Page 21 of Happily Ever Laughter

My wide grin seems to amuse her. “Yeah, I loved that sneak peek you sent, gorgeous. Let’s see the whole thing.”

She pulls her laptop out of her knapsack and opens it to show me an odd, almost jungle landscape texture. Blinking hard, I realize it’s just houseplants.

“Don’t laugh, but they’re almost like my pets,” Tanis whispers.

“They’re wonderful,” I say, leaning closer to examine the movement. “You used a fan?”

“Two of them, actually. A steady fan from the left, and light bursts of another one from the front, so that the movement was a little more random.”

As I chuckle, nodding excitedly, she seems confused. “You’re a natural at this,” I say, kissing the top of her head. “Creative, innovative, and willing to do anything to get the job done on time.” Sweeping hair to the side, I plant a dramatic kiss on the side of her throat. “You’re made for this, sweetheart. I’m going to see to it that you get a lot more work.”

Her cheeks stain a faint pink. “Thank you.”

“Let’s get down to the nitty gritty,” I say, stretching out my hands to crack my knuckles. “Matching nine video clips to nine sound clips, while making them hilarious, weird, and artsy. Or at least two out of three.”

Tanis rips a sheet of paper from her notebook and sets it on the desk with a flourish. “Here you go. Fifteen of my best, funniest clips, labeled by style and content so that we can refer to them easily.”

The words, ‘I love you,’ hover on the tip of my tongue. Every single aspect of her existence thrills me to the core, and her work ethic is pushing me straight to the edge

. But this is not the right time. I couldn’t possibly take a chance of freaking her out by admitting my feelings far too soon.

“I love how prepared you are.” It’s a poor substitute but it will have to do for now.

Pulling a chair and laptop up beside her, I call up the sound clips, as we make a game of putting video and music together.

We work so easily together that it illustrates the point we’re a match made in heaven.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

~ Tanis ~

A few hours later, Felix already has all of the clips synced to the music except two.

Watching him work is absolutely awe inspiring, and he’s actually teaching me quite a bit about the analytical side of the creative process.

Whenever I was craving anything artistic, it was purely for my own visual pleasure, or to make a statement about something.

Felix is clearly creating music that he enjoys, but he’s doing it specifically for a client’s project. He has to filter what he wants to create through what he knows the client is looking for.

It’s got to be a tricky balance at some points, being creative to order, and it’s absolutely fascinating for me to watch him fall in and out of his wordless creative head space.

He completely zones out for a minute, mixing and editing the sound file. I swear he wouldn’t hear me if I were to yell, ‘Fire!’

Then he takes a slow breath and turns back to me with a huge smile as if he hadn’t been in a completely different headspace for the past five minutes.

In some strange way, I really like that he’s already comfortable enough with me to be himself. He isn’t trying to impress me. Of course, his work is so inspirational that he is impressing me anyway.

“All right, gorgeous. All we need you to do now is stand in front of the mic and say your lines.”

Looking down, I can see that my fingers are already twitching.

As I stand up, Felix jumps up to hug me. “Relax. Seriously – we can do as many takes as you want. This is not a big deal.”

He stands me in the corner, adjusting the microphone to my height, and making sure my lips are the proper distance from the pop screen.

“You don’t have to be yourself here,” he says reassuringly, tapping some keys on his laptop. “Say it completely seriously, then wait for a few seconds, then say it in a completely different way. Whatever comes to mind. It doesn’t even matter.”

I love his energy. His enthusiasm for the smallest things. And how he automatically has complete confidence that I’m going to give him exactly what he needs.

---