Page 24 of The Producer: Aaron

“I hit on him!” I cringe when the image of how I clung to his tie comes to my mind.

I grab my phone from the bag on the floor and I notice three things: I’m utterly late for work, there’s a message from the production assistant telling me to get well soon, and I have a credit card balance of one thousand two hundred dollars on the card I left at the venue.

“Shit! Shit! Shit!” I open the door wide and run down the stairs to the kitchen to put something in my stomach before taking a shower.

I’ve never been late for work, not a single time. I have always been on time and professional, even on those days when cycle cramps make me almost bend in two from the pain. I arrive at the kitchen and stop on the spot when I see Aaron leaning against the marble counter, sipping coffee. It’s ten in the morning. He should have been at the studio hours ago. Instead, he looks at me sternly, dressed in a pair of Chinos and a white shirt. He is even barefoot.

“I called the producer of your show this morning and said that last night at dinner, we ate something that gave us food poisoning. Shooting will resume tomorrow,” he announces with such seriousness that it seems almost a funeral announcement.

“Thank you… I…” The words die in my throat because what can you say to your boss who just lied to the whole production team to cover your mistake?

He approaches, gives me a cup of steaming coffee, and studies me for a long moment.

“I have no idea why you insist on going out with that girl, but this is the first and last time I do something like this to save your ass. At the next bullshit, you’re fired.” His tone is so low that it vibrates in my bowels. He’s not joking.

“She’s the only friend I have… she’s the only one who doesn’t try to stab me in the back,” I whisper, more to myself than to him.

Aaron stops, looks at me for a few moments, then barely shakes his head.

“Are you sure about that? Because I discovered from herInstagram stories you were drunk in that club. If you consider her your only friend, I’m sorry to give you the news so brutally, but you’re alone under the hot Hollywood sun,” he says before leaving and locking himself in his office.

I sit at the kitchen counter, look at my phone, and at the one thousand two hundred dollar charge from the Mystique. I had time to drink only one cocktail. How did they spend one thousand two hundred dollars in one night?

Aaron’s words dig a hole in me I can’t fill. Still, the thing that most devastates me about this whole story is seeing the disappointed expression on the face of the only man who, despite everything, continues to give me second chances.

Karthik, the head of the accounting department of the streaming division, has been rattling off numbers and budgets for hours at our monthly meeting. Usually, I would ask about every single number, every budget overrun, and every penny lost or earned. It’s my job, I want to be aware of how my company is doing, and I want to know if we are in deep trouble so that we can make any drastic decisions in time before sinking.

This is not the case today. The whole week was unlike any other because the image of Dakota in that club, with a top and a skirt that left nothing to the imagination, occupies my mind twenty-four hours a day. The way she touched my lips, how she stuck her thin fingers through my hair, how she approached sensually, and how her nose touched my skin, fueled my erection until it was about to explode. I’ve never had so much trouble holding back in front of a woman in public.

The only thing that stopped me was the fact that she was drunk. When I sleep with a woman, I want her uninhibited, consenting, and above all, completely controlling her mind and memories. But if she had been sober, I would have dragged her into one of the small closets and fucked her until she shouted my name loud enough to hear it over the deafening music of that place. To hell with her age, to hell with the fact that I am her boss and in a position of power. I would have blown up my entire career just to sink between her thighs and enjoy an orgasm that would have given relief to the solid rock erection inside my pants.

She was excited, attracted to me, and entirely out of control.The thought alone makes me so confused that I don’t even know where to start convincing myself that thinking about her is a bad idea. I always thought she found me vaguely interesting but not the forbidden fruit in which to sink her teeth and damn her soul. I’m old. She’s always considered me old. Pleasant to the eye, perhaps, but still ancient in comparison to her.

I am the living cliché of the thirty-six-year-old infatuated with the twenty-three-year-old. I’ve always thought that old men alongside girls in their mid-twenties were ridiculous, and here I am pumping my ego because a young woman made a move on me.

“Aaron,” Karthik’s firm voice makes me look at him.

“Pardon, what were you saying?” I ask, trying to get my wits together when he caught me daydreaming about a woman I can’t have.

“Your phone has been ringing for several minutes,” he tells me, embarrassed.

I realize only at this moment that the phone in front of me is lit with a notification that I hope never to see in my life.

“Holy shit.”

“Problems?” he asks, raising a perplexed eyebrow.

“It’s the fire alarm in my house.”

The news makes him scramble for his phone.

“I’ll call nine-one-one.”

I wrinkle my forehead as I scroll through the alarm system app and realize it’s just the kitchen.

“No, don’t worry. Surely someone from the security company went to check. Possibly they have already called for help.”

What puzzles me is that it’s just that room. If it were a fullhouse fire, the security system would have isolated the upstairs rooms that contain the most expensive artwork. And then I am reminded of the message from my driver who drove Dakota home an hour ago, and anger rises from my stomach. She’s probably smoking in my house with that friend of hers that I can’t stand. Maybe weed, given her predilection for illicit substances.

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