…
Danny returned from his morning jog as April, Madigan, and Theo were finishing bowls of oatmeal at the picnic tables.
“I bought two bikes from one of the rangers,” Danny said. “They’re not in the best shape, but they’ll be good for errands around the valley.”
April paused midbite. The second she got her hands on one of those bikes, she was going straight to the showers over at Housekeeping Camp.
Danny emptied two packets of oatmeal into a bowl, along with the last of the hot water from the stove. He joined them at the table, flipping through his planner as he ate.
“The gala’s coming up soon,” he said. “April, would you mind giving Vera’s assistant, Gabby, a call to see what they need from us?”
“Is this something we’re covering?” she asked.
“No, we’re attending. It’s a fund-raiser for HSSR.”
High Sierra Search and Rescue. This was the small village of white platform tents next to the campground. The same place where Josh was parking his truck-house during filming.
“They’ve always been funded federally, but this year’s budget cuts hit them hard,” Danny said. “Vera’s taken it on as a personal cause, because of her brother.”
Theo’s sharp eyes didn’t miss the fact that April had no idea who that was. “Vic McWilliams. Yosemite climber from the sixties. Pretty much bagged the first ascent on every major formation in the valley.” He slapped her back for good measure. “Good name to remember here, Hollywood.”
“Vic was paralyzed in a climbing accident,” Danny said. “Vera took care of him until he passed away last year.”
She nodded and suddenly it clicked. Vera—the woman financing their film—was Vera McWilliams-Smithleigh, from the Smithleigh Company family. The face wash, aspirin, and shampoo April had brought to Yosemite were all Smithleigh products.
Danny scraped the last bite of his oatmeal out of his bowl. “Gabby said she’d reserve a block of rooms for us at the hotel, but can you double-check that when you call?”
“By the hotel,” Theo said, “he means the Kingsbury.”
The Kingsbury? As in the five-diamond hotel chain? It would have been nice to know about this before she left L.A. Her mom would have to mail her a gown from home.
Danny turned his planner to the current week. “I’m thinking Flying Sheep will be dry enough in about three days.” He looked over at April. “How do you feel about filming the top out?”
Top out sounded a little frightening.
“We’re only filming the bottom two-thirds of the route, but I want to show him coming over the edge when he finishes. All you have to do is hike around the back side, then wait for Josh at the top,” he said. “It’s very straightforward. If you’re up for it, then I won’t have to call in a contractor. Madigan will show you exactly what to do.”
April fiddled with her paper napkin. “Sure.”
“Madigan told me Josh was uncooperative yesterday, but let’s try again with him tomorrow since we can’t be up on the rock yet.”
Tomorrow? She knew she’d have to face him again at some point, but she’d hoped it wouldn’t be so soon.
“He’s taking a rest day, so you should be able to find him over at his truck to schedule a time,” Danny said.
Dread settled into the pit of her stomach. She wanted nothing more than to not go over to that camp of his and be alone with him again. Picturing Josh’s stony face from the trail yesterday, she knew it was quite possible he’d refuse an interview altogether.
Talent or not, she couldn’t let someone treat her like that, but if she stood up for herself, there was no doubt he’d report her to Danny. Either way, it would be humiliating.
Chapter Four
Josh eyed the camera as if he expected it to roar to life and suck the soul from his body. April frowned and paused the clip. In some parts of world, native peoples still believed this. But Josh had no excuse. He grew up in America, and as a professional rock climber who had been in at least a dozen films, being in front of a camera should be second nature to him by now.
It was the third Josh Knox interview she’d watched on her laptop as she, Theo, and Madigan drove back to Yosemite Valley after picking up the ranger’s bikes in the miniscule town of El Portal. Although the clip was his most recent, it was also the worst, and that was saying a lot, because the first two had made her want to bury her head in her jacket.
It was a complete mystery to her why Danny had picked Josh to be the film’s central character. She’d watched some segments of other professional climbers, and it seemed like there were plenty of others out there who were charismatic, energetic, and zany. In other words: likable. And cooperative.
Back at camp, Theo got to work tuning up the bikes, and April watched another cringe-worthy clip of Josh. If only his climbs were at the end instead of the beginning of filming, she would have several dynamite interviews with the other climbers to prove her worth to Walkabout before having to tackle an interview with Josh.
How was she, an intern, expected to come up with something usable out of this guy? Further, it was very unusual to do one-person, small-channel, television reporting–style interviews on a documentary film, and Walkabout was normally no exception. Even for UCLA student films, everyone would take turns helping each other out with sound, because if you messed up the sound, the whole take would be useless.
She looked over at the search-and-rescue camp and sighed. Instead of going to find Josh, she sidled up to Theo, who was still working on the bikes.
“What do you think about helping with Josh’s interview tomorrow?” she asked.
“No can do, Hollywood,” he said. “Time to step it up.”
She huffed.
“Danny thinks Josh will do better if it’s just one person,” he said. “You know, so he’s not distracted with a bunch of extra people hovering around.” Theo knelt down to put some oil on the bike’s chain. “I saw the sample movie you sent. If you could get those guys to talk, a climber should be no problem. The other bike’s done, by the way.”
That meant she could shower. Yes! She needed to shower badly.
After gathering her things, she pedaled over to Housekeeping Camp. She took her time showering and getting dressed—the longer she stalled, the better her chances were that Josh would have other plans for tomorrow. She biked back to the campground slowly, with plans to volunteer for dinner duty so she would conveniently run out of time to go ask him.
Back at camp, Theo had already started dinner and Danny was at the stove helping him. “What did Josh say about tomorrow?” Danny asked.
“I haven’t talked to him yet,” she said. “I was just heading over there, actually.”
She leaned her bike against a tree and started toward the search-and-rescue camp. Theo peered around Danny’s back and smirked. She scowled.
Entering the woods between the campground and the search-and-rescue camp, she prayed to cross paths with a Yosemite superbear that would force her to turn back. It didn’t happen. She continued around behind the white platform tents in search of Josh, halting as she came to the truck. Her skin bristled. It wasn’t just the way he’d acted yesterday that made this hard. It was her having spent so much time watching videos of him today, and the fact she had fallen asleep last night picturing his serene but hunky Redpoint climbing photos. Entering his personal camp felt way too intimate.
The tailgate of his truck was down, and the camp chair next to the fire ring was empty. There was a hammock strung between two trees, which was where she found him, all bundled up in a hat, down jacket, and long pants. It was a stark contrast from the shirtless, ocean-backed Redpoint Josh.
He was reading a book and hadn’t seen her yet. She could still escape.
Her father’s voice came echoing from the past. Nonsense, April. Just get in there and get it over with.
She exhaled and clomped loudly into the clearing. Josh looked up immediately. He didn’t say hello. Instead, he waited in sile
nce for her to explain her presence in his campsite. Great. “Can you do an interview tomorrow?” she blurted.
He closed his book and looked toward the platform tents. Someone over there was playing guitar. “Tomorrow?”
“It’s okay if you can’t,” she said. “We can find another time.”
His gaze returned to her. “Tomorrow’s okay. After lunch. Does that work for Danny?”
“It’s just going to be me again.”
One of his eyebrows twitched. He frowned. What had she done to make him dislike her so much?
“Okay, then,” she said. “I’ll set up before you get there. Just keep following that trail we were on. One o’clock?”
“Sure,” he said. He opened his book and started to read.
“And please make sure to wear a shirt that is—”
“I remember.”
Her pride recoiled. This guy might act the part of a free-spirited, climbing-bum hippie, but really, he was nothing more than a spoiled athlete. Jerk. She turned back toward the campground.
“Hey, April?”
She stopped. As much as she wanted to ignore him and keep going, she was an intern and didn’t have the privilege of returning his disrespect. She turned around.
He was still in the hammock, now looking up from his book. His face was distinctly softer. “What’s for dinner?” he asked.
She closed her eyes for a fraction of a second to collect herself. “I don’t know,” she said. “Danny and Theo are cooking tonight.”
Their eyes met, and she felt as if he were not looking at her but into her. Her heartbeat picked up, and she reminded herself that he was exotic looking, not hot. His eyes were too deeply set and his cowlick made his hair stick out weirdly. Even though his muscles were defined, he was skinny overall, not to mention the icy personality.
She sighed silently. Her mind’s attempt to trick her body wasn’t working at all. She could nitpick his features all day, but in the end, he wasn’t just hot, he was irresistible.
“Hmm,” he said with such cool disinterest that she wondered if it had only been in her imagination that he’d asked about dinner. It was completely mortifying that she had such a fascination—okay, attraction—to this person who was so awful.
She walked quickly past his truck and back into the woods, the tight, intolerant line of his mouth burned into her head. How in the hell was she going to make it through this interview tomorrow?
Chapter Five
April set the camera up in the alcove formed by a band of low cliffs. It was a nice, private place for filming, with light that was bright but not blinding and a background that would be visually interesting but not distracting.
She pulled the penny out of her pocket to tighten the tripod screws before setting up the camera, and then sat on a log to review her video journalism class notes on challenging interview subjects. If she played her cards right, perhaps she could stay one step ahead of Josh and outmaneuver him into some decent sound bites.
That was, if he actually showed up for the interview. It was 12:55 with no sign of him. What if he stood her up? She started sweating. What would she say to—
Josh appeared around the corner. A wave of relief washed over her.
The new shirt he’d chosen fit exactly within the parameters she’d described, but it was downright hideous: a plaid, cotton, button-down shirt that was so faded and misshapen that it couldn’t be anything other than a thrift store castoff.
Josh sat on the boulder between the camera and the cliff. He didn’t bother to make small talk, and that was fine with her. At least he was here. She adjusted a few settings on the camera, and Josh came into clear focus. Through the camera, the shirt looked perfectly normal. She smiled at the tiny triumph.
What was unacceptable was the way he was sitting. His back was ramrod straight and his knees were pressed together, making her worry that the boulder she’d picked was sharp and pointy. She should have sat on it to test it first.
While pretending to adjust a knob on the camera, she frantically scanned the alcove for an alternate backdrop with good lighting and a softer place to sit. “I think over there might be better,” she said, pointing to a fallen log.
Josh switched to the log right away, but even before she moved the camera, she knew the new position would never work. The barely perceptible breeze had turned the shiny-leaved bush behind him into a mirror ball, sending beams of light all around the alcove.
“I’m sorry, that isn’t going to work, either,” she said. “Let’s try back by the rock, but this time, stand just behind it and a little to the left.”
He silently obeyed. Once in place, he settled in with crossed arms.
“Would you mind uncrossing your arms, please?” she asked.
When he did, his hands dangled limply like scarf tassels. The view of him through the camera looked like a mug shot. She took note of the boulder in front of him. It was as flat and smooth as a bench. The problem had been him all along.
“Well, the first time was the charm,” she said, trying to lighten the mood. “Let’s go back to sitting on the rock.”
Josh repositioned as she untangled the lavaliere microphone wires. She handed him the transmitter pack, which he clipped to the back of his pants before threading the mic through his shirt and fastening it onto the collar. Even though Walkabout seemed to be ignoring everything her professors taught her about sound technique, at least they had provided the most expensive, Hollywood-grade lav mic on the market.
“We’re going to do a little something different with that mic.” She pulled a piece of skin-colored blister tape from her pocket and peeled the back off. “Just put this across the base of the mic and then stick it right to your collarbone underneath where you have it right now.”
She held the tape out to him, their fingers touching for a moment as he unstuck it from her finger. Turning on the sound monitor, she could tell, even without looking at the microphone itself, that Josh had placed it all wrong. The way things were going, he would probably whisper his answers; she had to get that mic in exactly the right position.
“Do you mind if I do a quick adjustment?” she asked, walking toward him.
He shook his head. Those killer brown-green eyes of his were wide and somber as she leaned over him to peel the tape off his warm skin. His breaths were deep and rhythmic against her hand as she hid the mic higher and a little farther under his collar, with a better angle toward his mouth. Her hair slid off her shoulder and onto his shirt.
She was close enough to smell his laundry soap, and the scent of his body beneath that, which she purposely tried to not focus on. Thank god she’d taken the time to go over to the bathroom to brush her teeth before this.
The fabric was scraping against the mic, so she fiddled with his collar to get it to rest lower, on the stem of the mic. Good thing she was wearing a crew-neck running top, otherwise he’d have a view straight down her shirt into her meager cleavage. She blushed just thinking about it.
Back at the mini soundboard, she focused on fine-tuning the mic while her cheeks cooled down. She could tell that Josh was watching her, but she didn’t know if it was because he was mad she was taking so long or because of something else.
She clipped the soundboard to the camera and looked up. Finally, he was sitting normally on the rock! She smiled and gave him two thumbs up.
“Looking good. Are you ready?”
There was a hint of a smile at the corners of his mouth that made her feel light and carefree. Her own smile grew a little bigger.
But then, with his eyes still on hers, a shadow seemed to pass across his face. His jaw hardened, and his posture turned stiff.
“Go back to what you were doing before,” she said, sitting on her collapsible stool to demonstrate. She dropped her hands into her lap and exaggerated her slouch. “You want to relax and look natural. Try shaking out your hands.”
He gave a few halfhearted wiggles of his wrists, which did nothing for his stiff back. His fac
e had not just lost its softness, he looked cold. Defiant, almost.
“Okay, how about—”
“Listen, if you’re not ready…”
Not ready? Are you kidding? It was absurd that he’d even think of blaming her for his awkwardness in front of the camera!
She darted behind the tripod, pretending to check the focus as she let her anger simmer down. Returning to her stool next to the camera lens, she pressed the buttons to start recording sound and video.
“I’m going to start out with a few questions to make sure the sound is coming out okay.” Her voice trailed. He was so stiff! Stiffer than he’d been the first time he sat on the rock. “You know, there are a few things you can do to make this smoother. I’d be happy to share a couple of—”
“This isn’t the first time I’ve been interviewed,” he said, his voice tinged with even more hostility than his face showed. “Could we just get started?”
She couldn’t think. No one had ever been that directly rude to her. She opened her mouth to ask the first question, but nothing came out at first.
“Why do you like climbing?” she stammered.
“It’s fun,” he said.
“Why is it fun?”
“I don’t know. It just is.”
“Is it scary?”
“No.”
“Can you expound on that?”
“What’s there to expound on? It’s never scared me.”
He looked at her with a perfectly expressionless face as he waited for the next question. She tried to use the silence to her advantage, seeing if he would give a better answer if she waited him out, but the technique backfired. Suddenly, they were in a staring contest. Each second of silence stretched into eternity. She folded first.
“How old were you when you went climbing for the first time?” she asked.
“Five.”
April caught a whiff of nervous sweat and, realizing it was hers, lost her train of thought. If you lose control of your interview, pause and then take it right back, her notes had said. She exhaled slowly. “What attracts you to the sport of rock climbing?”
Lessons In Gravity Page 4