Vinny and Ali let me do that, and after half an hour, we leave the apartment. I’m the one driving because no amount of feelings—platonic or romantic—can change the fact that I’d rather be the designated driver than sit in the backseat.
Usually, driving keeps me at ease, but with what I'm doing today, and who I’m doing it with, I feel anything but. Ali is in the backseat giving me directions, and after a fair amount of traffic, we’re there.
The sun is already setting on the horizon as we enter the building. It looks almost…abandoned. Not dusty like a haunted house, but the aesthetic reminds me of the last film set I stepped foot on when I was seventeen.
Eventually, Ali leads us to a room, where Carly and a girl with vibrant red hair are standing, setting up the camera and sound equipment. A table stands next to the girl with red hair, and an empty bowl rests on it.
Carly finishes handling the monitor and her eyes find the three of us standing there, watching. Her demeanor changes once she spots me, from two different levels of surprise.
Yes, there are different kinds of surprises. Mostly good and bad, and then there’s genuine surprise when something you’d least expect appears out of nowhere. Carly’s eyes convey the latter.
Ali approaches her best friend, who hugs her.
“What are you guys doing here?” Carly asks, slightly confused but excited nonetheless.
“I told you that we’d help,” Ali responds.
Carly glances over Ali’s shoulder, and her eyes, those x-ray eyes that see right through me, find me. Her brows furrow when she sees me standing there. “All of you? Wait, I don’t remember asking for help.”
“Carl,” she sighs. “I wrote it down on my phone when you were complaining about it.” She pulls her phone out of her purse and holds it up to Carly, who leans a little closer to it.
A light chuckle escapes her lips, but even from this distance, I hear it. “Oh shit, I remember now.”
Vinny steps up, pulling me along with him. “Less staring, more helping,” he whispers to me.
“I wasn’t staring,” I retort. “I just zoned out.”
He raises a brow, clearly seeing through my bullshit, before turning to Carly. “What do you need us to do, boss?”
She lights up and starts giving us directions. Vinny is supposed to help Carly set up the equipment, while Ali goes with Stella—the girl with red hair—to unload the rest of the supplies.
My job? Mix the fake blood with said supplies. Not exactly ideal, but at least it’s easy.
I wait for Ali and Stella to grab the stuff needed for the fake blood and continue to scroll through my phone. There’s nothingelse I have to do today, other than homework and study, but I would take that over being on a set.
Yet, here I am, helping out on a film set. I seriously need to learn how to speak up for myself.
I feel the table shake and see Carly place a giant tub of glycerin on the table. “You know, Movie Star, I was not expecting you to come along.”
“Can you please stop calling me that?” I beg.
She shakes her head. “Nope.”
“What do you mean, nope?”
“I mean nope. Do you need to hear it in a different language?” She’s so amused right now, isn’t she? “Níl, Crew. That’s Gaelic.”
Adding another thing to the list of hobbies I didn’t know Carly Ryder had until now: speaking a language I’ve never heard of.
“But why did you come here?” She questions, dark brows furrowed at me. “If you don’t mind me asking. Did Vinny and Ali coerce you?”
I shrug helplessly and grab the bottle of glycerin to pour into the bowl. “Pretty much.”
Stella and Ali place the rest of the ingredients—chocolate syrup and a bottle of red dye—before walking off, in conversation.
“Ali is hard to say no to,” she comments, adding the red dye into the bowl, a few drops at a time.
I nod in agreement, because who the fuck am I kidding? Not Carly. There’s no point in hiding or lying to her because she can call me out with the snap of a finger.
