The Last Take

by Tabitha Bree

  The Last Take

  Tabitha Bree

  Landing a production assistant job on a film set is a dream come true for me. But this isn’t just any film—this is Adam Thorne’s film—grumpy director, king of sarcasm, thinks I’m an idiot extraordinaire.

  My sunny demeanour clashes wildly with his perpetual resting bitch face, especially when I make dumb mistakes. We’re polar opposites but that’s fine; I’m here for one reason only—to see my name in the credits and prove to my parent dropping out of medicine wasn’t a colossal mistake.

  But the more time I spend with him… the more I can’t stop looking at his stubble and those deep brown eyes… and if I’m being honest, I think my Gandalf impression got under his skin. Was that a smile I cracked? Then we get sent on a location scout together and I see a different side to Adam, especially when the tropical cocktails start flowing. Maybe this guy isn’t as bad as they made him out to be?

  Or maybe I’m about to mess up my big break in more ways than one.

  For Billeye

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Also by Tabitha Bree

  About the Author

  Acknowledgments

  1

  Evie

  I slowly push my front door open and cringe as it creaks, the same way all doors creak when you’re trying to be quiet. Poking my head into the hallway, I look both ways to check for other forms of life. The coast is clear.

  I slide to the other side of the threshold and gently pull the door closed behind me, careful to turn the doorknob so the latch doesn’t make a sound. Turning the key in the lock, I immediately regret the amount of key chains I have as they jingle in response. Like a cat being sold out by the tiny bell around its neck while stalking its lunch.

  But I am still the only person in the hallway. Exhaling the breath caught in my throat, I tiptoe toward the elevator, nearly home free.

  “Evie, just the person I wanted to see.”

  If only nearly were enough.

  I un-scrunch my face before turning to my landlord. He is standing in front of his own apartment, his beady eyes watching me like I might try to make a run for it.

  Which I absolutely consider for a hot second.

  “Ron, hi,” I say, plastering a smile across my mouth. “You’re looking very dapper today. Is that a new shirt?”

  Ron stares at me unblinking, not even looking at his khaki green button-down. Which I have seen him wear at least twenty times.

  “Your rent is three weeks overdue.”

  He crosses his arms over his chest and looks at me expectantly, like I might have a handy one thousand dollars hiding in my polka dot blazer.

  “I know, I’m so sorry. Since this internship started, it’s taken up a lot of time, and I had to cut my hours at the café…”

  I let the words trail off, as it’s obvious Ron gives zero hoots about my crazy schedule or my unpaid internship. So I go with an alternative.

  “You know, I have a batch of oatmeal raisin in my apartment. Should I box you up a couple?”

  Ron drops his head with exasperation. A clear signal that I’m making his morning more difficult than he would like it to be.

  “I don’t want cookies. I don’t want cupcakes. I want my money.” He circles his hand in my direction. “This little act with the Bambi eyes and the baked goods won’t cut it now, kid. I need the three weeks you owe me, plus next week by the end of the month. Otherwise, you’re out.”

  I knew I should’ve gone with chocolate chip. Who likes oatmeal raisin?

  “Please, Ron. I need more time,” I say, stepping toward him with my hands in actual prayer position. “We can work something out. Maybe I could help around here? Vacuum the hallway? Or… hey, do any of your clothes need fixing? I’m a whiz on the sewing machine.”

  As I ramble on, Ron looks down at my light sweater, which I have embellished myself with tiny bows. He’s doing that unblinking thing again.

  “I think I’m all good for shirt ribbons.”

  My eyes dart around the walls as I search for another solution. Four weeks' rent by the end of the month? It’s impossible. I’d have to pull double shifts at the café. Which might be fine. If I could survive off one hour of sleep every night.

  “I just don’t know how I’ll get the money in time,” I say, more to myself than to Ron, who has already lost interest.

  “Look, I don’t care how you get it. As long as it’s under my door by the end of the month. This is Hollywood, kid. If you can’t keep up, there’s always someone else happy to take your place.”

  And with those final pearls of wisdom, he disappears behind his door. Where he was probably lurking and waiting to pounce all morning.

  I groan and press the down arrow next to the elevator, waiting for it to arrive at a glacial pace, as always. I don’t even know why Ron lived in the building. If I owned every apartment on the floor, I certainly wouldn’t live here. I’d be sunning myself on the balcony of a condo in West Hollywood. But then again, if Ron didn’t live in the building, he wouldn’t be able to trap his tenants on their way out.

  I sit in my old Volvo dwelling on my predicament while I wait for the engine to warm. Poor Ron, it’s not his fault I have no money and no spare time to get more money. He’s just trying to pay his bills like the rest of us poor chumps.

  I knew leaving boxes of buttery treats outside his door could only last so long.

  I drive down Santa Monica Boulevard until the sidewalks are less stained and more rainbow, and eventually I pull up beside a Spanish bungalow-turned-production studio. It’s only my second month of interning at Guerilla Productions, but I’m learning a lot. Especially how Mr. Jacobs likes his coffee—piping hot with a shot of vanilla. I try not to get hung up on how much actual production experience I get. Because if I’ve learned anything since dropping out of medicine to pursue work in the film industry, it’s this:

  What I know doesn’t really matter.

  But who I know is going to make or break my career.

  Unlike traditional career paths, where you emerge from your college degree and land on a clear trajectory to a stable salary and 401(k), there are no promises for film graduates. In fact, one particularly jaded professor told our class that only fourteen percent of us would find work in Hollywood.

  I can almost hear the I told you so’s from my parents’ house.

  But I won’t let myself get deterred that easily. If I have to work my way up from the unpaid bottom, so be it. I could fetch lunch and run errands as good as the next desperate millennial. And most importantly, I’m making connections.

  I scramble to answer my phone as it buzzes inside my handbag.

  “Evie, where are you?” Caroline squawks into my ear before I can even say hello.

  “Yes, I’m here, I’m here. I’m just out the front.”

/>   “Great, don’t bother coming in. Lyle needs his coffee. Get me a green juice while you’re out.”

  I push the door open with my elbow, balancing the drink tray on one hand like it holds a precious vase from the 1800s. I don’t need another green-juice-down-the-crotch situation. Like last week.

  “Evie, did you buy more storyboard glue? This one is almost empty,” Lyle says without looking up from the large board on the table.

  “I did. It’s in the second drawer.”

  He retrieves the full bottle and begins shaking it, frowning as his eyes finally land on me.

  “You look like Pippi Longstocking.”

  I run my hand down my long, light-red braid. “Um, thanks?”

  He continues to frown through his thick, black-rimmed glasses before returning to his board, trailing the glue around the edges of a piece of card and sticking it to the top right corner.

  “What are we making?” I ask, peering over his shoulder. “Is this for the indie film at Venice Beach? I’m so excited for that to start!”

  “The Venice project is on hold,” he replies, with the opposite amount of enthusiasm. “They’ve run out of cash. This is for a lotion commercial.”

  “Oh.” I try to sound interested, but I’d be lying if I said jobs like these inspired me.

  When I applied for the internship, Guerilla Productions claimed to specialize in feature films. But so far, I had only seen them working on commercials and the odd social media promotional video. But I don’t want to seem ungrateful. At least I’m meeting the right people. Lyle Jacobs built the company from scratch after many years of working as a cameraman. I would kill to have a job on the sets he’d been on, brushing shoulders with the heavyweights of the industry, eating lunch next to A-list actors.

  “Ugh, thank God.” Caroline bustles in and heads straight for the green juice, taking a big slurp through the biodegradable straw. “It’s warm. Did you come straight from the juice bar?”

  “Of course.”

  “Hm.” She takes another sip and turns toward Lyle. “Is that the mood board?”

  “Impossible client. They expect us to have the whole commercial turned around in two weeks. Can you believe it?”

  “We need this job,” Caroline says, lowering her voice and turning away from me. “Now that they’ve pushed the Venice project back, we don’t have any incoming work.”

  “I’m aware of that, Caroline,” Lyle says, scratching the top of his dark, balding head of hair. “But we don’t have the capacity to turn this around in their timeframe. I think we’re just wasting our time.”

  “I’m sure Evie can help.”

  I straighten up at the mention of my name, like a well-trained dog. “Me?”

  “It’ll be great experience, being out on location instead of in the studio,” Caroline goes on. “And it would only be a few extra days over the next couple of weeks. You would be compensated, of course.”

  My eyes light up. “That would be amazing! Being a production assistant is the next step in my plan, so I’d love to be involved in the shoot.”

  There’s a funny tickling feeling in my stomach. I can almost see myself there on the sand, clipboard in hand, ready to tackle any task thrown my way. A real, paid job that doesn’t involve fetching juice or taking people’s coffee orders. Who said changing my life plan was a colossal mistake? Everything is going to be fine. I don’t know why I let myself get so worried.

  “Perfect. We’ll just have you sign a waiver and at the end of each week, you’ll be reimbursed for gas.”

  “Okay,” I say, thinking the free gas is a nice little perk. “And if you don’t mind my asking. What would the hourly rate be?”

  “Hourly rate?” Caroline looks at me, forehead creasing.

  “I mean, I’m guessing minimum, which is totally fine! I was just curious because you see my landlord is chasing me up for—”

  “We can’t pay you for your time there.” Caroline looks at me like I might have an undiagnosed head injury.

  “Oh? I thought you said something about compensation.”

  “For your gas, yes. And you’ll get lunch every day on set.”

  “Right,” I say, the tickling feeling in my stomach turning to nausea. I can’t afford to take time off for my internship as it is, let alone sacrifice more shifts at the café. But passing up extra production work feels like a cardinal sin.

  “We will pay you in experience,” Caroline continues, like she’s reading my mind. “And you can’t put a price on that. Not in such a competitive field.”

  I chew on my bottom lip, nodding. “I agree, it’s just… I don’t think I can swing extra days away from my job at the café if I’m not getting paid.”

  I know that logically, this is quite reasonable. But I can’t help the nagging guilt rippling through my brain. And the brief look that passes between Caroline and Lyle doesn’t help either.

  “That’s why we usually get film students who still live at home to intern for us,” Lyle says, leaving the unfinished mood board. “More flexibility. Fewer bills to pay. Caroline, let’s leave the board until we know what’s happening. I’m going to make a call.”

  As Lyle walks out the front door, Caroline sighs, running a finger over the pictures that are yet to be glued on.

  “I’m really sorry I can’t help. I’m in a money bind at the moment, that’s all.”

  “Someday, you will understand the financial strains behind a production,” Caroline says, draining what’s left in her glass jar. “We simply don’t have the margin to pay our interns.”

  They clearly have the margin for her thirteen-dollar organic juices, but I decide not to point that out.

  “That is, if you ever make it in the film business.”

  As the ominous undertones of her last comment sink into my pores, I nod and turn toward my desk. “Right. Well, I better get to renaming that footage from last week’s shoot.”

  Maybe I won’t be able to go on set. But I’m still getting valuable insight into how a production company runs. I open the computer folder containing last week’s raw footage, armed with the printed naming convention document Lyle left on my desk.

  “Hold off on that. I’m starved,” Caroline says, looking at her rose gold watch. “It’s nearly noon. Can you fetch us some lunch?”

  2

  Adam

  If I’ve learned anything from my years in the film business, it’s that you don’t say no to Nolan Smith. As far as executive producers go, he’s the top dog. Which explains why I’m schlepping along the sidewalk toward an obnoxious fancy restaurant for lunch, and not to my favorite sandwich place. I told myself it was worth going, if only because I could walk to the fancy restaurant from my house—a rarity in LA. But as the midday sun assaults my squinting eyes, I’m having second thoughts.

  The heat bares down on my head, and I feel a trickle of sweat making its way toward the band of my shorts, destined for my butt crack. Perfect.

  I turn the corner and further up the path sits a homeless man, his scraggly gray beard glistening in the light of day. As I get closer, I can read his ‘I’m With Stupid’ t-shirt and see the lines that cover his face, shaded by a trucker cap.

  “Hey, Bob. What are you sitting here for?”

  A low motorcycle-like grumble rolls out of his throat. “Some young kids have taken my usual spot around the corner. Yahooing until all hours every night.” He scratches his leathery cheek. “I’m too old for that.”

  “Yeah, I hear ya.”

  He cranes his head, shielding his eyes from the sun, and looks me up and down. “What’s with the hoity toity clothes?”

  I look at my button-down shirt and shorts. “I have a meeting. On my way now.”

  “Ahh, another one of those action man movies.”

  “I don’t think so. I’m just going to show my face.”

  Another deep grumble escapes Bob’s throat. “I don’t know why everyone is obsessed with their iron hulks and their spider girls. It’s all a bunch o
f boloney.”

  This is what I like about Bob. No bullshit. It’s hard to come by in LA.

  I shrug. “Beats me. I better get going. Have you got lunch?”

  He waves his hand dismissively.

  I pull out a ten-dollar bill from my wallet. “Go to the sandwich shop on Melrose. Ask for the pimento cheese with pastrami. You won’t regret it.”

  He accepts the money and tips his head.

  “See you round, Bob.”

  “Take it easy.”

  I make my way to the restaurant and soon I’m standing outside the front door. As I’m ushered in by the host wearing a suit, I look back to see Bob turning the corner toward Melrose and know who I’d rather be eating lunch with.

  I drum my knuckles on the white tablecloth and check the time on my phone. Again.

  “Nolan should be here any minute,” Eric assures me, taking a sip of his kombucha. “Are you sure I can’t order you a drink?”

  “Water’s fine,” I reply, sitting back in my chair and observing the other patrons on the patio. Business meetings, work lunches, and a sprinkling of tourists hoping to glimpse Hollywood’s rich and famous. And I’m sitting here with two of the biggest bozos of all.

  “Did you catch the last episode of The Walking Dead?” Eric says, grinning at Simon.

  “Epic!”

  “So epic!”

  “What about you, Adam? Did you catch it?” Eric looks at me excitedly.