Acting Out

by Tibby Armstrong

  In a flash of awareness of something outside himself, Kit understood the potential Falkner saw in the guy. The dichotomy. A latent power and flexibility of nature that, if harnessed, promised to light up the screen. Rich or poor, Jeremy stood to go places far beyond the ass end of Culver City. Kit smiled as Jeremy’s weight settled back onto the motorcycle. Rarely did he get to do something different. Experience something new. Unless he missed his guess, if he stuck around with Jeremy, they’d both be in for a wild ride.

  Chapter Four

  Kitsch and concrete gave way to mission style and neighborhood-like streets as they crossed over Santa Monica Boulevard. Trying to forget all his worldly goods now consisted of a half-filled duffel separating his chest from Kit’s back, Jeremy focused on the way the actor’s muscles moved as he maneuvered his mechanical steed around tight turns. Tanned forearms rippled with a landscape of blue vein and golden hair as a twist of the throttle let loose a throaty growl.

  “Can you go faster? Really open it up?” Jeremy asked, not caring he didn’t have a helmet. He needed to feel power somewhere in his world, if only in the scream of the engine beneath him.

  Kit’s wicked chuckle gave the implicit warning, You don’t know what you’re in for.

  “Go for it!” Jeremy shouted. Traffic was light, and the street stretched long and straight into the distance.

  Crouching low, Kit said, “Hang on!”

  And they were off almost before Jeremy could grab hold. Pressing himself as close as he could to Kit’s back with the bag in the way, he turned his head sideways and relished the inertia as the bike rocketed forward. Parked cars and bungalows a blur, they raced down Manning. Tears stung at Jeremy’s eyes as they blew through the stop sign at Holman, and something broke free in him.

  Laughing, he screamed, “Faster!”

  Amazingly, Kit complied.

  At this velocity, the shriek of the engine seemed likely the only warning pedestrians had of their approach. In Kit’s mirror, Jeremy saw a police car start to follow them and give up before it’d even begun. He laughed, maniacal, at the feeling of danger-wrapped freedom, emotions seeming to whipsaw through him at the same speed as the bike. When Kit slowed, turned into a driveway, and eased the motorcycle down a ramp under a mission-style condominium, Jeremy found himself still grinning.

  They pulled into a space wide enough for a car and parked next to a silver BMW Z8. Legs rubbery from the adrenaline, Jeremy stood.

  “That what you were looking for?” Kit asked.

  “Hell yeah.” Jeremy’s voice echoed in the cool underground space.

  Kit huffed a laugh and grabbed the bag from Jeremy.

  Jeremy eyed the Z8 and several other pricey cars nearby. He’d never seen so many luxury vehicles in one place. “That your Beemer?”

  Already walking toward a lobby entrance, Kit tossed a “Yeah” over his shoulder and kept going.

  “Nice,” Jeremy said, his eyes trailing over shiny chrome and glistening leather.

  Feeling lame and not a little inadequate, he trotted to catch up with Kit. They walked into the two-story art deco lobby. Jeremy reflexively sniffed, attempting to scent stale beer or the pungent tang of fear. The air smelled crisp, every surface gleamed, and he felt himself relax a notch. No need to look over his shoulder or check dark corners here.

  Kit’s cell buzzed. He held up one finger and put the phone to his ear. “S’up?”

  Jeremy sat in a tufted ivory chair in the lobby’s center and listened absentmindedly to Kit’s conversation. Light glinted off the gilded ironwork in the atrium above, creating tiny splashes of color along the colonnade. Black and white marble tiles gleamed under a period chandelier, and well-watered palms flanked floor-to-ceiling windows.

  “Yeah. I thought it went well,” Kit said.

  Jeremy rolled his head to the side and looked at Kit, who pointed at the phone and mouthed Stone. Excitement shot from his stomach to his extremities, and he sat up.

  Kit walked in a tight circle around a medallion embedded in the marble foyer floor as he listened to whatever the casting director had to say. He ran a hand through his hair, letting it fall in sun-streaked waves.

  “Thanks, dude. I appreciate the say. I’m good.” Covering the mouthpiece, Kit asked Jeremy, “Do you want to talk to him?”

  Jeremy waved his hands in a no way motion. What could the guy possibly have to say to him?

  “Jeremy’s here with me,” Kit said, ignoring the response. “Yes, Ash. Who else?”

  Jeremy groaned and closed his eyes. No way he’d beg for this part, no matter his circumstances.

  “Take it,” Kit whispered, emphatic.

  Jeremy opened his eyes to see Kit holding out the phone. With a wary glance, he took the warm cell and lifted it to his ear. “Hello?”

  “Jeremy.” Vance’s voice sounded businesslike and bubbly in a way only Hollywood veterans seemed to manage. “Glad to know you and Kit hit it off.”

  Holding the phone away from his ear, Jeremy struggled for something to say that would disabuse Vance of the notion he and Kit were BFFs. He couldn’t exactly say, I just lost my apartment. Or I’m down to my last twenty-two dollars, and he took pity on me.

  “Yeah, he’s great.” He glanced at Kit’s back.

  “So you’re good with working with him, then? It’s a pretty intimate part.”

  Jeremy’s stomach dropped sixty feet and rebounded twice as high. “What? I mean yes!”

  Hell yes!

  Kit turned and gave him a glint-eyed grin that made Jeremy’s abdomen go funny. He’d bounced from his lowest low to his highest high in a little over an hour, and the contrast gave his reality a surreal tint he suspected closely resembled shock. Hands shaking, Jeremy let his arms drop. A moment later, vaguely aware of Kit prying at his fingers, he released the phone.

  “I’ll have him call you tomorrow.” Kit ended the call and sat on his haunches. “You all right, dude?”

  Jeremy knew he should speak, say something reassuring, but his brain spun without finding traction.

  “Hooboy,” Kit said. “You need a drink.”

  Jeremy licked his lips and found them dry.

  “Yeah,” he managed.

  “Come upstairs.” Kit grabbed him under the arm and foisted him from the chair. “We’ll get changed and go celebrate your first Hollywood victory.”

  Upstairs, Kit tossed his keys into a bowl by the door and slid off his shoes. Jeremy followed his host’s example, and his bare feet met cool bamboo flooring. At the far end of the room, arched balcony windows showcased the fading streaks of a pink-and-purple sunset. The view drew him into the living room, where he cataloged every egress. An open-concept kitchen to the right. A hall to the left. Understated Japanese furniture kept the room open and airy despite an abundance of dark wood. Shimmering art-glass pieces decorated most of the horizontal surfaces, the effect calm, soothing, and elegant.

  “Did you have a decorator?” Jeremy asked.

  “Nah. I threw it together from stuff I’ve picked up here and there,” Kit answered from the kitchen area. “Want something to eat?”

  Jeremy popped into the kitchen and observed the granite counters and stainless appliances. “You cook?”

  Kit peered over the top of the fridge door. “Meals? No.”

  “Sure you’re not trying to poison me?” Jeremy settled onto a bar stool by the island.

  “And go through that audition process again?” Kit approached the island, his arms full of a container of yogurt, a bag of granola, and a pile of fresh fruit. “Help yourself.”

  The fruit bounced to the counter. A few grapes threatened to escape off the edge. Jeremy caught them with one hand and stopped a rolling apple with the other. The banter between himself and Kit calmed his nerves. If he’d walked the long miles home only to find himself evicted, he didn’t know what he’d have done.

  “Thanks for this…for everything,” Jeremy said.

  “Don’t mention it.”

  The openin
g of containers and clink of spoons punctuated a companionable silence, and Jeremy’s thoughts returned to the conversation with Vance.

  “Oh shit.” He paused, spoon halfway to his mouth as he remembered he’d landed the part. “Oh fuck. Oh holy shit.”

  “Whoa, whoa.” Kit laughed. “Don’t go catatonic on me again.”

  Jeremy put down his spoon and stared into the bowl. “Sorry. It’s like rags to riches in the space of one day.”

  “Not like. It is.” Kit punctuated the reassurance with a brilliant smile.

  “Wow.” Jeremy didn’t know if the statement applied to his good news or the stunned feeling he had in his middle every time Kit flashed his pearly whites, but either way, it worked.

  “I wish I could feel your excitement.” Kit lifted an apple and began to peel it as he spoke. “I’ll have to settle for getting drunk with you to celebrate.”

  Spooning yogurt and granola into his mouth, Jeremy contemplated the tart and sweet flavors. The rough edges of the oats and nuts reminded him of the scrape of Kit’s canines along his tongue. He closed his eyes and swallowed.

  “Don’t you think you’re going to have your fill of me during filming?” he asked.

  “Something like,” Kit answered wryly. “But if I have to go gay to reestablish myself, at least it’s with someone who can show me the ropes so I don’t make an ass of myself.”

  Familiar with the straight mentality that said being gay constituted the adult version of cooties, Jeremy brushed aside the impulse to take offense at Kit’s ignorant statement. No use repaying the guy’s kindness with snark. The best way to beat prejudice in this case seemed a healthy dose of patient understanding, not in-your-face politicking.

  “Did it freak you out?” Jeremy asked.

  “What?”

  “Kissing.” Jeremy tried to make the question sound matter of fact. “Did it freak you out?”

  Pink crept up Kit’s neck to color his face, and he dug into his yogurt with studied focus. “It was weird.”

  “I’ve never kissed a woman.” Where the hell had that confession come from? “I think it’d feel weird.”

  “Dude.” Kit looked up, eyes wide. “Then how do you know you’re gay?”

  “Do you drive every car before you decide what to buy?” Jeremy settled his spoon against the rim of his bowl. “Don’t you know what you like when you find it?”

  “It doesn’t mean I rule out a Porsche later on because I drive a Beemer,” Kit argued.

  “Yes, but you’re at least interested in a Porsche. It does something for you when you look at it, right?”

  This dialogue about sexuality constituted Jeremy’s first on the subject. To have it with not only a virtual stranger but a Hollywood celebrity seemed even more surreal than the rest of his day.

  Kit frowned, staring into his bowl. “Do you want to fuck me?”

  Jeremy gaped. “What?”

  “Am I your Porsche?” Kit elaborated. “Do you want me?”

  Thoughts crashed through Jeremy’s brain. The loudest screamed, Lie! and the second loudest said, God, yes! Deciding on a compromise between the two, Jeremy made a joke of the question. “Doesn’t everyone?”

  A self-conscious snort accompanied Kit’s rise from the stool. Grabbing Jeremy’s bowl and his own, Kit brought them both to the sink and washed them up. Staring at sturdy shoulders that tapered to a muscled back and slim hips, Jeremy felt himself harden at the thought of pressing his host against the counter from behind. Jeremy met Kit’s gaze in the mirror over the sink.

  “How many?” Kit asked.

  Unable to look away, Jeremy parroted, “How many what?”

  “How many guys have you fucked?”

  Jeremy’s arousal subsided as quickly as it had come on. What was this? The Spanish Inquisition? The challenge in Kit’s gaze made Jeremy bring his chin up a notch. “Actually fucked? None.”

  The bowl Kit washed clattered into the sink.

  “How many women have you slept with?” Jeremy challenged.

  Drying his hands, Kit leaned against the kitchen counter and shrugged. “How the hell should I know?”

  Visions of Kit entwined with a woman flickered like a grainy home film against the movie screen of Jeremy’s mind. He stood to take the drying towel from his host and, as a distraction, finished up the dishes. The actor leaned casually against the far counter. Watching.

  “What?” Jeremy stilled.

  Kit blinked, slow, as if coming back to himself. “I’ll show you to your room so you can get ready.”

  Jeremy began to trail Kit into the living room, realized he still held the dishtowel, and returned to the kitchen to put it away.

  “Ready for what?” he called after his host.

  Distance muffled Kit’s answer into, Something something, celebrate and get wrecked.

  Jeremy followed the sound of opening doors to the back of the condo, where a bedroom opened off a long hallway. A black platform bed, low to the ground and of generous proportions, dominated the room. Tatami mats massaged his feet with their rush-grass surface as he entered to find Kit inside a walk-in closet bigger than some bedrooms he’d had. The actor held up a black shirt. It draped from its hanger in a waterfall of silk.

  “I think this’ll fit you,” Kit said.

  Jeremy backed up a step. “I’d ruin it.”

  The garment sailed across the closet toward him. Reflexively, he shot out his hand to catch it. Soft material landed lightly in his fingers. Cool and luxurious, it’d feel so good against his skin in the warm night air.

  Reluctantly, he tried to hand the shirt back, but Kit further dismissed his concerns with, “It’s yours. It doesn’t fit anyway.”

  “You think it’ll look okay with these jeans?” The question came out sounding as dumbfounded as Jeremy felt.

  Rummaging through his clothing, Kit drew out a pair of darker jeans lightly faded in all the right places, then lifted gleaming black loafers from a custom-made shoe rack.

  “Size eleven?” he asked, looking at Jeremy’s feet.

  Jeremy nodded, and Kit handed him the shoes and trousers.

  “You need to have your feet done,” Kit said with a grimace.

  “A pedicure?” Jeremy burst out laughing.

  “Good hygiene is not just a gay thing.” Kit’s bristling tone took Jeremy aback until he saw the glint of humor in his eyes.

  “Yeah. Right. Whatever.” Jeremy forgot about the embarrassment of borrowed riches in his hands as he smirked at Kit.

  Kit broke the stare first. “You can get changed in here.”

  Jeremy looked behind him. “Isn’t this your room?”

  “I’m down the hall.” Already on his way out the door, Kit called, “Take your time. Shower… Shave… Cut your toenails…”

  Jeremy snorted and closed the door. He took in the room’s understated opulence—a light down comforter, a Japanese take on a swooping slipper chair, a rice-paper lampshade edged in dark brown, fluffy white towels monogrammed with Japanese characters visible in the bathroom beyond—nothing overdone, yet everything indefinably expensive, even to his inexperienced eye.

  Jeremy crossed to the bed and sat. Firmness you could sink into without getting lost invited him to lie back and contemplate the ceiling. Quiet cushioned the space around him. White light rippled with the movement of sheer draperies in the gentle breeze of central air. The temperature in here felt perfect. In fact, everything felt perfect…perfectly safe and so very far removed from the cockroaches scuttling across the wide-gapped floorboards of the room he’d poured his meager tips into. Part of him couldn’t believe people really lived this way—without the threat of violence or the fear of loss. With enough money not to worry where their next meal or next month’s rent would come from.

  He drew in a lungful of air and blew out a breath. The events of the day rushed over him, tumbling his emotions until he confused up with down and happy with sad. Overwhelmed, he lay motionless as tears welled to stream down either side of his
face, wetting his hair and trickling into his ears. He cried for the loss of his things and fragile sense of place, then laughed at the flood of gratitude for his last-minute rescue from hell’s gaping maw. Laughter turned into gut-wrenching silent sobs, then into hysterics as his brain tried and failed to cope with his change in circumstances. If his family knew… His family. Telling Kit he’d check in with them next week? Bullshit. Pure and simple. If Kit hadn’t brought him here, he’d never have known he’d gotten the part.

  Sitting up, Jeremy swiped at his cheeks. With so much to be thankful for, his crying jag seemed more than a little crazy. One audition…one kiss…one motorcycle ride changed so much. Confusion still dogging him, he went in search of the shower to clear the emotional haze from his brain. Tonight, he wanted to take in everything. To remember…and to forget.

  Chapter Five

  Kit’s entourage trickled into the club around midnight when the place really got rocking: Phil Carraway, a stunt double from his first feature film; Eric Lawson, an actor from a rival show he’d met on the studio lot in his early teens; and Drew Millhouse and Curt Fontaine, a couple kids from other Hollywood families he’d been hanging out with for years. All insiders.

  The more people arrived, the more withdrawn Jeremy became. A dead bottle of Cristal lay on its side on the table, the label long-since stripped as a result of Jeremy’s nervous habit. The table had moved on to Johnny Walker Blue. Kit eyed the tentative way Jeremy handled his glass, nursing the whiskey, and snorted.

  Wary brown eyes focused on Kit.

  Taking the glass from Jeremy’s hand, Kit downed the quarter inch of alcohol in one gulp. His stomach warmed and his nostrils stung, but he didn’t blink.

  “Man up, dude!” Kit challenged.

  The rest of the guys at the table, along with their token babe, model Amber Winslow, hooted at the challenge.

  “Sorry.” Jeremy shrugged, looking twice as self-conscious and out of place as before. “I don’t like the taste.”

  Surprised the kid hadn’t risen to the bait and downed a glass like the rest of his friends, Kit raised a finger for the cocktail waitress.