Elliot watched me as I dabbed his lip some more. “You should have told me,” he said softly.
“About my Nigerian prince?” I was intensely aware of his gaze upon my face.
“About your job being at risk,” he said with an eye-roll.
“You didn’t exactly make it easy for me,” I reminded him.
“I’m sorry, okay?” Elliot said. “Like I told you in the Village, there’s a lot riding on this script for me and … I took my frustrations out on you.”
“Believe it or not, I have a history of frustrating people,” I said, thinking of Bex.
“Oh, I believe it,” he said.
I stepped back, moving the teabag away.
“Sorry, sorry. Start over?”
“I’d like that,” I replied. Elliot’s thankful smile was sweet and slow, creasing dimples that I had an irrational urge to stroke. But then he hissed in pain and the smile vanished instantly. “Oops,” I said, replacing the teabag. “Less smiling, more teabag!”
“Tell me, what is it with British people and tea?” he asked.
“Big question,” I said. “It’s … it’s a ritual. It’s identity and it’s comfort.” I waggled the teabag in the air. “Don’t underestimate such a symbol.”
Elliot’s fingers brushed against mine as he took back the teabag poultice. “Huh.”
“What?”
“The power of a symbol. We can use that.” He eased off the table and pulled his laptop from his bag. “Shall we?”
Several hours later, I emerged from the writers’ room, dazed and thirsty, heading to the kitchen. Elliot and I had spent the last thirty minutes arguing whether Marla would use a word likeobsequious. I had thought not, Elliot had accused me of reverse snobbery, and I’d felt like throwing my laptop at him as a result. But we’d managed to make some changes and now the scene where audiences first met Marla was so much better, with Elliot working in subtle symbolism to satisfy his vision for the character, but more efficient dialogue to keep audiences hooked.
As I helped myself to juice from the fridge, Ralf entered the kitchen on his phone.
“It’s not bullshit,” he was saying. “You want more bang for the buck, I get it.” He caught my gaze and winked. I drank more juice, pretending I wasn’t intrigued by what he was talking about. “But I’m telling you I can squeeze another mil.” He laughed loudly – it sounded a little fake – but whatever the person on the other end said was clearly what he wanted to hear, and he hung up after a cheerful goodbye.
“That sounded like a good call,” I said casually, as if I wasn’t dying to know the details.
“Oh, it was absolutely not.” He chuckled, pulling an espresso cup from the cupboard. “Finance stuff, you’d be bored.”
“Guarantee I wouldn’t,” I assured him. “I think I could learn a lot from simply listening to you and Sadie talk shop.”
His eyebrows twitched with interest. “You swear you’re just a PA?”
I frowned. Kind of an odious assumption that a PA couldn’t express interest in the financial structuring of movie deals. “Well, I’m not a plant from Rian Johnson’s office, if that’s what you’re asking,” I said.
“Right, you picked up on RJ’s obsession with theotherRJ of Hollywood?” Ralf said, filling his espresso cup.
“Honestly, I didn’t know what to say,” I admitted. “But it’s weird, right?”
“That’s directors for you,” he said. “But speaking of the race to the Oscars, let me reiterate just how revolutionary this software I mentioned is.”
“I’m sure it is,” I said hesitantly. Like Elliot, I was wary of AI.
“You know the stakes,” Ralf said. “Oscars, box office … ? Maybe we should bring in the big guns, you know what I mean?”
“Is he trying to peddle his AI nonsense again?” Vivian’s voice cut through our discussion like a blade. Ralf and I turned to see her at the watercooler, filling up a rather ostentatious Stanley cup that appeared to have been custom-upholstered in a leather-like material. Was there anything about this woman that didn’t scream money? I’d have put good money on her elegant suit costing more than my entire wardrobe.
“Vivian,” Ralf greeted her with a lazy grin. “Nice of you to take a break between manicures to fraternize with the peasants.”
