That wasnt in the script, p.2
That Wasn't in the Script, page 2
“Enough!” Mom motions to both of us like a traffic controller. “My ride is two minutes away and I’m anxious enough as it is. Please try not to kill each other.”
“No promises,” Pru scoffs. Her bare feet slide across the ancient hardwood floor with deafening creaks as she flops onto the side of our couch, pulling her phone out of the back pocket of her jean skirt.
“I probably need to go get ready.” I gesture to the closet-sized bathroom my sister and I share. “I work in about thirty minutes.”
Before my mother can wrap me in another hug that is sure to leave me a hysteric mess, she tenderly grips my shoulders and looks me square in the eyes.
“Behave yourselves while I’m gone. Please? Positive big sister mode?”
I smirk. “Probably not the best time to tell you I hooked up with some random dude in the alley next door then, huh? It was very intense. You might be a grandmother soon.”
“Very funny.” Mom deadpans. “I can trust you to stay out of trouble, but will you make sure your sister cleans up after herself, does her homework...”
“Stays away from the random dudes in the alley?”
“I’m more likely to wind up with one of them than you are!” Pru cries over the noise of whatever video she’s watching.
She’s not wrong. My mother, that is, not Pru. Trouble wasn’t even on my radar. Since we’d moved here, I’d had two sole objectives—survive high school, and get back home to Ohio as soon as possible after graduating.
My application for the University of Cincinnati had been sitting on my laptop since the start of the summer. I’d been meticulously writing and rewriting my entrance essay since January. Each version including why their film program had been my academic dream for years. It was a seamless plan. I’d get into UC, finish high school in May, turn eighteen, then move back and into an apartment with my best friend, Hannah. Once it happened, life would feel normal again. As normal as it could be without Dad anyway.
I just needed to make it through the last few months here, keeping my nose down and certainly not going out of my way to get comfortable like Pru had. She walked in after her first day of sixth grade with four new best friends and a potential crush. She and Mom spent every free evening going into the city and crossing items off their New York bucket list, while I stayed behind and worked on extra credit assignments that would look good on my transcripts.
The both of them loved it here the way Dad hoped they would, but all I wanted was to get the hell out as fast as I could. If Mom’s plan to plead for tuition money worked, my seamless plan was more of a reality than it had been in the last year.
Seven more months, I was constantly reminding myself. You can survive the chaos of New York City for seven more months. I was beginning to wonder if I’d need it tattooed on my eyelids to make it through the next shift at work.
Mom’s phone pings loudly, signaling the arrival of her ride. She pouts as she invitingly swings her arms out wide to the two of us. Pru jumps up from the couch to join us in a deep, warm hug.
“I love you, rats,” she mutters, planting wet kisses on both of our foreheads.
The moment feels bittersweet and final. This is the first-time Mom has left the two of us alone since Dad died. Even when he was alive, I could count on one hand the number of times they were ever away from home for more than a night or two. Dad’s co-workers used to tease him about how close our family was. They’d say we would all get sick of each other one day. Little did they know we’d never get that chance.
Mom bops the top of Pru’s nose, causing her to giggle. “Keep your nose clean, Rat Two.” Her pale eyes squint as they meet mine, tapping the apple of one of my plump cheeks in the same playful manner. “Maybe go find a little trouble, Rat One?”
My gaze sinks. I force myself to meet her plea with a solemn smile. “I’ll do my best.”
Unlikely, I think to myself. Seven more months, Josephine. You can survive for seven more months.
CHAPTER 2
ROWAN
My career is over.
That’s all I’ve been telling myself in the days since the fight happened.
Warm flashbulbs pierce my vision as someone rips the corner of my jacket and shoves me through a small herd of screaming fans at baggage claim. They’re all holding different pictures of my face they want signed. My feet are dragged over multiple loading zone tripping hazards before realizing the hand pulling me along belongs to my bodyguard, Alex. He leads the three of us forcefully to our tinted getaway suburban outside, the locks clicking loudly behind us as the driver attempts to speed away.
Growing up, my grandmother had a flip phone—one of those thin, hot pink ones with floral designs on it. I would always know when she got a call that pissed her off because she’d slap the thing shut and you’d hear it shutter two counties away. Now, everyone owns a smartphone, and there’s no warning on the other end of a bad phone call. No intimidating cell phone slap. Only a muted end call button, followed immediately by…
“GODDAMN IT!”
Aunt Lexi is anxiously bobbing her head, having just finished an extremely long phone call with the executive producers of Dawn Heights. Her skinny fingers massage the top of her glossy, blown-out hair. She quit smoking a year ago, but something tells me she’s about to start up again.
“Am I fired?” I ask, not brave enough to look up from my muddy Converse.
Furious was an understatement. My typically attentive aunt was slowly being burned alive by an internal inferno. I’d eaten six complimentary peanut butter cups since getting inside the car and she hadn’t batted an eye.
“No,” she grumbles, “but your ass is on the line.”
“I didn’t even start it!”
Lexi clenches her fists and releases them mid-air. “You didn’t walk away from it either!”
It had been nearly forty-two hours since the incident that potentially derailed my entire acting future. The whole thing is starting to feel like a massive blur. Alex and I got home just before news outlets began reporting on it. The outside of my aunt’s gated home in the Hollywood Hills was teeming with paparazzi for hours afterward. Since then, Lexi had been living on her phone, solely communicating with my publicist and trying to put a positive spin on what happened.
In case you missed the memo, I’ve apparently been canceled.
Aunt Lexi delicately places her hands on her laptop in an elaborate illusion of staying calm. “They’re insisting Michael Brewer take an anger management course, and they would like for you to make a formal apology for your behavior. When we meet with them tomorrow, I told them you’d apologize in person as well.”
I nearly choke on the mouthful of melted peanut butter gluing my jaw together. “Are you ‘ucking ‘idding me?!”
“Someone told the cops you were drinking at the party, Rowan,” she continues. “Were you?”
Alex’s eyes grow wide in light of the claim. He stares me down as he folds his muscular arms across his broad chest. He was there. He never missed anything. Somehow, he’d missed this. I hang my head low, hoping this mess is one big nightmare I’m eventually going to wake up from.
“Because one of the directors gave me a drink. Just one. Like, a single shot.”
This isn’t helping my case in the slightest, but if the press is going to report on my downfall, the least they can do is be the slightest bit factual about it.
Yes, there was a fight with my co-star at the Dawn Heights season three premiere party. Yes, I threw the first punch, and yes, I might’ve had alcohol in my system, but that’s barely the tip of the iceberg. Nobody knows how the fight started or why. Not that I felt comfortable coming clean with any of it to Lexi.
I bite down on my lower lip to keep the series of f-bombs in my head from pouring out. “Michael Brewer apologized, so why am I being asked to? It’s not like he wasn’t six beers deep when it happened.”
“You know why,” she snaps. “We’re not going to meet with everyone tomorrow to play nice. This meeting has been on the books for weeks. If you want to continue to be part of the show, we need to make things right.”
Alex’s husky voice finally chimes in. “The guy who provoked the fight is getting a slap on the wrist, but Rowan is somehow coming out of this looking like the bad guy?”
We can both see the inward flames begin to spill out onto my aunt’s face, made all the more terrifying by her spider-like lash extensions.
“Because the other guy isn’t Rowan Adler!” She loudly argues. “Michael Brewer’s contract is on the line for next season too. This is about you though, Rowan. The sooner we bury this, the sooner it goes away.”
I push my dark sunglasses further up on my nose, sinking into my seat with an exhausted sigh. I don’t sleep well on airplanes, unlike Alex, who is usually dead to the world before the flight attendants finish their safety spiel. Rest hadn’t been easy to come by lately, the added concern of flushing my future down the toilet only adds fuel to the sleep deprived fire.
“You look tired.” Aunt Lexi observes my deflated body lying lifeless in my seat. She begins feverishly digging through her glossy, snakeskin purse.
“I’m fine, Lexi.”
“You need to try and rest when we get in,” Alex insists.
“Gee whiz. Thanks, Dad. I’ll be sure to do that.” He ignores my jab, his orange pompadour bouncing sideways against the jerking vehicle.
On the outside, Alex was a three-hundred-pound teddy bear with a splotchy chain of freckles lining his nose and cheeks. Little did anyone know he was trained by Special Ops and could kill you before you had time to wonder if he possibly could. Hiring him was one of the best decisions my aunt had ever made. Mainly because he was one of the few people I’d grown to count on as always having my back, even when I made his life a living hell.
The chaotic energy in the car begins to settle as we roll to a slow stop. I look out the shaded windows to see The Four Seasons towering over the lower Manhattan skyline. Alex and I are enamored by the spectacle while Lexi frantically looks side to side, vigilant of her surroundings. I grab the hood of my dark jacket and raise it over my flat airplane hair, grabbing my faded Lakers hat from my computer bag and pulling it tight over the top to conceal it in place.
This widely exaggerated nightclub fight wasn’t the first time I’d been on thin ice with the producers of Dawn Heights in the past several months. The real trouble started when production on season three wrapped, and I impromptu decided to shave my head. Little did I know when I did it, I was needed for reshoots and press photos a week later. Lexi was livid, and the tabloids had a field day, accusing me of having a Britney Spears 2007 level meltdown. I only did it because the bleach they used to keep me platinum was causing my hair to fall out in clumps.
“Not to mention, Britney was actually dealing with mental illness.” Alex would defend me—and apparently, Britney. I didn’t have the heart to tell Lexi he’s the one who helped me shave it.
My hair had grown back enough to style it again for campaigns and photo spreads, but that didn’t stop the costume department on the show from bitching about how tacky my character Hunter’s wig looked throughout the rest of filming. Part of me felt horrible about it. Classic Rowan acting without thinking, as my grandmother would say. Then there was the other part of me that could care less.
As I exit the car, Lexi practically forms a human barrier to shield me from the non-existent paparazzi. I prolong the moment to breathe deep and take it all in. A small part of me feels like I’m home, even though home was technically another three-hundred miles away in Rochester.
Alex jumps out behind me. His spotted nose bunching in disgust.
“I don’t remember the nice part of New York smelling like rectum.”
“It’s not New York if it doesn’t smell like rectum,” Lexi scowls. She directs the bellhop coming to greet us on where to take our luggage.
“When did we all become rectum experts?” I tease.
“It happens when our heads are constantly up your ass,” Lexi fires back.
I wince. “Ouch.”
The inside of the hotel room looks like some pop-up art museum. It’s large and acutely minimalist. Bare white wallpaper lies behind dark wooden furniture, expressionist paintings hanging all over the walls. Alex and I share a large double bedroom while Lexi sleeps next door in an adjacent studio loft. Far enough away to give me space, close enough to hover like a helicopter. It’s what she’d been good at ever since I was a kid.
I lifelessly flop like a fish onto the uncomfortable velvet couch in the common room. Lexi shouts a startling ‘ah-ha!’ and finally pulls what she’s been digging for out of her massive purse.
“Here!” She tosses a neon orange pill bottle from across the room. It plops onto the lap of my jeans with a soft thud. “Those will help you sleep. Only take half of one, they’re intense.”
My dry, sunken eyes shoot out of their sockets. “Seriously?!”
“As a heart attack. You look like shit, and you need rest.” Leave it to Lexi to offer tough love. She’d been working as a talent agent since before I was old enough to know what ‘personal branding’ even was. She laid things out straight for people and never cared if she hurt your feelings doing it. It’s what made her great at her job, and simultaneously, the worst person to live with.
I shove the pills into the pocket of my jacket with a scoff, feeling the smooth edge of my sunglasses poking out a small hole in the stitching.
“I’m already on anxiety medication,” I remind her. “I don’t think it’s smart to throw in some mystery sleeping drug because you think I’m a toddler who needs to go night-night.”
Lexi clenches her jaw, her bright red lipstick forming a pencil-thin line. That always meant one of two things. Either you were in for an insensitive lashing, or she couldn’t think of a comeback and would dramatically exit the room with visible disgust. In this case, it was option two.
“You’re welcome,” she seethes.
My insides sink to the floor. My aunt could insult you directly to your face and still manage to squeeze an apology out of you as if she deserved it. I jump to my feet and prepare to sincerely thank her when she abruptly slams the sliding doors to her loft. It shakes the walls of our hotel room all the way down to the ground floor.
Alex pulls a plain black shirt out of his suitcase, inspecting it with a smell before ripping off his sweaty airplane shirt and replacing it.
“She cares about you, you know.”
“I’ve endured six years of her caring. Trust me. I get it.”
A steady stream of gushing water comes echoing out of Aunt Lexi’s loft. I breathe a welcomed sigh of ease. She was notorious for her hour-long showers, sometimes longer depending on her stress levels. I was pretty sure she stood under the running water and screamed the entire time. Effectively, it always calmed her down.
Regardless of how she spent her time in there, and I wasn’t too keen on learning, I could always count on it being one uninterrupted hour of freedom a day where she wasn’t breathing down my neck about something Dawn Heights-related.
The two full beds wrapped in velvety sheets call my name, even if my brain is moving too fast for sleep to even cross my mind as a viable option. My stomach groans in hunger as I fall face-first onto the mattress closest to the window. The fading sun lights the New York skyline in a cascade of soft oranges and pinks. I can’t help but smirk into my pillow, wondering what Grandma would think if she saw it. Sunsets were her favorite.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” Alex asks for the one-millionth time since the plane landed.
“Yes. I’m just hungry,” I half-lie.
“Order room service then.”
“I can’t. I’m fasting.” I add finger quotes around ‘fasting.’ Those peanut butter cups I inhaled on the drive are hitting my stomach like molten chocolate meteors.
Part of playing Hunter Cade meant being contractually obligated to keep the physique of Hunter Cade, which also meant working out more than I ate on any given day. Ironic considering Hunter Cade isn’t athletic. Being the anti-jock is sort of his thing.
“You could always say it’s for me!” Alex cheerfully offers. He parks himself on the edge of his bed and stretches his legs out with a loud pop. He wasn’t much older than me, mid-twenties at best, but his supportive demeanor automatically made him the closest thing I had to a father figure.
I momentarily tilt to my side with a grateful yet coy grin. “I could always leave this hotel room. Just run away and never look back.”
He shifts his eyes to the ceiling. “Ha-ha.”
I sink my head, my words going muffled against the comforter. “Wouldn’t it be nice? One day without worrying about the press, or cameras, or freaking cheerleaders.”
Alex’s oversized ears perk up at the mention of cheerleaders. Months ago, a Dawn Heights fanfiction circulated on Archive of our Own. It involved a group of Heights High cheerleaders kidnapping my character and locking him away in one of their basements to fulfill all their weird sexual fantasies.
Rumors started swirling that the person who created the fanfic was some fourteen-year-old girl from Florida who was secretly planning on finding and abducting me, using each chapter as some decipherable code on where she’d take me. It was one of the dumbest conspiracy theories I’d ever heard, but it became popular enough to pose a valid concern for Lexi. After that, Alex went from my occasional red-carpet chaperone to my round-the-clock, grown-ass Navy SEAL babysitter.
The silence in the room lingers. Alex’s fair eyebrows wiggle in a line across the top of his forehead. He taps his fingers against his torso for a moment before jerking his body off the bed. He leans across the doorframe to be sure Lexi’s sliding doors have indeed slammed all the way shut. Everyone in the hotel below us could’ve told him they had.
“She’ll be in there a while, right?” He asks.
I prop myself up on my palms and remove my hat and hood to give my hair a shake. “She usually is.”
Alex nods slowly, stroking the orange stubble on his chin. “Would she kill me if I took a power nap?”
