1
Lana
I woke every morning to loud music from downstairs. At first, it bothered me, but I gradually stopped fighting it. This was not my house, and the man who owned it would not care about my complaints.
When Mom and I moved in with her new husband, a man known as one of the biggest porn stars alive, I thought living in a large, modern mansion in a gated community in the Hollywood Hills would be an upgrade from our two-bedroom, one-bath suburban home in Brentwood.
I was wrong. Callan was a multimillionaire who kept his doors open to anyone tied to his work. His crew and other guests drifted through the rooms and settled into whichever spare bedroom was available. At the same time, maids, housekeepers, and security moved through the house on routine and casual business.
My bedroom was large, but it offered no privacy. There were always voices and footsteps, and I could not remember a single day when I had been alone in that house.
It’s only been a little over a year since we moved in. While I was still trying to get comfortable in this place, my mothermade everything worse by moving right back out after a fight with Callan.
She left me, and she didn’t care that her nineteen-year-old only daughter would be staying in a house full of adult film actors who filmed and had sex here almost every day.
Though we never had a good relationship. She spent most of my life telling strangers how good a mother she was for not putting me up for adoption. She always talked about how hard her life had been as a single mother, using those claims as proof that she deserved a pass for her usually obnoxious behavior.
The truth was, she chased money and attention. She tried for years to make a name in the porn industry and managed only a few minor amateur videos that pulled a few thousand clicks on those sites.
Not that I ever watched any of them. Because…ew.
She bragged about those clips constantly back in our old home, where privacy never meant much to her. It still meant nothing here.
If you asked me to name her biggest achievement, it would be marrying Callan. I still couldn’t understand why he wanted to marry her. He had always been a bachelor who kept as many women on his arm as possible. His choices seemed driven only by fame and money.
Although…now I see it: my mother and Callan were the same type of person, the main difference being that Callan had the power she never did.
As alone and abandoned as I felt, I couldn’t let my mother’s antiques stand in the way of what I was doing, so I kept my head down and focused on school because I was in college to become a screenwriter in Hollywood, not to follow her into the porn industry. I was so deeply immersed in my studies that I couldn’t let these circumstances derail me.
I was a freshman, and I told myself I could make it to graduation. Consistently following through on what I set my mind to was something I was proud of. And, to be fair, living in a house that contained an actual filming studio was an advantage for a student.
Whenever the place emptied, usually when Callan was off filming or partying at someone else’s, I would slip downstairs to the setup. Professional cameras, microphones, and an editing desk waited there, and I used that space whenever I could.
Well, not actually. I didn’t dare touch anything. I liked to stand there and pretend it was a film set for a movie I’d written the script to. I was manifesting my future and holding a deep-down feeling that it would work out someday.
It was Friday morning, and from all the voices I could hear downstairs, I knew Callan had planned a full day of filming.
I never had classes on Fridays. I intended to leave the house, go to the college library to find a book about one of the greatest screenwriters ever, Billy Wilder, then head to the Griffith Observatory. I wanted to watch the sunset and eat a sandwich I’d brought from home. Unlike my stepdad, I didn’t have money to spend on every outing.
As a movie buff, I liked visiting places where films were shot. Since watchingLa La Land,the Griffith Observatory had become a place I visited regularly.
And today, that’s where I was headed once more.
After showering and getting dressed, I grabbed my tote bag, which held my beloved notebook and Nikon digital camera, and headed downstairs. I always tried to avoid eye contact with the people roaming the house, and today I managed to reach the kitchen without running into anyone.
I moved quickly, first filling my water bottle, then pulling out everything I needed from the fridge to make a sandwich.
I narrowed my eyes and stared into the fridge when I couldn’t find the sliced deli turkey I had bought just last Tuesday. I had some money for weekly groceries, which I automatically received from my mother.Let’s face it…she had to make up for leaving me here alone in some way. It wasn’t much, but it was enough for me.
I wasn’t a big spender and only bought what I needed. Still, lately, my food was being stolen.
“Not again,” I murmured, sighing heavily when I found the empty plastic package of the turkey. “At least throw it away when it’s empty.”
“You should tell Francine to clean out the fridge if you’re bothered by it.”
Callan’s voice had never startled me before, but this morning it did, simply because he had snuck up on me while I thought I was alone in the kitchen.
I turned around to see him standing there in just his boxers, and I didn’t give his extreme attractiveness any attention. He had plenty of it already. He didn’t need it from his nineteen-year-old stepdaughter, whom he didn’t care about.
