Page 24 of Love Off-Limits
The studio was alive with activity. On a regular shooting day, things were busy. But today was special. Isaac had been working for the past several weeks to build a Rube Goldberg machine that now filled up more than half the studio. Its complexity was pretty amazing—a testament to Isaac’s scientific brain. The newer members ofRandom I’s staff were blown away by what he’d built, but I wasn’t surprised. That brain had gotten Isaac into MIT even if he’d chosen to forgo college and focus instead on buildingRandom I.Not a bad decision considering how many people filled the room—all on his dime.
What Iwaswas distracted. I couldn’t seem to get my head in the game. My conversation with Darcy earlier that week kept pushing to the front of my thoughts.
I could leave. Try something new. Go out on my own and make a name for myself as somethingotherthan Isaac’s lead camera guy.
“Tyler,” Isaac said, his tone indicating it wasn’t the first time he’d called me.
“Yep, sorry. What’s up?”
Isaac narrowed his gaze. He’d known me a long time. Too long not to notice that something was off. He ran a hand across the back of his neck. “We’re shooting in five. You good?”
I nodded. “I’m good. I’m ready.”
He hesitated. “You’re covering the sequence from segment five to seventeen with the lead camera.”
I nodded again. “I made the assignments, man. I’m ready.” The entire machine was divided into different segments—an easy way to assign different cameras to different areas. Segment five started a domino cascade—an aerial of the fallen dominoes spelled out the show’s name—that then launched a marble through a series of turns and obstacles that eventually pressed the launch button on the controller of a drone that was preprogrammed to fly out the studio window, hook its tether around a clothes line and hoist a flag into the air. The sequence continued through a few more elaborate segments outside, but I was only responsible for filming right up until the drone left the building. I knew the plan. I’d planned it out and assigned the camera crew accordingly. Isaac didn’t need to remind me of anything.
“You sure?” Isaac said, his gaze unrelenting. “You just seem a little off. We only get one shot with this. I can’t afford for us all not to be on our A-games.”
Well.Hecould afford it. He could afford whatever he wanted.
“I’m ready,” I said again.
He relented with a final nod and crossed the room to where Rosie was perched on a stool, down from her desk upstairs to watch. He wrapped his arms around her from behind, and she leaned into him, tilting her head to welcome his kiss. I looked away quickly, not wanting to be the weird guy who stared but also not needing the reminder of how happy they were.
I missed Olivia.
Or maybe I just craved the idea of having someone who was that comfortable in my arms, and Olivia was the last woman who’d made me think it was possible.
Shehadbeen comfortable in my arms. The entire night, it was like we just...fit. Our personalities, our sense of humor, and of course, the long length of her body pressed into my side as we looked at the stars. The heat of her kiss. Her featherlight touch sliding up my arms and across my chest.
“And, action,” Isaac called from across the room. I snapped my attention back to the studio and scrambled to get my camera in place. My camera.It wasn’t even turned on.I fumbled with the controls and swung into position.
But then I panicked. My memory card was full. How had I forgotten to put in the new card? I yanked the clean card out of my pocket, one eye still on the already-progressing sequence in front of me. There wasn’t time. I had seconds until I needed to start rolling and needed twice that to make the switch.
I closed my eyes and dropped my forehead onto my camera; I couldn’t even pretend to go through with filming. There was no point. Everyone would know in a matter of minutes I didn’t have the footage anyway.
Isaac shot me a glare hard enough to kill before he disappeared outside to watch how the last of the machine sequence progressed.
Victor,Random I’s chief video editor, approached warily, his hands pushed into his pockets. “What happened?”
I shook my head. “I didn’t get it. My memory card...I forgot to swap it out.”
“Damn.” Victor backed up a few steps. “That’s... Isaac is going to be so pissed.”
I sighed. “I know. He should be.”
“What the hell, man?” Isaac said as he barreled back into the studio. “What just happened?”
I dropped onto a stool behind my camera, noting that most everyone else had cleared out of the studio. “I’m sorry. I forgot to put in a new memory card. It was too late when I realized it was full. I didn’t have time to—”
“You had plenty of time,” Isaac said, cutting me off. “Iaskedyou if you were ready to go. Had you not even turned on your camera by then?”
I clenched my jaw. “I’m sorry.”
“Do you know how long it’s going to take to set everything up? To do this again?”
“Isaac, it was an accident,” Rosie said from somewhere behind him. I looked up and caught her gaze, and she gave me a sympathetic smile.
