“Audra,” said my father, slowly stepping up to me with an even smile on his face. I could tell he was already pretty drunk.
“Hey,” I replied, tightening my grip on my bag and probably giving him an impatient face.
“Can I, uh, get some money,” he said, fumbling a bit. “For bills.”
“For bills,” I repeated, emitting a soft sigh. Reaching into my bag, I retrieved my wallet and started thumbing through it. I pulled out a few twenties and handed them over. “Here.”
“Thanks,” he said. “I’ve got some buddies coming over later and they might get a little loud.”
“Thanks for warning me.”
“I can kick them out if you know what time you’ll be back,” he said.
“I don’t,” I said. “I’m not sure how late this thing is gonna go.”
“All right,” said my father, looking down to the cash I had given him.
“I’m running late,” I said. “I’ll catch you later.”
I pushed through the screen door and let it slam behind me. It was hard for me to spend time with my father. I mean, I loved him but I just had a tough time respecting him anymore. My being stuck at home with him was like a metaphor for me being stuck in this town.
I needed out of both.
I stood alone, hovering around a high top table in the old ballroom of the hotel, watching as the production crew and cast drifted about, socializing, drinking, picking at finger food that was setup throughout the hall. The ballroom had a vintage charm, not really grand by any means, but still a nice throwback to the past. There was a stage at the front where bands used to play but we pretty much always kept the curtains drawn closed now.
Sipping on my champagne, I wondered why I even came to this. Nobody was interested in talking to me. I was, after all, the help. And I think Jake simply had me come in so that I could be his eyes as he ran around and made sure everybody had what they needed. But at least I wasn’t at home. At least I wasn’t smelling beer on my father’s breath, wishing I was somewhere else. And even though I was a bit lonely, I felt good in my dress, I felt good having my hair down, I felt just that more free even if it was for a fleeting moment.
Out of the corner of my eye I spotted someone nearing me. I lowered my champagne glass, setting it on the table, and then turned my head. It was Kelsie heading my way, a casual smile on her lips, strutting toward me wearing a lightweight white summer dress with little black and yellow floral figures on it.
Kelsie had her hair done in two braids, kneaded back into pigtails, and she wore a puka shell necklace around her neck. Her face just beamed with joy and contentment, like she had it all figured out, like she was immensely happy all the time. It was incredibly alluring. I felt my heartbeat quicken as she closed in on me.
“Audra,” she said coolly, sliding up to me and resting her hand on the table, using it to support herself. “It’s nice to see you.”
“Hi,” I said, feeling a little bit embarrassed.
“I like the seersucker,” said Kelsie with a slow nod, looking down at my dress. “Really works with your tan.”
“Thanks,” I demurred.
“You still haven’t taken me to the beach,” said Kelsie, mock scolding me. “We’ve been here, what? A week? All work and no play makes Kelsie a dull girl.” She laughed at herself lightly. She was so carefree and easy.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I just feel like I work all the time.”
“C’mon,” she said with a sly grin. “You can take a day off.”
“Yeah, but don’t you have a crazy schedule?” I asked incredulously. I felt kind of pushed by Kelsie, to be honest, and I think I reacted a little harsher than I should have.
“Totally,” she said with a smile and a shrug. “But we can figure it out.”
Kelsie made me feel kind of strange. Apart from the sexual attraction I felt for her, it just felt so strange to me that this Hollywood actress would give a damn about me. The skeptic in me was coming out and I really wanted to know more. It just felt so odd, so out of place.
“I don’t even know why someone like you would want to hang out with someone like me,” I said in a self-deprecating tone. I reached for my glass and took a quick sip of champagne.
“I dunno,” admitted Kelsie, offering a shrug. “You just look like you’d be fun and I’m looking for a friend.”
“What about all them?” I asked, pointing haphazardly out toward all the production people, twirling my finger indolently.
“Those people are great,” she admitted with a smile. “But I don’t fit in with them.”
“You don’t?” I said. It was a confusing realization.
“Not so much,” said Kelsie. She was still smiling but it was more of a wistful smile. “Hollywood is a weird world, a lot of focus on money and power and, I don’t know, being better than everyone else.”
“Okay,” I said. “But aren’t you supposed to be, like, a super famous starlet or something?” Kelsie laughed and looked at me, our eyes meeting. Hers were warm and accepting, tickled even, and I’m sure mine conveyed timidness and confusion.
“So what are you saying?” she intoned. “That I should be like all them?”
“Well, no,” I said. “But I just figured that if you’re in this position, you probably care at least a little bit about all that.”
“I guess I do,” she said. “A little. I can’t deny that. I do like the attention. But it’s like… it’s hard to explain. Sometimes I feel like I don’t fit in with all these people… emotionally. You know?”
“I suppose,” I said. “Not really.”
“This happened really fast for me,” said Kelsie. “One minute I was living in this communal flophouse with a bunch of weirdo friends, the next I’m in this low budget movie that does well at Sundance and now… all this,” she said, spreading her arms out to indicate something greater than she expected. “Audra, I’m just a normal chick who is now living a very abnormal life.”
“Okay, okay,” I said, putting my hands up. “I get it.”
“Don’t be so on edge,” said Kelsie smiling. “I’m just trying to be friendly.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t mean to be on edge. I guess I just got my defenses up for whatever reason.”
“I understand,” said Kelsie with a warmth in her face. She had a smattering of freckles on her face but they were mostly obscured by makeup. Kelsie had slight features and a pale visage. It made me feel stupid how much I was attracted to her. It made me feel like just another Hollywood stargazer. But I’d never seen a single movie Kelsie was in, I probably hadn’t even heard of them. Unless, of course, they had previously been a book.
“Okay,” I said. “I’m going to lower my defenses a little bit and try to cool down. I just want to let you know that I’m not impressed by celebrities.” This gave Kelsie a big laugh.
“Fine,” she said with a hint of snark. “I’m not impressed by snotty hotel receptionists.”
“That’s good” I countered, beginning to feel a little more comfortable with her. “Because I’m not a snotty hotel receptionist.”
“What are you then?” said Kelsie, putting her hands on her hips.
“I’m a… uh,” I said, trying to find my words. “I’m a writer.” I mean, I wanted to be a writer but I hadn’t written anything in a long time. What I should have said to her is that my dream was to be a writer.
“A writer?” said Kelsie, lifting an eyebrow. “That’s awesome. I love writers. I wish I had that kind of imagination. What are you working on?”
I sunk against the high top table and averted my eyes. Some dance song came over the speaker system and I saw a handful of people begin to move with the music. I also caught a couple of people looking over at us, probably wondering why Kelsie Kent was spending so much time talking to the boring hotel receptionist.
“I haven’t written anything in a while,” I said. “I need to get back to it.”
“I see,” said Kelsie, giving me a knowi
ng grin. “Maybe you could write a movie for me.”
“I wouldn’t even know the first place to start with writing a movie,” I said. “Just a lot of dialogue?” Kelsie laughed.
“You should come to our shoot sometime,” she said. Kelsie reached out and gently placed her hand on my wrist, offering me a tender smile. “You can see what it’s like behind the scenes.”
“Yeah, maybe,” I said, my eyes flashing down to her hand. My wrist felt like it was beginning to sweat. To have Kelsie touch me like that sent a shiver up my spine.
“Why not?” she said. “It’ll be fun.”
“What’s the movie about?” I asked cautiously.
“It’s a romance,” she said. “About the children of farmers in a dying farm town.”
“You and that guy?”
“Yep,” she said with a smile. Kelsie then leaned in closer to my ear, a smile still on her face. “I’m a good actress,” she said in a whisper.
I wanted to ask her what that meant but in that moment I knew exactly what she meant. It was so obvious in her tone. Kelsie was coming on to me and I could feel it in my heart. I admit that it threw me for a loop, and it made me feel amazing and unworthy at the same time. This pretty actress could go for any girl she wanted and there were probably plenty of amazing women out in LA where she lived. But here she was, hinting at something with me, and the emotions I felt inside were just so satisfying. Did somebody actually want me? The answer felt like yes. I smiled and tried to not let a tear come to my eye as all of this bounced around my brain.
“Okay,” I said, slowly nodding. “I’ll come to the shoot.”
“Awesome,” said Kelsie. She gave my wrist a tender squeeze and then stepped back. “I should get back to socializing with the crew. We’re shooting at this old farm house off of Hickory Tree Road, do you know what I’m talking about?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I know the farm.”
“I’ll let them know you’re coming,” said Kelsie. “See you soon?”
“Right,” I said. I was flummoxed.
“Good.” Kelsie smiled and it was perfection. “Peace!” said Kelsie, lifting her hand up and flashing a peace sign at me. I couldn’t tell if she was being funny or serious. She then turned from me and began wandering off, back toward what looked like the VIP table of the party. My hand automatically moved toward my champagne, lifted it toward my mouth, and I downed the rest of it. I continued to watch Kelsie as she shimmied away from me, her pallid legs casually stepping one after another, her dress bouncing up around her rear, her braided ponytails swaying with her moves. I had to stop myself from allowing my knees to buckle.
I didn’t know what was coming over me. These definitely weren’t the feelings I was used to. I needed another glass of champagne.
I had told Jake that the movie people wanted me to come out to their shoot the next day so that I could coordinate some things with production. It was a fib, sure, but Kelsie’s invitation had given me a new verve that I hadn’t felt in a really long time. And since Jake knew I had been working off and on with Jennifer, the production assistant, he didn’t question my request to have someone else fill in on the desk for me. He was keen to make the production crew happy. They were, after all, paying him a lot of money.
Pulling up to the farm in my Jeep, I turned into the dirt driveway and cruised down it. It was a long driveway with a large stand of trees out front that blocked the movie crew’s many vehicles from the view of the road. Still, it wasn’t a big secret where they were filming. Word gets around fast in a small town. I had all the doors and roof off my Jeep and the sun beat down into it, warming my bare arms and legs, my jean shorts riding up, my torso covered in a tank, sunglasses down on my face, ponytail up. I admit, I felt pretty cool driving up to the shoot. I felt almost as though I belonged.
A large bald man with sunglasses stood in the middle of the driveway as I closed in on the shoot. He held his hand up and stepped to the side as I slowed my car and brought it to a stop next to him.
“Oh, hey,” he said, recognizing me. “You’re the girl from the hotel.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Kelsie invited me to the shoot. Is it all right if I come in?”
“Sure,” he said. “Just pull around up to the left there, you’ll see all the other cars parked. And make sure to be quiet as you walk up.”
“Thanks,” I said, offering the security guard a smile. He nodded at me and gave me his official wave through. I continued driving.
There were large white semi-trucks parked along the side of the driveway and then when I got to the makeshift parking lot I saw midsize white buses, but the fancy kind, the same short buses I had been seeing every morning at the hotel to pick up the crew and take them to the shoot. Turning the steering wheel, I parked alongside one of the busses, careful not to park anybody in.
Looking up to the rearview mirror, I checked out my face, opened my mouth, smiled, inspecting that nothing was in my teeth. It was a hot late summer morning, and I already felt a slight sweat on me. But the heat was my friend. I never complained about the heat and always welcomed its arrival each year. Stretching in the Jeep seat, I sat up and picked my shorts out from underneath me.
It wasn’t too long of a walk down the dirt driveway until I came upon where the movie was being filmed. There were a couple of large cameras, each with a man sitting in a chair attached it, riding it like a horse. There were big generators with tall poles running up from them, a light pointed down toward the ground even though there was plenty of sun out. And there were many people milling about, but all of them kept behind some imaginary line beyond which it appeared only the actors were allowed.
And one of those actors was Kelsie.
She was dressed in cutoff jean shorts, much like those that I was wearing, along with a sleeveless plaid button-down shirt and a mesh-backed baseball cap on her head. I found it kind of hilariously corny, actually, to see her dressed like that. It was so stereotypical “farm girl” whereas the real-life farm girls I’d actually known never really dressed like that at all. Usually just full-length jeans and a grubby t-shirt. The actor opposite her was that guy everyone was talking about, Josh Timony, and he was dressed about how you’d expect. Again, stereotypical farm guy.
I think it was those kind of tropes that really made me roll my eyes at Hollywood. They always took the easy way. But, at the same time, despite not being a woman who gives a damn about movies, I have to say that I was pretty stoked to be standing there behind the scenes, watching Kelsie film a scene. It was strange. It was like watching someone I knew, but it wasn’t her. Okay, granted, I didn’t really know Kelsie all that well yet. But I sorta did. And watching her act was like looking at her from another angle, if that makes any sense at all.
As I approached, one of the assistants, this guy Jerry, turned to me and lifted his finger to his lips to indicate I should keep quiet and I nodded to him with a smile. I saddled up near him, crossed my arms, and listened in on the scene.
“But what are you going to do if your daddy sells the farm?” Kelsie asked, her arms lingering at Josh’s hips. She looked sullen, defeated, her eyes trained on Josh’s face.
“I suppose I could get a job at the quarry,” said Josh. “But I’ll have to move out of Harrisville to be closer to where the work is.”
“Oh Baker,” Kelsie said in lament. She laid her head on his chest and closed in on him as Josh wrapped his arms tightly around her and pulled her in close. The two of them held this pose for a few moments, which confused me, until I heard a man speak off to one side.
“Cut!” said the man, waving his hand in the air. “We got it.”
Kelsie and Josh pushed apart, laughed, made some small talk, as the crew livened up and conversation suddenly filled the air. It was a strange dichotomy for me, going from a few dozen people hanging out in near silence, only Kelsie and Josh speaking at all, to almost everyone else speaking at once.
“First time on a movie set?” asked Jerry, the production assis
tant I was near. He gave me a friendly smile.
“Yeah,” I admitted. “Not my first time at this farm, though, strangely.” He laughed.
“Did we leave something at the hotel?” he said, still smiling. “Is there a reason you’re stopping by?"
“No,” I said sheepishly. “Kelsie asked me to stop by and see her.”
“Fair enough,” said Jerry, giving me an affirmative nod.
The cast and crew were doing their own thing, maybe setting up for whatever they had planned next, I wasn’t sure. I really didn’t know how to interpret what happened behind the camera. I did see both Kelsie and Josh talking to the director, whose name I knew to be Reggie Lafayette not because I had heard of him before — I hadn’t — but because of having him pointed out to me at the hotel.
After they finished with Reggie, Kelsie caught my eye and her face brightened. She then motioned for me to come over to her and Josh and although I was a bit trepidatious at first, I conceded and plodded across the grass toward where the two of them stood.
“Audra!” said Kelsie with that famous smile. “I’m so happy you could stop by. It wasn’t too hard to break away from the hotel, was it?”
“Nah,” I said, looking down to the ground and smiling. She didn’t have to know about my little white lie.
“Have you met Josh yet?” she said. “Josh, did you meet Audra?”
“Yeah,” he said. He was a classically handsome guy, typical young movie star, longish wavy hair, waggish grin, a bit of subtle. I could see how women might be attracted to him but my heart was increasingly set on Kelsie. “We spoke at the reception desk.”
“It’s true,” I admitted. “I helped Josh with a few accommodation issues.”
“That’s great,” said Kelsie. “Did you like watching that last scene?” she asked me eagerly. “I know it’s hard to put it all together when you just see scenes and not the whole movie.”
“It was something,” I said gingerly. Kelsie and Josh chuckled.
“Yeah, it’s out of place,” said Josh, pushing his hand through his hair and stretching out. “Don’t worry about it.”
Hotel Hollywood: A Lesbian Romance Page 3