“...after reshoots, of course,” Steph was saying, and my brain skidded into the present.
“Reshoots?” I repeated.
“Yes, reshoots, and you’d know about them if you’d kept your phone on,” Steph said, plucking her own phone out of my hands and then using it to point at me. “You, missy, are due back in Vermont in a few weeks for reshoots. Pearl changed the ending of the film. There’sa lotof boning in the new ending, so brace yourself, but the intimacy coordinator with the mangled-looking dog will be back to help you with it.”
I must have gone pale, because Steph came up and patted my cheek. “Turn on your phone,” she said.Pat, pat.“I’m emailing you the scripts and proposals tonight. Let’s make some money, Winnie.”
And then she waltzed out, leaving the scent of cherries behind her.
I stared at the shiplapped wall in front of me until Addison’s concerned face replaced it.
“You okay, boo bear?” she asked.
“I don’t know if I can see him again,” I confessed. “Much less do love scenes with him.”
“Oh honey,” she soothed, pulling me to my feet and into a tight hug. Which was really nice until she squeezed and pain shot from my breasts to everywhere in my body. I yelped.
Addison let go of me with a worried look as she prodded at her side boobs. “Did my underwire poke you or something?”
“No, it just hurt having my boobs smashed— Ow! Shit!” Addison had just reached out and given one of the boobs in question a thoughtful honk.
“What the heck?” I demanded, rubbing the abused breast protectively.
“How long have you been mega-sleepy?” Addison suddenly demanded.
“I don’t know, a while, I guess? Since I got back from Christmas Notch?”
“And the whole peanut butter sandwich and green smoothie diet? When did you start that?”
“Also when I got back, but I just haven’t felt good enough to eat much else—”
“And have you had your red badge of courage this month?”
I scoffed. “Of course I have; I always have it at the end of the...” I trailed off as I realized that in fact the crimson tidehadn’tcome this month. It had finished up right as I’d gotten toChristmas Notch, and then had stayed un-crimson ever since. Which didn’t mean anything. People had fluctuating periods for all sorts of reasons!
“I’m late sometimes when I’m stressed,” I insisted. “That’s what it is. I’ve just been stressed out about being bad in the movie. That’s all.”
Addison was eyeballing me like I was a teenager trying to argue that I hadn’t replaced the gin with water while Mommy was on vacation. “Winnie, I hate to sound like a high school counselor right now, but did Kallum wrap his willy before he got silly?”
I dropped my face into my hands. “Addison!”
“Well?”
“Yes! We always used a condom—even the first time when we thought we didn’t have one, and it turned out Kallum had an emergency condom in his phone case.”
“In his phone case?” Addison repeated. “Like trapped against a hot battery every hour of every day for God knows how long?”
“Phones don’t getthathot,” I said. “Plus no one gets pregnant the first time they have sex together. That’s a lie we were told as teens, Addy.”
“I think it’s less of a lie if you’ve sous-vided a condom to death with a phone. I bet it was an Android phone too. Stupid boys,” Addison muttered, disappearing from the living room and then coming back with a pink box. “Here. My sister left these here a million years ago when she was in town doing IUI.”
“What—no, I can’t be pregnant. I was going to have to see someone to get pregnant with Michael!”
“And had Michael ever seen anyone about having children? About making sure his loins were well seeded?”
“Gross, Addy.”
“Well?!”
