HDU #2: Dirt (22 page)

Eventually,
Amanda had caved and called Ian just to have someone to stay sane with.
 
Lucky for her, he was the type to rise
at the crack of dawn these days.
 
Within twenty minutes of her call, he had arrived to keep her company,
under the impression that Amanda needed to vent about
Leadoff
.
 
That was what
she had told him anyway, wary over starting his day with some panicked
Casey-related story.
 
After all, it
could very well have been a random, well-timed text.

Though probably not.

Regardless,
Amanda did her best to talk to Ian about less stressful topics — less
stressful for him at least.

“Man.”
 
Ian took a swig of his coconut water as
they both sat behind the safety of the giant Boar’s Head poster in the bagel
store window.
 
“Those writers all
sound like a bunch of assholes.”

Amanda nodded as
she tore off a piece of her sesame seed bagel.
 
“And the biggest asshole of them all is Liam’s best
friend.
 
Which is just awesome.”

“Why don’t you
just tell Liam that Connor’s being a dick to you?”

Amanda frowned
as she chewed.
 
“He hasn’t done
anything blatant enough thus far.
 
And I don’t want to give Liam another reason to worry about me.
 
He has enough to worry about himself
considering Terrence Rambis is out to get him killed for the glory of his
movie, basically.”

Ian pushed his
salad around with his plastic fork.
 
He shook his head.
 
“Crazy
what people will do to promote their movies,” he mumbled.
 
His gaze lifted up at the billboard
across the street.
 
“Or
shows.”
 
Amanda studied Ian as he
eyed the
Legacy
billboard.
 
Just minutes ago, it had still been
blown out by the light of the rising sun.
 
Now, with the sunlight blocked behind a building, the picture of the
strung out stars was perfectly visible before them.
 
Amanda winced at herself.
 
Probably shouldn’t
have picked this place to sit
, she realized.
 
She peered over at Ian, as he shook his shaggy hair into his
eyes.

“Ian.”
 
Amanda chewed the side of her
nail.
 
“Are… you actually okay
these days?”

The question
prompted him to give her a brief look of surprise.
 
“I’m as okay as I can get, which isn’t bad.”

“I’m sorry I
reminded you about Casey.”

Ian
laughed.
 
“Dude, I’m the one who’s
sorry.
 
She should’ve outed me
along with you and Liam.
 
Harper’s
been trying to help me past my guilt these past few weeks.
 
I feel like I got away scott-free.”

Amanda gave him
an incredulous look.
 
“I wouldn’t
say that.
 
She’s screwed us both
equally at this point,” she grumbled, realizing how much of the bad in her life
was thanks solely to Casey — her wavering reputation, her separation from
Liam, the possible cancellation of
Leadoff
,
the prospect of soon being jobless and unhireable.
 
She couldn’t help the odd look she flashed Ian when he
shrugged.

“Everything
happens for a reason.”

Amanda felt her
face contort.
 
“Ian.
 
What good has possibly come out of
either of our situations with Casey?”

“I met Harper.”

She blinked, a
little stunned.
 
“Harper is worth
all the mess you got into in the past six months?”

“I wish none of
it happened because it was the worst, most embarrassing time of my life,” Ian
replied.
 
“But the good thing about
getting to your lowest point is knowing that you won’t get worse than
this.
 
And then you think about all
the bad shit you did and you realize who you really are.
 
And who really cares about you because
they’re still around after the mess you’ve made.”

“And in Harper’s
case, she showed up
because
of the
mess you made,” Amanda laughed quietly.
 
“Which says a lot about her, I guess.”

“Yep.”

Amanda wiggled
her pursed lips.
 
“Well, hopefully,
this is the worst, most embarrassing point in my life right now because I can’t
imagine a situation more humiliating than the world reading my old Internet
comments while waiting for me to get forced back to living in Merit.
 
Or anything more shitty than being so
far from Liam all the time.”
 
Amanda flicked a sesame seed off the table.
 
“I didn’t think I’d miss him this much this fast.”

Ian
smirked.
 
“You’ve underestimated
how much you’ve liked him from day one.”
 
He paused.
 
“Which is funny
‘cause I think
he
knew how much he
liked you from the start.”

Amanda turned to
Ian with a roll of the eyes.
 
“Really.
 
And why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because it was
funny watching you get flustered over him and act all pissy and internally
confused over your feelings.”

“Wow.”

Ian burst out
laughing.
 
Amanda couldn’t help but
follow suit.
 
“So have you guys
said the big ‘L’ word yet?” His green eyes actually glittered when Amanda
answered with a sheepish grin.
 
“Man, what does it sound like when Liam Brody says ‘I love you?’ I’m a
straight man and even I wonder.”

“It sounds
angry, actually.”

“That seems
about right.
 
‘Rawr, you make me
feel things.
 
Liam mad.’”

Amanda snorted,
her giggle winding down into a sigh as she recalled the day of their “I love you’s
and the less-than-ideal circumstances they had come under.
 
Somehow, she didn’t mind those
circumstances — she just minded the fact that she’d had no chance to say
or hear the words since.
 
Sensing
Ian’s eyes on her suddenly gloomy face, Amanda tried to laugh it off.
 
“Blah.
 
Whatever.”

“Don’t ‘blah
whatever.’
 
I can tell you miss
him.
 
A lot.”

“Yes.”

Ian lifted his
gaze again to stare at the
Legacy
billboard.
 
“I’m sorry.”
 
They were quiet for a moment.
 
“So…” He squinted, chewing his lip.
 
“The other day at your apartment when
you said you weren’t looking to get back at Casey… did you mean that?”

Amanda looked at
him.
 
“Nope.”
 
She smiled when he laughed.
 
“But I honestly don’t know how to get
back at her right now.
 
At first I
thought I’d be amazing at my job at
Leadoff
and contribute all this writing and somehow get
Legacy
canceled.
 
But
that was a shitty plan to begin with and now it looks like
Leadoff
is going to be the one getting canceled because Casey’s
just so edgy and raunchy and interesting that we’re paling in comparison.”

Ian shook his
head as he stared out the window.
 
“I know Harper wouldn’t want me to and I’ve told her I won’t but
especially now… I’m pretty sure I want to get her back as badly as you do.”

Amanda cocked an
eyebrow.
 
“I thought you were all Zen
and peaceful now.”
 
She laughed
when Ian smirked at her.

“I am.
 
But I also want Casey Mulreed’s career
to go down and burn in flames,” he said, batting his long eyelashes with mock
innocence.
 
“I’m in a pretty good
place now.
 
But there are just some
things that rehab doesn’t change.”

Amanda felt her
lips spreading into a slow smile.
 
Somehow, it felt incredibly good to know that Ian was actually on the
same vengeful page as her.
 
“It
sounds horrible for me to say but I’m really glad to hear that.”

Ian grinned as
he held out his fist.
 
“So… are we
partners in crime? Amanda and Ian Take Hollywood Part Deux?”

Amanda laughed
as she bumped his fist.
 
“Looks
like it.”

“Our last little
scheme
did
work to a tee,” he pointed
out with a sheepish smile.
 
“We’re
just an even better team this time because… well, I’m sober.”
 
He shrugged.
 
“And I guess we’ll just hide this from our significant
others, since you don’t need to give Liam any more to worry about.”

True
.
 
“Yes, we’ll hide it from them.
 
What they don’t know won’t hurt them — I don’t think
it will, at least.”
 
Amanda’s
shoulders slumped for a bit.
 
“If
they find out, I guess we’ll just stop.”

Ian
snorted.
 
“And people wonder why
celebrity relationships are always on the rocks.”
 
He shook his shaggy head.
 
“Loving someone is such a weakness in this town.
 
You have to worry about them when all
you want to do is destroy and conquer.”

Amanda frowned
at his familiar words, though only because she was fairly certain they were
true.
 
“Well.
 
That’s why we’re keeping it a secret.”

“Yep.
 
Now all we gotta do is figure out what
the hell Casey Mulreed’s weakness is.”

“If she has
one.
 
She sure as hell hasn’t shown
even the smallest hint of one throughout her career yet.”
 
Amanda’s lip curled but Ian only nodded
calmly.

“Throughout her
career,” he repeated.

She narrowed her
eyes at him.
 
“Huh?”

“She hasn’t
shown any weaknesses throughout her career but what about before her career?
Everybody has a past that we don’t know about.
 
Maybe Casey has some skeletons in the closet,” Ian said, his
lips curving into a grin as he watched Amanda’s eyebrows slowly lift.
 
“See, you catch my drift.
 
All we need to do now is dig up some
good dirt.”

~

Eyes dull but
unblinking, Amanda watched the boys club in front of her literally toss ideas
around, suggesting plot changes for the season finale of
Leadoff
while throwing a baseball to one another.
 
It came as no surprise to her that she
had yet to be tossed the ball to catch.
 
It also came as no surprise to her that the guys in the writers’ room
immediately took to Connor, the screenwriter who had decided to grace them with
his presence.
 
Leaning back in his
chair, he looked utterly relaxed on his first official day on the job.

“So, Milo’s a
small town kid who left unsupportive family at home to pursue his dream of
playing baseball.
 
Ends up going
undrafted but gets miraculously signed by the Yankees when both their ace
pitcher and his backup go down with injuries,” he summarized.
 
“Now he’s on top of the world, New York
loves him — he has endorsements, restaurants, nightclub managers,
beautiful women chasing him down to offer him whatever they’ve got.
 
He’s on top of the world and his fame
is skyrocketing… and we’re trying to figure out a way to make this
more
interesting and dramatic? This
is
drama.
 
Gentlemen, I don’t know what’s wrong with the world but you
shouldn’t have to change a thing in this script.”

“Right?” The
writers echoed his sentiments as Amanda did her best not to roll her eyes.
 
Unfortunately, they went ahead and
rolled anyway.
 
Across the table,
Connor looked her way.
 
Catching
her expression, he shot a hard look that she returned, unfazed.

Something about
her talk with Ian before work had energized and reinvigorated her.
 
Revenge on Casey was once again her top
priority and with
Leadoff
still one
of her main routes towards taking her down, she had to focus on saving the show
more than ever now.
 
And that
required confidence and confidence meant staring Connor Schaffer down if she
had to.
 
She raised an eyebrow when
he smirked at her before looking away.

“I’m curious to
know what Amanda thinks,” he said, catching a toss from Bird before lobbing the
ball across the table to Fish.

“That one you’re
alone on, buddy,” Fish laughed.
 
“Unless you’re just looking for a laugh.”

Jesus
.
 
Amanda shot a glare.
 
Tom opened his mouth only to close it, tired.

“You could say
that,” Connor snorted.

“Gentlemen,” Tom
finally said, eyeing Fish before looking up earnestly at Amanda.
 
“Amanda,
do
you have any ideas? You haven’t spoken much today.”

It was a kind
assessment — she hadn’t spoken at all yet.
 
She had been too busy either rehashing her conversation with
Ian from the early morning or counting how many times each writer had been
thrown the baseball without it once coming to her.
 
Everyone had caught and thrown the thing at least four or
five times now.
 
Except for
her.
 
They were going out of their
way to avoid her.
 
Amanda gnashed
her teeth with annoyance as she thought about Tom’s question for a few silent
seconds before letting her lips blurt out the first thought that came to mind.