Page 51 of The Actor: Harrison

I chuckle. “Okay, just this once. Only because it’s already been a hard day and I don’t want to fight you on that.”

I regret the words spilling out of my mouth when he frowns, ruining the light atmosphere we had until a few seconds ago.

“What happened?” he asks.

“I don’t want to bother you. Just work stuff.” I try to escape his inquisition but it’s hard to get away with a work-related argument when you actually work together.

“Iwantto know. We’re in a relationship and if we don’t talk about this stuff, what do we do? I mean, sex is great, but we aren’t going anywhere if we don’t talk,” he points out, not noticing my stunned face.

Arewe in a relationship? And are wegoingsomewhere with that?

I take a deep breath and try not to focus on the implication of his speech and bring my mind to the actual point of the conversation.

“We need to reshoot a few scenes and we’re already out of budget. I dread the moment I have to ask Kevin for more funds.” I feel my chest deflate with my confession.

I feel ashamed. Working with tight budgets made me an expert in containing costs, but it’s clear that when I have a bigger project, I need to learn a lot. It’s kind of a personal defeat.

He seems to struggle with what to say. He frowns, fidgets with the glass of wine, then takes a deep breath and exhales slowly. I’ve never seen Harrison so restrained in saying something. He’s always pretty vocal about his suggestions.

“Spit it out!” I finally say, sipping my water.

“I can give you the money. You don’t need to beg Kevin to find it,” he finally blurts out.

“Absolutely not,” I say firmly.

The defeat expanding in my chest is overwhelming. I don’t want his money. I don’t want him to save me from my misery. I’m perfectly capable of doing my job without a man rescuing me, throwing money at me and taking all the credit.

“I knew you would say that, but can you at least listen to me?” he pleads. So this is why he was fidgeting. He already knew I was going to refuse his offer. So why do it in the first place?

“Why should I listen? I won’t accept your money, why bother to explain?” I can feel my anger boiling inside me.

“You’re stubborn, you know that? Why don’t you want to accept my help? Why Kevin and not me? It seems like you have a lot of preconceptions about me and you don’t want me to step out of the box you put me in.” He sounds almost hurt and I feel guilty about it.

“I apologized for that. Either forgive me or not, but don’t bring it up every time you see fit,” I spit and it sounds mean even to my own ears.

He scoffs. “Wow. Talk about low blows.”

“I’m sorry,” I mutter.

“Yeah, sure, but this doesn’t change that you’re not letting me help you. You won’t even let me talk about it.”

“Do you know how that would look?” I raise my voice and immediately regret it. Fortunately, the tables are quite far apart and the background music helped to cover my outburst.

Harrison doesn’t seem to care about other people eavesdropping on our conversation. He seems more focused on trying to understand what I’m talking about.

“I’ll look like a woman who got her big chance because she slept with the Hollywood star,” I explain.

“Why would they say that? They don’t need to know who put up the money,” he says, sounding offended.

“How do you plan to keep it secret? This is Hollywood, Harrison, they’ll dig up every bit of dirt for everyone to see and judge.” I exhale, defeated.

“I really don’t see a problem with being one of the investors in this movie. I think it’s a damn good project, I believe in it, it’s normal for people in this industry to invest in their own movies. I think you just have a problem with me and I don’t know why.” He sips at his wine, lowering his gaze and cutting this conversation short.

I don’t answer because, in part, he’s right. I have a problem with him and his money. I can’t play this game and feel like we’re equal. He’ll always have that advantage over me and the fact that I can’t contribute in the same way makes me feel like I’m a leech sucking at his money. He’s comfortable with sharing it, but I’mnotcomfortable with taking it.

And then there’s the fact that I trusted a man once to help me out in this industry and that backfired big time. I know Harrison is not my ex, but it’s hard to put my future in another man’s hands and hope this time it will turn out right.

I’m not so lucky when I mix my work and my personal life.

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