Cut to the Chase (9 page)

“I’d be an architect,” Avalon said.

“Really?”

She nodded. “Building things, that’s what I’d like to do. Being able to create a structure that suits the people who want to live there, or plays to the arc of the sun and feels as if it was grown from the land it’s on, would be so satisfying. Homes say so much about a person and their life, or at least they should. Adobes in New Mexico and Craftsman homes in Pasadena make strong statements about how people want to live and what they want to be surrounded by. And I’d like to create places where they feel comfortable and happy.”

Avalon looked at her with a gaze so deep, all she could do was take it in and urge her breathing to slow down. In the following silence, Avalon turned to look out the window and appeared to be contemplating something.

“What are you thinking about?”

After a moment, Avalon said, “Finding land and designing my first project. One for me.”

“That sounds wonderful.”

“What about you? What would you do without a camera in your hands?”

She hadn’t expected Avalon to turn the tables. She was supposed to be conducting the interviews. “I don’t know. I mean, I guess if I could do anything I wanted…” She wasn’t sure if she should reveal any more.

“Come on, what would you be?”

Embarrassing as it was going to sound, she said it. “A live-weather journalist.”

“Like a tornado chaser?”

“Tornadoes, hurricanes, monsoons, yeah.”

“Truly?”

“Well, I know I’ll never do that, but it would be awesome.”

“But why wouldn’t you do that?”

She had to laugh at herself. “Because it’s not me. My life is fairly predictable and pretty habitual, which is the opposite of what it would have to be if I reported on the world’s insane climate.”

“That would be so cool to do that!”

She was struck by Avalon’s passionate interest in her dream. “Yeah,” she said, “but I never will. It’s a fantasy that I have for the simple reason that it would force me to be a little more impulsive.”

“Feh.” Avalon waved her hand in the air as if shooing a fly. “Impulsive is easy.”

“For you, maybe. It doesn’t come easily to me.”

“You just have to not think too much about what you’re about to do.”

“You mean, like the consequences?”

Avalon pursed her lips and Paige knew she was being scolded for being so stiff, which she was.

“Like the regret that hits you when you realize you could have done something exciting or spontaneous, and didn’t.”

“Yeah,” she said, shaking her head. “I’ll leave that to the fearless people.”

“You don’t think you’re—”

Someone knocked on Avalon’s door.

“Come in,” she called.

Tawnya poked her head in. “Gotta get you ready. Your call is in fifteen.” She walked in holding a satchel and dropped it on the counter. As if this routine was as familiar and automatic as walking over to the coffee condiment stand, Avalon relocated to the director’s chair in front of Tawnya.

“Now let’s see how we’re going to cover that cut and bruise of yours…”

When Paige stood and walked toward the door, Avalon said, “You don’t have to leave.”

“I need to download some images to the laptop in my car.” That wasn’t really true. She could do that anytime. She was just feeling a little foolish for revealing her crazy dream and needed to get away. “I’ll be back before you start shooting.”

Avalon watched the door close from its reflection in the mirror she was facing, ignoring the smirk on Tawnya’s face behind her.

“You don’t have to leave…?” Tawnya brushed out the ends of Avalon’s hair.

“She’s cute, huh?”

“Very much so.”

She fidgeted when Tawnya didn’t say any more. Something about Paige was refreshing, and she was miles above her ex in class and decorum. Jessica Wiley was a wild ride, all right, generating more press-covered stories than even she had. There had been instant sparks between them but no lasting fire. She knew that thought seemed silly, but it was like their relationship just materialized overnight. She was pushed onto a roller coaster that she hadn’t even asked to board.

Her nerves were always a bit on edge with Jessica, which surprised Avalon because she knew she had her own untamed and spontaneous streak. However, the pairing had seemed so contrived and taken for granted by not only Jessica, but her friends, the press, and just about everyone else.

Paige was a breath of crisp, clean mountain air in a town more noted for its belching car exhaust of a dating pool. The photographer had no pretenses and seemed so…normal.

Sure, Paige had been timid when they first met, a bit nervous even. That reaction wasn’t new to Avalon, who’d seen her share of faint-hearted fans and even more jumpy, excitable ones. But Paige seemed to be cut from a different cloth. There was something about her that, though she couldn’t quite pinpoint it, was definitely intriguing and worth discovering.

“And?” Tawnya interrupted her musings.

“What?”

“And…what about her, beyond her being cute?”

“I’m just saying that she’s cute, that’s all.”

“I know what that means.”

Avalon started to turn around to face her but Tawnya pulled her hair, forcing her back around with a wince. “Ouch. So what’s it supposed to mean?”

“Jessica will soon be but a distant, yet pissed-off, memory.”

“She’s already a memory. Who cares if Jessica’s got a stick up her ass? She has no right to my business anymore.”

Tawnya brushed the last few tendrils of hair and lightly sprayed them. “If I know anything about her, you’ll care.”

“Well, I don’t.”

“I’m not saying you should. She didn’t treat you well. I’m just telling you to be careful. She doesn’t take rejection too well.”

Avalon stood and assessed her image in the mirror. “In this town, who does?”

*

The one action scene they were filming that day involved a reshoot of yesterday’s fistfight. Paige positioned herself close to the same spot she’d been yesterday when Brent Hastings had hit Avalon.

“Ready for more?” Brent said to Paige.

“Yes, as long as more doesn’t mean actual contact.”

Brent grimaced. “I still feel so bad about that. She’s a trouper, but it had to have been painful.”

Avalon arrived as the director stepped from behind the camera.

“Same positions,” he said, and turned to Avalon. “Are you feeling up to doing this again?”

She raised her arm, wrapping it around Brent’s neck. As she pulled him down and locked him in a playful chokehold, she said, “Absolutely, but let’s try to get this right. I don’t want to injure my costar’s knuckles again.”

Laughter erupted from the crew, and the director moved back to stand next to the director of photography.

Paige lifted her camera to frame the shot and saw that Avalon was looking right at her. The smoldering smile weakened her knees so much she almost forgot what she was there to do.

The director called for action, and Avalon and Brent began their scene.

Paige’s camera clicked frames in rapid succession. She might be able to string together a series of shots of Avalon ducking from the incoming blow and then countering with an evil roundabout kick. It would be great to include in the book.

The director yelled “cut” and Paige lowered her camera. She was excited about the batch of pictures she’d just taken, but her heart raced about something else. Avalon looked her way again and winked. Her heart rate shifted into double time, leaving no doubt about what that something else was.

*

The wink came so naturally that Avalon was only aware after she did it. Paige grinned and Avalon liked the connection. But simple reactions like that, she thought as she made her way to her director’s chair off set, were the only responses she had gotten from her the night before. It wasn’t that she wanted to literally jump on Paige, really. She was just used to something happening. Some romance would have been great, but she had to admit she’d had a fantastic time simply hanging out and watching the movies.

She sat down and waved off Helen’s offer of a bottle of water.

Paige struck a melodic chord in her. If instant attraction existed, Avalon had experienced it, and she jerked a little as a thrill scampered up her spine.

She didn’t know much about Paige’s personal life. She’d talked about a breakup, but Avalon assumed that someone as amazing as Paige had to be dating again.

What would whoever she was dating be like? Would she be just like Paige—reserved, serious, and beautiful? Like she was using a pencil on paper, the picture of a gorgeous woman reclining on a sumptuous love seat sketched itself in her mind. Frowning, she imagined thick eraser lines blotting it out, and a new drawing emerged of an ugly, hunchbacked female gnashing her hideous teeth.

That was better.

“Avalon?”

She looked up to see the assistant director.

“They’re ready for your next scene.”

Maybe she wasn’t dating anyone in particular. On the lucky chance she wasn’t, would Paige accept a formal date?

As she made her way to the set, Tawnya fiddling with her hair as she walked, a sudden but strange wave of doubt overcame her. This was a new and strange feeling for her. It sat as uncomfortably as an unripe banana grumbling in the bottom of her stomach.

Maybe she wouldn’t.

"Come on,” Paige heard Avalon say when she’d come back from some discussions with the director.

It was the last shot of the day. Beyond the klieg lights that brightly illuminated the small area of street where the movie cars sat, the sun that had disappeared over the buildings on Hollywood Boulevard now cast an eerie darkness. The surreal daylight of the set made for ideal photographs in a business where Hollywood often altered time and space.

“Where?”

“Just come.”

Avalon led her to an Audi TTS. Crew members scurried about, adjusting lights and reflectors, measuring distances from the camera, and calling out orders and remarks.

“Mack, this is Paige. Paige, Mack, our best stunt man.”

She shook his hand, though she didn’t know why.

Mack reached into the backseat of the car and pulled out a helmet. “Here.”

She took it. “What’s this?”

“A brain bucket,” he said.

“But why am I holding it?”

“I’m not sure, since it should be on your head.”

Avalon took it from her. “You’re going to be on a ride with us.” She began to put the helmet on Paige’s head.

“What?”

“You wanted good shots, so you’re gonna get some from close up.”

“In this?” The car looked dangerous. As she allowed Avalon to help her into the helmet, she nervously sized up the car as if it had just challenged her to an after-school fight. Its polished red paint job covered what Paige thought must be a monster engine. “This looks fast.”

Mack nodded, almost indifferent. “265 horsepower, 258 pounds per foot of torque, an inline four-cylinder, spark-ignition engine, double overhead camshafts, and an S model turbocharger. It’s a canyon carver.”

“We’re driving through a canyon?” She knew she sounded ridiculous, but she was having trouble processing this.

“No, silly,” Avalon said. “He just means it rips.”

“I can get some great shots from the curb.”

Avalon pulled her aside, almost intimate in her manner. “Consider this a form of tornado chasing. Don’t think about it. Just go with it.”

She bit her lip to trap words that would beg them to let her back out. Mack positioned her in the backseat and belted her in. Avalon climbed into the driver’s seat, and Paige was glad she couldn’t see how scared she was.

While the camera crew adjusted the rigging of one camera on each side of the front windows—one to shoot directly at Avalon in the driver’s seat and one to shoot her forward point of view and the car she was to chase—she tried to ready her own camera through hands that shook so badly, she dropped her lens cap. Mack climbed in the backseat and sat beside her.

He must have read her look of horror as one of confusion because he said, “We’re not in the shot. And I’m here to help if Avalon gets into trouble.”

Her fight-or-flight response had already chosen the latter. “What kind of trouble?”

He shrugged. “If she swerves out of control or hits her head and gets knocked out.”

She knew her face hadn’t changed, but Mack must have finally noticed the meaning behind her true expression.

“Don’t worry. This car has roll bars built in. If we go over, just hang on and go for the ride.”

Was he serious? She still had time to back out. But before she could grab the door handle, Avalon turned around and said, “This’ll be a blast!”

She knew immediately that the smile she attempted looked more like she’d passed gas because Avalon laughed.

“You’ll be fine! I swear!”

“I’m not sure my pants will be.” She looked around for something to hang on to but realized she’d need both her hands for shooting. Marlene’s cruel words came back to her
. If you hadn’t been so fucking boring in bed, and out…

Well, fuck her. She clenched her jaw and decided to prove her ex wrong.

The director came over to talk to Avalon, and sooner than Paige wanted, she saw the director back away, yell for the cameras to roll, and Avalon hit the gas.

The car sped up rapidly and she was pushed against the backseat. Avalon followed the car in front of her, turn for turn, and Paige thought she was getting a bit too close.

She got some shots off, glad to have adjusted the shutter speed because she was bouncing around pretty well. She was just starting to feel a little more relaxed when the car in front slammed its brakes and Avalon followed suit. Her car spun three hundred and sixty degrees, the tires screeching in what sounded like angry pain. Page closed her eyes, waiting for impact.

The car came to a stop and the first thing she heard was the radio sitting in the front seat cackle. “Cut! That was great!”

“Whooo-hooo!” Avalon yelled. “Fucking awesome!”

“Zero to sixty in three point six seconds,” Mack said, as if he were sitting on a couch having coffee with friends instead of in a car that had just spun around faster than Michelle Kwan on Olympic ice.