“It’s okay. I understand.”
“Understand what?” Reed asked.
“That I’m done. You found someone else. It’s okay. I didn’t actually expect to get the part or anything.”
Reed stopped walking and said, “Samara is in the room, waiting for us. I came to get you to do the chemistry read.”
“You still want me to do it?”
“Yes, Dana.” Reed chuckled. “We’ve got a few we’re going to ask to read again, but one of them is in London, wrapping another project today, so it could take her a week to get here. There’s another actress in New York available now, butwe’re not totally sold on her yet, so we’re going to hold off on flying her in. Then, there’s you. Well, there’s also one in LA who’s going to read another couple of scenes and send us another recording, but Bryce wasn’t a huge fan. Faye liked her. I thought she was okay. Anyway, you’re here right now, so if you’re still interested, we’d love to have you read with Samara and see if there’s a fit.”
“Now?” she asked.
“Yeah, now.” Reed chuckled again. “I’m sure someone else can scoop potatoes onto plates, or they can scoop them on their own. They’re adults, right?”
Dana laughed and said, “Okay.”
“Great. Let’s go. Her Majesty is waiting.” Reed started walking but stopped. “Don’t tell her I called her that, please.”
Dana laughed again and said, “Your secret is safe with me.”
They walked until they arrived at the building, and Reed opened the door for her.
“All right, she’s here. Let’s get started,” Reed said. “Samara, are you ready?”
“Of course,” she replied.
Samara was already standing in the front of the room, holding on to her script, and Dana realized that she hadn’t brought her own copy with her. She’d memorized the lines from the key scenes the previous night, but she was nervous now and didn’t know if her brain could focus on trying to perform with Samaraandremember all the words.
“Great,” Faye said as Reed sat down next to her. “Let’s get started. We’re going to start with the dance. Is that okay? If you two are comfortable with it, let’s actually give that part a try, too. It’ll give us a good chance to see how you are together.”
“Sure,” Samara said. “I’m good with it. Are you, Dana?”
Dana sensed a bit of a challenge in her tone, but she couldn’t find her words, so she just nodded.
“Dana, do you need a script?” Bryce asked.
“Oh, yeah. Thanks,” she said and walked to the tablewhere Bryce held out some script pages. “Okay. I guess I’m ready.”
“Good,” Samara said, and then her demeanor changed completely, and Dana knew she was Stella now. “You don’t think you’d watch meattemptto move hips that don’t like to move and see another woman on the dance floor and at leastthinkabout dancing with her instead?”
“No,” Dana said as she shook her head. “I don’t.”
She looked down at her script for her next line.
“Well, you’re right: we could do that. But we’d be giving up this amazing sofa seat I found for us. These are hard to come by here.” Samara as Stella said with a smile on her face.
“Could you part with it if we could find another seat?” Dana asked without looking up from the script pages. “Or, we could just dance… uh… in front of the couch… the sofa, blocking it so others don’t take it from us.”
She flipped to the next page.
“The song’s almost over, Bray. I–” Samara said.
“Take a chance,” Dana interrupted and looked up at Samara for a second before she returned her eyes to the page.
“Hey, Dana, everything okay?” Bryce asked her.
“Uh… Yeah. Sorry. I’m good. Can we maybe go from the top?”
