Page 72 of Little Monster
I nod and intentionally smooth the angry crease from my brow. Behind me, the director gives Dex additional instructions, but I’m too busy focusing on breathing steadily in and out to overhear what he has to say.
“Cue music!” the director shouts. “Ghost” starts playing over a speaker in the corner of the room. “And... action.”
I focus my gaze out the window, trying to keep my eyes soft despite the anger bubbling just under the surface. Dex’s shoes click softly across the floor behind me. My body wants to tense, knowing he’s about to reach out, but I keep myself loose.
Then his hand is on the low of my back, fingertips gliding across the shimmery silver material of my dress, and I’m turning to look up at him. I try to hold the director’s words in my head, but when I make eye contact with Dex, so close I could reach out and kiss him, I freeze up.
His eyes are like ice in the golden sunlight cutting through the window. They’re cold, hard, but something else too. He’swearing that same frustrating look he’s had on his face all day.
I’m not sure what my face does, but it must not be right, because the director calls, “Cut!”
Dex hesitates for one moment, then two. Finally, he takes his hand off my back and steps away.
“Let’s try that again,” the director says. “Softer faces, both of you. Andsmile. You’re supposed to be in love.”
I let out a scoff, and the director glances at me, but he doesn’t ask for an explanation. Behind him, two women in the film crew exchange knowing looks.
“Reset!”
The music turns off, and Dex and I go back to our original spots to try again.
It takes a few more tries to get the window scene right, and then the vanity scene goes by quickly. I just have to sit there pretending to touch up my makeup while Dex watches and smiles at me in the background. But then it’s time for the last scene: the bed scene.
There’s a quick wardrobe change, and they bring in one of those folding screens for me to get changed behind. I slip out of the silver dress, then into a sexy white nightgown that shows the majority of my back and has lace along the edges. A silky robe goes over the top, and one of the stylists tousles my hair a bit to make it look softer.
When I’m done and they move the screen away, Dex is waiting on the other side. He’s sitting at the end of the bed, shirtless, completely tatted up, wearing just his black pants now. His blue eyes latch on to me, then sweep up and down my body.
It makes me feel powerful. Butwhy? Why can I still draw his gaze? I’m not Serena, willneverbe Serena. So why is he looking at me like that?
The director swoops in, offering guidance for how he wants the scene to go. I listen in a vague sort of way, but really, I’m just remembering that day at Dex’s house, the look on his face when I asked him what I meant to him.
And he told me without saying a thing: Nothing. I mean nothing to him.
The director has the camera crew move to the side of the bed so they can film us at the end of it.
Once everyone is ready to go, he calls, “Action!”
I paste a fake smile onto my lips and move toward Dex. His hands come up to touch my hips, and it’s not acting when I soften into his touch. Slowly, almost hesitantly, Dex leans his head in so it’s resting just below my sternum, his arms snaking around my body to pull me into an embrace.
And again, I need no direction. I lower my head, bury my face in his hair. He smells fresh, and the scent of his shampoo takes me back to the shower we shared, when he touched me so tenderly, placed kisses along my bare shoulders. I move my fingers through his hair, and his arms tighten in response.
He’s acting, I remind myself.This isn’t real.
The director calls for us to cut, and if I didn’t know better, I’d think Dex hesitated a moment longer than necessary before releasing me. I step away and turn my face so I can’t see his eyes.
The director has us switch it up now so that we’re both lying in the bed. Dex still hasn’t said a word tome. Not aword.
The music starts up, and Dex’s vocals bleed through the speakers.
“I’m just a ghost without her, wandering in the cold, caught in the shadows of a love story I never let get told. I let her slip away, too scared to face the truth. Now I’m haunted by her absence in this lonely fuckin’ youth.”
The song lyrics meant little to me while we were recording, but now they hit me hard, right in the stomach.
The music continues to play, and now the cameras are rolling.
“I see her face in every shadow, hear her voice in every sound. But she’s gone, lost to the dark, and I’m left here to drown. I was a fool to let her go, blinded by my fear. Now I’m left with nothing but the ghost of her so near.”
Dex meets my eyes as I shift in the bed, slipping one bare leg over his body so I’m straddling him, but it feels like he doesn’t see me, like he’s looking right through me.
