“I know,” Ralf agreed. “I –we –have never seen him so psyched after getting critique on anything, ever. Like, he’s been talking about you like you’re a wunderkind. And obviously I have my concerns, but I’m also curious about what you can do. I hope you can live up to his expectations.”
“Wunderkind?” I repeated in horror. And why did his hopeful statement sound like a warning?
“Eh.” He waved a hand. “Don’t you worry. Just show ’em what you got.”
Easier said than done, I thought. Anxiety throbbed insistently just below the surface of my skin, and I darted a glance towards the lifts, wondering if I should just cut my losses now and make my escape.
Ralf could clearly read my emotions as he put a reassuring hand on my shoulder. “Honestly. Don’t worry. Anyone gives you any trouble, just come to me.”
“That’s really nice of you, but I—”
“Look, I’m going to share a secret with you,” he interrupted smoothly. “There are two types of people who work in movies. You get the dreamers and then you get the doers. Take me, I got the MBA, I got the five-year, ten-year, twenty-year life plan. I know exactly where I gotta be and when. I’m working for Sadie now, but that’s not for forever. You know why?”
“You’re a doer?” I said, bewildered.
“You got it,” he said. “Dreamers have their place, don’t get me wrong, but doers get shit done. Be a doer, Lucie.”
“Wow,” I mused. “You’re really American, you know that?”
Ralf threw his head back with laughter. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“It was meant as one,” I assured him.Mostly.But I understood what he was trying to say. Ralf was clearly someone who grabbed life by the balls, and I had to admit it would be good to have someone like him on my side. We’d been strolling through the office as we talked and not one person had smiled or greeted me, offering only a view of their backs or, at best, a cool stare.
“What’s over there?” I pointed over to the far end of the office, where people were milling around desks in an open-plan setting with a large whiteboard dominating an entire wall.
“That’s the production hub,” Ralf said. “A few doers, but definitely some dreamers whothinkthey are doers.”
I knew RJF had four full-time producers plus Sadie. Two were execs concerned with financing and budgeting, with two others focusing on the mechanics of production itself. “Are some of those people freelance then?”
“We nearly always have a considerable number of freelance producers and creatives working here,” Ralf explained. “Like for right now, outside of RJ’s script, we got two films in pre-production, not to mentionAll Kinds of Killing, whichis about to open, and it’s a big deal, a major studio release. We also have several TV shows in various stages of development and production. So, we need bodies, and this is where we put them.” He began to lead me away from the hub. “But as you’re solely working on this one script, you won’t need to spend any time there.”
“Okay.” I noticed one woman a little older than me, sitting by herself in a corner of the hub, head in one hand as she scrolled through something on her laptop. Her body was still, bar the bouncing knee, indicating some kind of underlying stress. There was something familiar about the taut expression on her face. I recognized it, as I’d felt what she was feeling in that moment many times throughout my career. Like her, I’d also endured it alone.
“So back here is RJ’s office.” Ralf led me to the back of the office, where a heavy wooden door awaited, framed by frosted glass windows. “You just need to brave Cerberus to get in there.”
“I see – wait, who?” I followed Ralf’s mocking gaze to the desk positioned outside the office. A woman with impossibly shiny black hair was rising to her feet, eyes heavily encircled with liner and thick lashes. As she folded her arms at our approach, I noticed a huge diamond ring on her left hand catch the light.
“Vivian, meet Lucie,” Ralf said. “Lucie, this is Vivian LaValle, RJ’s personal assistant.”
“Executiveassistant,” Vivian corrected him.
“Oh!” Ralf’s voice was smooth, his smile unflustered in the blast of her stony gaze. “Do excuse me.”
“Hi.” I reached out my hand.RJ invited me, I reminded myself.
Vivian stared down at my outstretched hand but made no effort to shake it. Abashed, I withdrew. Another person whodidn’t want me here. But I lifted my chin and met her eye as confidently as I could. “Nice to meet you.”
“Come on, Vivi, let’s be cordial,” Ralf soothed. “Lucie has come a long way to be here.”
“I know,” she said through gritted teeth. “And it’sVivian.”
“My deepest and sincerest apologies,” he replied calmly. “I will throw myself off the balcony immediately as penance.”
Vivian sniffed. “Such hyperbole is unbecoming of you.” She then turned discerning eyes my way, casting a gaze up and down. “RJ has asked me to set you up with everything you need. Laptop, cell phone …”
“I brought my own laptop,” I said, tilting my tote bag to show it.
“It’s company policy,” explained Ralf. “We need a lot of security software and the like to protect RJ’s IP. You understand. Same with the phones.”
