Hayes didn’t look mad. He wasn’t the type of teacher who held a grudge or punished his students. No, he even looked amused. “Drinking water helps a hangover,” he said with a wink in Holland’s direction.
“How’d you know I have a hangover?” Holland asked, her eyes widening. “Gosh, professor, you truly are a fascinating man. So smart and handsome. If I ever marry someone one day, I want them to be just like you.”
Laughter rippled through the room, and Hayes shook his head, smiling. “Thank you, Holland. Now, back to what I was saying…”
The second Hayes continued his lesson, and every other student listened, Holland immediately turned to me, her eyes wide and her jaw dropped. “Lana,” she whispered harshly. “You’re serious? About telling Callan that you want to be his fluffer?”
I nodded, nervously biting the inside of my cheek. “Yeah.”
She leaned in even closer, eyes sparkling with disbelief. “You mean to tell me that you, my quiet, rule-following best friend, took my advice and are now professionally making a porn star hard for work?”
Admitting it was harder than I wanted it to be. But I had now told her, and I couldn’t take it back and say it was a joke. “Pretty much.”
Holland covered her mouth, trying to muffle a laugh. “That’s the best thing I’ve heard, ever. You should’ve told me earlier.”
“I wasn’t exactly sure how to bring it up.”
“Now you did. And I have so many questions.” She glanced toward the front of the room where Hayes was still talking, then back at me. “I want every detail.”
“Not here,” I told her, meeting her eyes for a split second.
“You’re killing the momentum of the most shocking revelation of my week,” she murmured, then added, “Fine. Lunch, then.”
We ate lunch outside. Despite her hangover, Holland looked more alert than ever. She fired question after question, and I answered them all. I didn’t hold back. I told her what happened, how it felt, and how the whole thing had shifted something in me. I even admitted that I liked the control it gave me.
Holland stared at me like she couldn’t believe I had finally done something bold. Then she grinned, wide and proud, and told me to keep going and stop feeling weird about it.
Talking to her made things clearer. It made everything feel less heavy. Knowing she didn’t judge me for becoming a fluffer loosened the tightness I had been feeling in my chest.
After lunch and one more class, I headed home. Callan hadn’t told me when he planned to start filming, and I hoped I wasn’t late. But when I walked in, he was still adjusting the cameras. I walked up to the doorway and paused. He was focused, and the frown between his brows told me he was unhappy about something. I cleared my throat so he’d notice me.
Callan turned. “Hey.”
“Hey.” I tried for a small smile. “When are you starting?”
He let out a frustrated breath and lifted his hands in a short, annoyed gesture. “Whenever the girls decide to show up. I told them no later than four.”
I nodded and watched him shift another camera an inch to the left. He glanced back at me. “You had some questions.”
“Oh…yeah.” I dug into my tote bag, patting around for the notebook. “Shit. I have them upstairs.”
“Go get them.”
“Okay.”
I didn’t wait for him to repeat himself. I went upstairs, grabbed the notebook from my desk, and hurried back down. When I stepped into the filming room again, he was pushing a light closer to the bed. He turned when he heard me, giving me his attention with an expectant look.
“Shoot.”
I flipped open the notebook and turned to the pages where I had written down the questions. “I wanted to ask about the cameras first. Trey mentioned that you like to shoot from multiple angles, and sometimes even change them for the same scene. Why is that?”
He watched me more closely now. “You get different information from every angle. One camera gives you the action, another gives you the expression, and another shows the rhythm. If I only shoot from one spot, I lose half the story.”
I wrote that down in short sentences. “But why change them mid-scene? Doesn’t that take away from filming time?”
“It does, but I’d rather adjust than keep a dead shot. People shift. Bodies move. A good angle can turn useless in thirty seconds when you have the actors move differently than you intended.”
I nodded slowly before looking up from the notes again. “So you’re basically saying that you want your movies to seem real rather than staged.”
