Famous in Love

by Rebecca Serle

  “But I don’t.” Wyatt looks at me when he says it, and I’m reminded again of our conversation in my condo. How angry he appeared at the possibility of Rainer and me getting together. But now I think maybe he was wrong. And suddenly I’m incredibly annoyed at how big a deal this is. Because it’s no one’s business what I do off set. Rainer and I aren’t Noah and August, and if we like each other, so what? It’s not like we’re going to stop doing our jobs. I look at Rainer again, standing there—waiting for some kind of response from me. He doesn’t care. He’s not concerned about Sandy buzzing around or Wyatt’s pissed-off comments or the Scene people standing by, waiting to figure out how to move on. Because it’s not about them. It’s about us. I want to tell him I want that, too. I want him to kiss me more than I have ever wanted anything. I want him to put his arms around me and make this moment last, capture it right along with the camera.

  Except something stops me. And it’s not Sandy or Wyatt. My back feels hot, and I know, instinctively, that Jordan has heard. I can feel his stare. I can’t explain why it makes me feel guilty.

  I’m not hiding anything. Wyatt and Sandy are huddled up, and the Scene crew is setting up another shot, at least pretending they’re not listening. I drop my voice, edging closer to Rainer.

  “You can’t do that,” I whisper.

  “What?” he says. His eyes trace over my face. I suck in my bottom lip.

  “You can’t say stuff like that at work.” I look up at him.

  “This isn’t a no,” I want to say. “It’s a not now.”

  Rainer’s face lights up into a grin. “It’s hard to control myself around you,” he says. He cups my elbow with his hand, runs his thumb along the crease there. Heat fires up my arm straight to my core. “But if it’s what you want, I’ll try.”

  My chest lifts; my temples throb. I take a deep breath, attempting to quell my rebellious pulse. “So much of our lives is already going out there.” I gesture over my shoulder in the vague direction of the ocean, of whatever is at the end of it.

  “It’ll be okay,” he says. He puts both his hands on my arms. They feel sturdy there—like they’re holding me in place. His eyebrows knit together when he says: “I promise.”

  “No more funny business on set,” I say.

  Rainer laughs. “Ma’am, you insult my dignity.” He takes his hands away and throws one against his chest in mock horror.

  “I will if you insult mine.”

  He smiles, and his face gets soft. His features blending and setting into smooth, approachable lines. “Okay,” he whispers.

  The music starts back up, and Rainer goes over to Lillianna for a touch-up. I glance back, and when I do, I catch Jordan watching me. He turns immediately. I feel like I’ve lost whatever working relationship I could have had with him before it has even begun. My mother used to tell me that you can’t have everything in this world. That’s just not how it works. I guess she was right.

  The magazine director, a woman around my parents’ age, comes over to me.

  “We need some shots of you,” she says.

  “Okay.” I glance over at Rainer, who is filling a coffee cup now. “Should I—”

  “No guys,” she says, “just you.” She gives me that smile that people at the DMV give you. The one that says I’ve told you all I can. Now please go fill out the form and stop asking me questions.

  I nod, and let her arrange me so I’m sitting on this giant cupcake pillow. She has me bend my legs, my knees knocking together. She arches my back and puts my hair in front, then to the side. She steps back and squints at me, like I’m a painting she’s not sure is hanging even on the wall. Then she sticks a wind machine in my face.

  “Can you tilt your head a little more to the left?” she asks me. “Just the head, not the eyes.”

  I try to think what that even means, but by the time I start to work it out, the camera is already snapping, coming in on me, close. The wind is making my eyes tear, and I keep wiping at my cheeks, apologizing.

  “Have some fun with it,” she says.

  Fun. Right. I try. I smile, I laugh. I try to access that feeling of power and awesomeness that I was experiencing a few minutes ago. I open my eyes wide and set my lips in a perfect semicircle. But it’s not as easy as it was when we were all shooting together. Everyone’s eyes are on me now, and I feel exposed, like this barely-there dress has been wiped off and I’m suddenly stark naked in front of the crew and my costars. I can feel them looking at me, their competing gazes. The combined impact is almost too much to bear.

  Finally, mercifully, the camera stops, and Rainer and Jordan are called back. We do some posed shots now. Me still sitting, them standing on either side of me. We’re close, all three of us, and the music is low, barely humming through the soundstage.

  Rainer tucks his arm around me, and I lean back on his chest. Then we stand and do the same thing. Then the director motions for Jordan to get closer in the shot. “Grab her,” she tells him. I keep my eyes trained on the camera.

  Jordan turns.

  “Hey,” I say. I feel like it’s the first word I’ve said to him.

  “Hi,” he says. His face is inches from mine.

  Then he pulls me toward him. Fast. He smells like soap, like a shower, like Dove. It’s so specific it makes me feel like I’m back in my shared bathroom in Portland. The one with Annabelle’s rubber ducky toys, my sister’s antifrizz shampoo, and the drain that never quite works properly no matter how many times my dad has fixed it. And that, more than anything, makes me melt into him. He tucks my head against his chest and closes his arms tight around me. I can’t explain it, but the next instant I feel like putty. Like I’m Play-Doh in someone else’s hands. Soft and pliable. Like I could be molded into anything. Anyone. Even August.

  CHAPTER 13

  Here is what the official kiss count at the end of today will be:

  August and Noah: 1

  Paige and Rainer: 0

  We’re finally filming their first kiss today—a scene that takes place in the hut-house during a huge rainstorm. Romantic, sure. Nerve-racking, definitely. Of course, the sun is out and blazing on our actual Hawaiian island, and for the moment we’re inside on the soundstage rehearsing.

  Here’s the situation: Noah and August have been fighting their feelings since they got to the island. August is his best friend’s girlfriend, after all. But as the days and weeks wear on, they start to realize they might never be rescued, and they give in to their feelings. Cosmo actually called our version of the kiss “the most anticipated lip-lock of the year.” That’s a lot to live up to, but I get it. It’s supersexy in the book. And I want to do right by the scene. The truth is I’ve been equal parts dreading and looking forward to filming it, and I sort of can’t believe it’s actually here.

  Noah and August seem to be on track. And Rainer and I are, too, I think. Last night we had dinner. We went to Longhi’s, and a few girls around my age recognized Rainer and asked for his autograph. Dinner felt different from the way it has before. It felt like a real date. We shared a dessert. Our spoons clinked against each other, and he touched my knee under the table. I felt those girls watching us, watching me. The girl who was out with Rainer Devon—I liked it.

  After dinner, he walked me back to my door and reached for my hand. He brought it up to his cheek. He was so painfully beautiful. I just wanted to wrap my arms around his neck and draw him in. I know he wanted to, too. All these weeks have built up between us like electricity.

  But when he went to lean his lips down to mine, I couldn’t do it. It suddenly felt terrifying. It seems like so much is invested in our story already. Like as soon as we kiss, everything will change. And I want to be ready for that, but I’m not sure I am. I need him. He’s the one person in my life right now who understands me. Who is holding my hand through this. What if we get together and then it ends and I lose him? Is that a risk I’m willing to take?

  “I’m sorry,” I said. I reached my arms up and ran my thu
mb down the back of his neck. I felt my chest press closer to his, like my heart was trying to line right up with his rib cage. “It’s—it’s like if we kiss, it’s more than a kiss. Do you know what I mean?”

  “That’s what all the ladies tell me,” he said.

  I shoved him. “Oh my God, are you ever serious?”

  “Hey.” He pressed his forehead to mine. “We have plenty of time.” He put his hand on my face. Held it there. “We have three movies’ worth of time.”

  I laughed, and so did he. Then he kissed me on the forehead and disappeared down the hallway.

  And now here we are, ready to film this kiss. At least on paper. But we can’t get started because unlike yesterday, today it’s not raining.

  Jessica has a big piece of bamboo filled with sand and painted with these crazy African hieroglyphics. It’s her “rain stick,” and she brings it out almost every day—trying to make it rain, or trying to make it stop raining. Because of the unpredictable weather, we’ve started prepping for five or six scenes in case we can’t shoot the ones we had planned on for any given day. They’ve built sets in an old, abandoned shed by the beach and even one in Wyatt’s condo. Anywhere we can physically film, we have.

  Wyatt thinks this is nuts and is constantly yelling at Jessica to “put the damn thing away,” but I think that secretly, maybe, he believes it works. Because honestly, most of the time, it sorta does.

  This morning Rainer is running around the set with the rain stick, singing that song about the rain in Africa. The second unit has gone out to get some extra pickup shots, and Wyatt and Camden are trying to figure out how and if they can set up the scene here and bring in fake rain, and Jessica is talking to the props department, trying to figure out what happened to the fake mud. I’m still not sure why movie mud has to be fake. It’s not like blood, you’re not harming anything if you actually take the real stuff. Although, I guess, Jake might think you were.

  “Sing it with me, PG,” Rainer says, holding the rain stick in front of me like a microphone.

  “You’re in a good mood,” I say.

  He looks at me and raises his eyebrows. “I get to kiss you today,” he says. “Shouldn’t I be?”

  I blush what feels like fuchsia. I look away, over at Jessica, who is running by with a prop I can’t see.

  We’re right on the edge of something, like the heavy, wet heat of the air right before a huge rainfall. Once our characters kiss, will it change things for us? Actors are always talking about how unromantic love scenes are, how there are a million people in the room, how strategic it is. But they’re still my lips. They’re still Rainer’s. I know it’s different, separate, but I feel the same way he does. It’s like we can’t take the leap, so our characters are doing it for us.

  Wyatt makes an executive call: We’re going to film inside. The props crew immediately goes to work on constructing a set that will match the one we’ve already filmed on outside. They’ll use a green screen all around to be able to project the right background and match up shots in the editing room.

  Wyatt has requested a closed set for this shoot, which means it will be Rainer, the immediate crew, and me. No Sandy, no extra crew members. No Jordan.

  I remind myself of this as I run through lines in my head. It helps that he won’t be here—that it will just be Rainer and me.

  I watch Rainer from the side stage, dancing around with the rain stick. His smile and easy charm. He pokes Jessica, and even though it’s obvious she’s in the middle of a million things, she doesn’t get mad. Rainer’s older than Jordan and me by a few years, but there’s something about him that’s so childlike. He’s just happy, like a little kid on Christmas morning. He makes other people smile, too. I used to think it was calculated—his celebrity charm. But now I know it’s not. It’s real.

  Rainer is so different from Noah. Noah with his brooding, complicated past and mysterious aura. But they’re both incredibly loyal. Supportive. And I think, as it turns out, they both might want to kiss me. My blood zings through my veins at the thought, and I once again have to steady my heartbeat.

  “You look concerned, PG.” Rainer sets the stick down and comes over to me. He places both his hands on my shoulders, and then runs them down to my elbows. I exhale. It feels good to have him close to me like this. It’s calming.

  “Not concerned,” I say.

  He tilts his head forward. “You sure?”

  I shrug. “Maybe a little nervous.”

  “Okay.” He turns me around, marches me over to a crate to the side of the soundstage, and motions for me to sit down. I tuck my costume, a white nightgown-dress, under me and fold my arms across my chest.

  Rainer gently puts his hands on my knees, and kneels down in front of me so we’re eye level. “Hey,” he says, “it’s going to be fine. It’s just me and you.” He smiles—that warm, approachable, melting ice cream smile—and my nerves start to slacken.

  “People care about this,” I say. “Everyone keeps saying how important this kiss is.…” I bury my head in my hands.

  Rainer squeezes my knee. “Don’t think about them. It’s just us right now. Hey.” He lifts my fingers away from my face. “We’ll do our best. That’s all we can do.”

  “What if my best isn’t good enough?”

  He smiles at me. His eyes look into mine. “It will be. We have great chemistry.” He touches my shoulder. “Right?”

  I swallow. Nod.

  “You guys ready?” Wyatt comes over, Jessica at his heels. He’s wearing his Ramones T-shirt, which means today is a serious day. It’s his lucky shirt, and I can tell how important a shoot is by whether he’s wearing it or not.

  “Ready,” I say. I try not to let my voice falter.

  Rainer puts his hands on my shoulders, just below the blades, and nudges me forward. We follow Wyatt to where a makeshift set has been created in a matter of minutes. Sometimes the things they do around here are kind of magical. Like there are elves hidden in the palm trees or something.

  I snap my eyes closed and take a deep breath. Inhale and exhale. I’m trying to imagine what August is feeling right now. She wants to be with this person more than anything else in the world, and finally he kisses her. He lets them go there. It’s wild abandonment—of their past, their future. It’s all about this moment. Not thinking. Just acting.

  The first take is clumsy. I lean in too swiftly, and my nose knocks Rainer’s. I’m shaking. It’s making it hard to have any actual contact.

  The second take is worse. I have developed the hiccups, an old nervous habit, and when Rainer leans in, my entire body jolts backward.

  “Cut!” Wyatt yells. He runs a hand over his forehead. “Look,” he says to me. “What do we need here?”

  “Sorry,” I say, my body convulsing as another hiccup goes ratcheting across my shoulders.

  “I don’t know what’s going on with the two of you, but just pretend you’re someone else for a minute.”

  “I am someone else,” I say. “I’m August.” This is getting to be like Acting for Dummies over here.

  Wyatt shakes his head. “Get out of her, too.”

  How can I tell Wyatt that kissing Rainer now, as August, feels like kissing him as Paige, too? All this flirting. All these glances and moments. They’ve been building to this, and I can’t separate myself out.

  “Who then?” I ask.

  “A model?” Rainer offers. “Preferably French. Thanks.” He smiles at me, shrugging his shoulders.

  “You need to get out of your head,” Wyatt tells me. He’s frowning, and I’m afraid he’s going to start yelling, but instead he says, “Sometimes you need to be someone completely different. Someone who would grab Noah and have her way with him. Who would do that?”

  Britney? “I don’t know,” I say.

  Wyatt waves me off with the back of his hand and keeps talking. “Step out of the way. Take on a persona that would really make this happen tonight.” He looks at me. There it is again. His signature intensity.
“Just fucking do it.”

  “Okay,” I say. Except what I’m thinking is that the problem is not my being someone else, the problem is Rainer being someone else. I’m nervous to kiss him because of everything it would mean for us, our relationship. But right now we’re not ourselves. We’re August and Noah. A lost girl and boy.

  I make the first move. Practically before the camera starts rolling, I’m attacking Rainer, grabbing his face and shoving it down against mine. It’s not very sexy, but hey, it’s contact. Let’s just get through it. Rainer seems amused by this, and starts cracking up. Wyatt, of course, yells cut.

  Fourth take. Rainer places a hand on my elbow. He draws me closer, traces my jaw with his finger. I let my eyes slip closed. I lean closer. I feel Rainer right above me. Cut.

  Wait, why? I glance over at Wyatt. “More intensity!” he yells.

  Fifth take. I lean in, and so does Rainer, and our lips meet. It works. It way more than works. I wrap my arms around his neck, and he pulls me in closer. His hands are tight around me, and his lips are ziplocked to mine, so sealed I can barely even breathe. And I don’t want to. I want him to keep kissing me like this—like it’s just us on this island. His arms travel down my back, and I wind my fingers through his hair. My whole body feels on fire, and for a moment everything dissolves. We’re not on a set. We’re on an island. No one else matters. Nothing but this.

  But then Rainer pulls back. I feel his lips leave mine, and I grope forward, not ready for the break in contact. My eyes are still closed when I hear him say, “You’re not supposed to be here.”

  It’s Jordan. I know before I even look. Faded gray T-shirt, arms crossed.

  “It’s raining,” he says, like this somehow answers anything.

  “Shit.” Wyatt looks at him, then back at us. “It’s a closed set, Jordan.”

  Jordan stuffs his hands into his pockets. “Okay,” he says. “I’ll leave.”

  Rainer’s hand is still around my waist, and I feel him tug me in tighter. “Stay,” he says to Jordan. I watch them look at each other, watch Jordan’s eyes flit, briefly, to my hand on Rainer’s shoulder. It’s a challenge, and for a moment I feel a flare of anger that Rainer is claiming me right here, in front of Jordan.