A Little Less than Famous (23 page)

“I’m just a little concerned about how much time you’re spending with Jake,” Luke said, slowly.

I raised my eyebrow at him. “I’m not really spending any more time with him than I have with any other guy I’ve dated.”

“Yes, but not everyone you’ve dated has been a huge TV star,” Luke pointed out.

“Fair point,” I conceded. “The relationship isn’t really serious though, Luke, you know? Its me.”

Luke shook his head at the one. “It’s not really the relationship that concerns me, McKinley. I like Jake. You deserve to be in a happy and healthy relationship.”

I made a face at that.

“That’s a conversation for another time though,” Luke said, before I could interject. “I’m more concerned about the influence of Jake’s lifestyle on your life.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, slowly.

“Look, McKinley, as long as you’re safe and healthy and happy, then I’m happy. And if you want to act, then I’m okay with that.”

“I sense a ‘but’ in there somewhere,” I said.

Luke hesitated. “I just don’t want it go to your head, McKinley. You’re a good girl and you have a good group of family and friends. I don’t want you to forget where you came from.”

“How could I…”

“Wait, let me finish,” Luke said, holding his hand up to stop me.
“You’re getting this amazing part on Jake’s show and going to premieres and it’s just a lot for your old dad to take in. It’s hard to connect that world and you together. And yet, it fits you so well. I’m just worried that you’re going to let it get to your head.”

“I’m not,” I said, automatically. Luke raised his eyebrow at me. “I swear, I’m not.”

“McKinley, you’re all over the internet this morning. That dress was really something.” I felt my face blush at the thought of my extremely revealing dress. Sometimes I forgot that even though I was an adult and could do whatever I wished, I still very much wanted my dad’s approval. “And I know you, you thrive on attention. It’s not a bad thing.”

“No,” I said. “But it is true. And I’m having fun right now, Luke. This part is really crazy amazing and all but I’m not getting my head too wrapped up in this.”

“I really hope not,” he said, sitting up. “I’m so happy and proud of you but I don’t want to see you get knocked on your ass if it doesn’t work out for you. I’m not saying it won’t, but just don’t get too hung up on it okay?”

I nodded. “I promise, I won’t. Definitely not. My goal in life is not to be an actress.”

“Okay. I mean, it’s okay if it is,” Luke said. “But if its not…just make sure that you’re focusing on other things. I know you haven’t been going to any of your classes in months.”

I bit my lip, nervously, knowing that he was right. I had kept up with the schoolwork for a while until I had just stopped going in favor of going with Jake down to the set. “I know, you’re right.”

“I’m not mad; I know school has never really been on the forefront of your mind,” Luke said. “I just want to make sure you have goals and plans for your future. You’re twenty-five, you’re only getting more and more grown up.”

“I’m still not sure,” I said honestly. “I go to school but I’m unsure of what I want to do. And I like being on set and I like the idea of acting. I’m just still trying to figure stuff out.”

Luke nodded, covering his face with a yawn. He looked like he could use a cup of coffee. “And that’s fine. It’s only been a couple months since we last talked about that. I just want to make sure that no matter what happens, you don’t let it get to your head and that you stay humble.”

“I promise I will do my very best to stay humble,” I said.

“Good. That’s all I needed,” he said.

I stood up. “Great. I’m going to go open the diner now. Chris is going to think I left all the work to him.”

“Oh, hey, McKinley?”

“Yeah?” I asked, looking at him over my shoulder as I started to go down the stairs.

“You know, I really Jake. He’s a good guy. I’d keep a hold of this one,” he said, nonchalantly, picking up the newspaper that sat on the coffee table in front of him.

I felt my stomach clench at the words but rolled my eyes. “Yeah, no, Luke, we are definitely not going there.”

Chapter Nine

“You know, you look surprisingly not tired this morning, McKinley,” Wendy remarked, running a brush through my hair.

“I have to wake up way earlier than this to get ready to open the diner,” I told her, taking a huge sip of my coffee.

“Are you nervous?” she asked, taking a sip of her own coffee and barely concealing a yawn.

“Of course not,” I said, immediately. Wendy raised her eyebrow at my reflection in the mirror. “Yes, I am. I’ve never acted before. Ever.”

“You’re going to do just fine,” Wendy said, reassuring me. “You’ve been studying the script like crazy, you’ve been rehearsing with Jake, which is good since he is the actual counterpart to this part and Josh is a really laidback director.”

“Right,” I said, taking a deep breath and trying to ignore the shaky feeling that had been creeping its way through my body ever since I had woken up that morning. “I can totally do this.”

Call time was at eight a.m. so after going through hair and make-up with Wendy and then heading down to the wardrobe trailer with Jake to get changed, we both headed down to the set. It couldn’t have been just my imagination, but I felt that people were staring at me as soon as I we walked into the room; that people were aware of how close we were standing together and were aware that I felt like I was going to throw up.

“All right, guys, you ready?” Josh said, striding up, clapping his hands together and looking excited. “Nervous, McKinley?”

“Why does everyone keep asking me that?
I’m not,” I said, sounding very,
very grumpy. I immediately blushed. “I mean, I’m sorry. No, I’m not nervous.”

“She’s such a liar,” Jake said, laughing, “but that was pretty good.” I shot a glare his way, which he didn’t even seem to register. This guy was getting way too used to the way I acted and operated and I did not feel comfortable with it.

Josh laughed along with him. “Well, there’s plenty of time to get calm; we’re filming scene six first with Charlotte’s brother and then we’ll do scene eleven with you, McKinley?”

“Six and then eleven?” I asked, shaking my head, confused. “That doesn’t seem to make sense.”

“Well, when you film a show
, or a movie, you don’t film
it in sequence.
It’s too
time consuming and way too expensive. So you film a certain amount of scenes; say all the scenes that take place in a certain location so that way you don’t have to keep coming back,” Josh explained to me, walking with us over to the set.

Scene six, from what I could remember was between Jake, Cam and my character’s brother, David, in the jail cell where David is being held on suspicion of being a companion to a young girl’s murder. I was the concerned sister, taking care of an immature older brother who always managed to get himself into bad situations
simply because he didn’t think and yeah, got involved with minor recreational drugs.
Mikey Jr., played by Jake, was trying to get Charlotte to help him get David a lower sentence by convincing him to
testify. Charlotte is obviously
refusing, until Mikey gains her trust…and her affections too. I was pretty sure that I could handle this part; no, I
knew
I could handle this part.

After I had watched Jake, Cam and Alex
Morrow
, the guy playing David, finish their scene, we watched as the crew came out of nowhere and, after a little bit of switching and things, the jail cell set became the interrogation room. I hopped off my chair and crossed the room. There were a couple make-up artists there, ready at hand to freshen anything up. I looked to Josh for direction, trying not to feel like I was the biggest newbie in the world.

“Okay, so McKinley, you’re already seated and Jake is going to come into the room. Then the scene will start f
rom there okay? We’ll run through it once, see how you guys manage and go from there.”

I nodded, not daring to open my mouth to speak. I was afraid if I did, my breakfast would suddenly be all over the shiny metal interrogation table and then we’d have a
much
bigger problem on our hands. I slid into the chair, crossing my arms across my chest.

Jake smiled encouragingly at me before walking through the door he was going to be coming through in just a moment. I tried to ignore the attraction I felt as I walked away and how good his butt looked in his police uniform and tried to focus on the lines.

“Okay, on my count, in five, four, three…” he mouthed the last two and pointed. Jake came bursting into the room, looking angry. I felt a small bit of happiness; he looked so different than the original pleading look he had had before.

“So Charlotte Meyers
, I presume?” Jake asked, sitting down in the chair in front of me.

I felt my brain go blank, for a quick moment, and then the line came out as if my voice had a mind of its own. “And here I thought you knew everything around here, Detective,” I said, smirking, amusement coloring my voice.

A look of impatience crossed over Jake’s face. “Of course, I do. Which is why I know that you aren’t cooperating with Chief Matlock.”

“I didn’t realize that the chief needed his son to come in and do his dirty work.”

“Ms. Meyers
…”

“Charlotte,” I cut him off. “I’d rather be called Charlotte.”

The corners of Jake’s mouth turned up a bit. “I actually heard you like to be called Charlie.”

“No,” I said, sharply. “No. Charlotte is fine, Detective.” I spat out the word detective.

“Look, Charlotte, I’m not going to put up with this shit, okay? I’m trying to do your brother a favor here, but I need your help.”

“And I’ve told you guys already, I have nothing to say.”

Jake’s hand came slamming down on the table. If I hadn’t already known it was coming, I would have jumped. Instead I just looked from his fist to his face, slightly amused but mostly looking bored. “Charlotte, you need to tell me, you do understand that, don’t you?”

I stared at him. And then continued to stare at him. I couldn’t remember my line. I had practice
d
this scene a million times and I just couldn’t remember my line. I turned and looked over at Josh. “Oh my god, I’m
so
sorry, I couldn’t remember my line.”

“Cut!” Josh said. He came over to me and I was actually genuinely nervous that he would be incredibly pissed at me and that he would call up Isabelle Monroe, diva or not. “We’ll take it again. You did a great job, McKinley. Try not to be too pissed off. Charlotte is protective but she’s also scared at the same time, which is what is causing her to lash out at Mikey. Remembe
r, she’s going to fall for him. We need to see more of that hesitation.”

I nodded, taking a deep breath, hoping it would help to get rid of the huge lump in my throat.

“Now, lets start from ‘Charlotte, you need to tell me…” He walked back over to one of the main cameras. One thing I had always found pretty awesome about Josh was that he never sat in his actual chair; he was always standing, walking about, watching every angle of the shot to make sure that it was perfect. He counted down the scene and we started once more.

“Charlotte, you need to tell me, you do understand that, don’t you?” Jake said, his hand slamming on the table again.