Page 2 of Act Like You Don't Care
“You know you have a native guide if you ever do,” I promised, and that was it. I was done, officially finished at the Tate Agency.
I walked out the doors into the cool damp of late winter New York, squared my shoulders against the wind coming in off the water, then headed for the subway and my apartment to sever the last of my ties to the East Coast.
Tam
“And, cut!”
I handed my fake gun back to the props guy and replaced it with a cup of coffee offered by one of the omnipresent assistants on set. Since it was still chilly today despite the sun, I took the cup gratefully, then headed over to hear what the director had to say. This had been take three. I hoped there wouldn’t be a take four.
Grady, my co-star, met me on the way. “We’re going again.”
“You’re kidding?” I checked my watch and mentally calculated how far behind we were going to end up. “What was wrong?”
“My fault. He wants to see my face as we go down the alley. We’ll get it this time.”
“Man, I hope so.” But this was the life. The unglamorous side of the film business.
I hid behind the cameras and chatted with Pete, our director, while special effects reset the alley I was going to chase Grady through.
"We good?" Pete asked the effects coordinator over the radio.
"We're set," he replied, and we watched as the technicians dashed out of range of the cameras. Props came back with our guns and make-up ran through to tidy us up and check for continuity. My coffee, only half-drunk, disappeared somewhere in the middle of the scrum.
"All right, places," Pete yelled.
We all scurried to our marks to be ready when we were given the signal to go.
"Try not to trip over that box this time," I joked to Grady. Our first take was probably going to make the gag reel due to a misplaced box that had taken Grady down before I could even get a single shot off.
"Make sure you're shooting at me, not somewhere in my general direction this time," Grady joked back and we laughed. He was a good co-star—I’d definitely worked with worse. But Grady was a hard worker, with the bonus of a solid fanbase and those brooding, threatening good looks that might have made my omega self go a little weak in the knees if I didn't have to work with his prankster tendencies.
"Ready?" Pete yelled in our direction.
"Ready," Grady shouted back and pulled out his gun.
"Ready," I said and pulled mine out as well.
Someone clapped the scene marker in front of the camera, yelling "Kentucky Boys, Scene Thirty-Two, Take four!"
"And, action," Pete yelled.
Grady put his head down and barreled past Camera One into the alley. I saw him lift his head so Camera Two could get a good shot of him before he spun to ‘shoot’ at me, then he flashed past it and jogged to a halt at the end of the alley.
As soon as Grady was past Camera Two, I got my cue and took off after the man who had destroyed my fictional family’s livelihood and left my brother in a coma in the hospital. My mark came up and I skidded to a stop, taking aim down the alley and letting off a couple of shots before I started running again, my teeth gritted with the effort.
Five minutes later, we gathered behind the monitors to see if what we'd just done would pass the acid test of Pete's keen directorial eye.
Pete frowned as the recording played and I held back a sigh of resignation—that frown looked like we were going to have to do this again. I glanced over at Grady, but he was ignoring the screens to talk to the guy running Camera One.
"Okay, I think that will do." Pete's words startled me, but it was a happy startle. I was starving, and we still had two more scenes today that I had to be around for. And then Pete absolutely made my day. "I think we’ll break for lunch while the guys set up for the next scene." He turned in his chair and clapped me on the shoulder. "You did fantastic. I really thought you wanted to kill Grady for a moment there."
Grady grinned. "He did. I insulted his shooting."
The crew snorted with laughter and I made a gun of my finger and thumb and mimed popping one-off in Grady's direction before announcing, "Food! Point me at the food!"
On my way over to catering, shouting coming from one of the side ‘streets’ of the lot caught my attention. I was going to ignore it at first, then I remembered this promotional thing they’d done for Pete’s last movie. Winners got to spend a day on set during the filming of Kentucky Boys. I waved as I passed the little group, kept in tight formation by the security that had been hired to escort them around, and strolled over to say hi.
"Oh my God, Tam," one of the young women said, bouncing like an excited child. "I've seen all your movies, I think you're incredible!" She held out a notepad, which I happily signed for her. "Thank you," she crowed and showed it to her friend next to her.
