Page 102 of Method Acting

“Well, it’s not all awful,” he amended. “There are some good parts.”

I stared at him and he pouted.

“I like you too,” he mumbled. “And it’s not the L-word like Jimmy said, because he’s full of shit, and that’s ridiculous. I absolutely do not L-word you. And I don’t want to spend every night with you, and I do not want to touch you all the time. And I absolutely, absolutely did not envisage us moving to West Hollywood together and sharing a tiny condo and going to auditions and chasing the big Hollywood dream. That was just a post-coital brain fugue of stupid wishful thinking, and in no way an accurate representation of my feelings.”

Uh . . . what?

I snorted out a laugh. “What?”

“Nothing. I said I didn’t do that. Weren’t you listening to anything I said?”

I sat back down, tired from the circles of this conversation. I took his face in my hands, and his beautiful blue eyes met mine. “You are insufferable. Has anyone ever told you that?”

“You do. A lot,” he said, pouting because I was kind of squishing his cheeks.

“But you’re really fucking cute. And you drive me so crazy I could scream.”

“In a good way?”

“No.”

He made a squishy sad face. “Oh.”

“So let’s clear the air, start again, do this filming, stupid-ass reality-method-acting thing, and then we can decide what we want to do.”

He sighed. “Okay.”

“But you can’t stay in here and wallow.”

“I’m not wallowing.” He rolled his eyes at himself. “Well, maybe just a little bit. But I’m allowed. I’m not used to feeling the feelings.”

“Look. We’ve established that we like each other. That’s enough feelings for one day. Let’s just get through this stupid production. No sleeping at my place until it’s over and you know how you feel for real.”

“Whose stupid rule is that?”

“It was yours.”

“Well, I take it back.”

I sighed. “Chase. For the love of fucking god. Stop being a child.” I kissed his pouty lips, then let his face go.

“See? There it is again. Sweet, with a side of ouch.”

“Just keeping it real.”

“Could you be gentle with me? I’m fragile.”

I sighed. “You know that game Kiss, Kill, or Fuck? Well, you’re all three for me, and I don’t even know how that’s possible.”

He finally smiled. A proper Chase Soria smile. “You wanna kiss and fuck me?”

“And kill.”

“Those odds are still pretty good.”

I stood up. “You know what? I have to get to class while I still have some sanity left. If you want to fail, go right ahead. But we are expected in the rehearsal hall by one o’clock. I will be there because I cannot afford to fail. If you want to stay here and wallow, then be my guest. But we can’t get a tiny condo in West Hollywood and go to auditions together if you’re still in college because you failed.”

He unfolded himself from his covers, tried to stand up, almost fell over, and somehow managed to right himself before he hit the floor. “I said I never thought that. You need to listen more.”

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