“Thanks, you’re a doll. It was a pleasure to meet you, Damon,” he said with a smile before grabbing his coat and scarf and hurrying out the door.
Damon watched him go before his attention returned to me. “Quite the character, isn’t he?” I said as I chopped some garlic.
“Are you two — ”
“Oh, God, no,” I interrupted, immediately knowing the direction of this thoughts. “Julian’s like a brother. Actually, he sort of was my brother for a little while.”
“Ah,” said Damon, before glancing at his watch. “What does he do?”
I pursed my lips, wondering if I should just get the matter of Julian’s profession out of the way sooner rather than later. My friend made no secret of what he did for a living, but at the same time, he didn’t go shouting it from the rooftops, either. If anyone were to ask, those women were simply paying him for his company, nothing more. In fact, every once in a while that really was the truth. There were lots of very wealthy, very lonely women out there who just wanted someone to take them out for dinner and dancing.
“Yeah, um, Julian’s job runs somewhat unconventional hours.”
“Oh?”
“He’s an escort.”
Damon’s mouth fell open slightly. “An escort as in….”
“Women pay him for the pleasure of his company.”
He cleared his throat and shifted uncomfortably in place as his brows drew together in consternation. Staring at the countertop, he seemed lost for words to the point that he looked like he was in physical pain. I felt bad. Maybe I should’ve waited a little longer before laying it on him.
“It’s okay. I wouldn’t know how to respond to that information, either,” I told him with a reassuring smile. “Julian and I, well, we didn’t have the most conventional childhood.”
I watched as Damon swallowed and shook his head. A long moment passed as he appeared to be experiencing some kind of internal struggle. I didn’t know how to take it. I mean, people were usually surprised when they discovered Julian’s job, but they didn’t look like it pained them inside.
“No,” he said finally. “It’s not that, I just…I don’t have the best memories of sex workers, but I’m sure Julian is different.” He paused to clear his throat. “What kind of childhood did you have?”
He sounded genuinely curious, but I was still stuck on his comment about sex workers. What the hell did that mean? I didn’t want to pry, though, so I answered his question instead.
“Up until the age of ten I lived alone with my mum. I was an only child, and my dad left when I was little. Then she met a man named Elijah. He had that kind of small-town charisma, and Mum fell for it hook, line, and sinker. He also had two other women in his life, Julian’s mum, Kimberly, and Joanna, who had two daughters from a previous marriage. The four of them quickly fell into a polyamorous relationship, and I suddenly found myself moving into a new home with a bunch of new siblings, Julian being one of them.”
I paused to let Damon absorb all that, because I knew it was a lot to take in. “Well, that’s uh, not something you hear every day,” he said finally.
“No,” I replied, exhaling as I continued to prepare dinner. “It was unusual, to say the least. What about you, though, any brothers or sisters?”
“None. Mum died when I was fourteen, and then the only real family I had left was Gran. I cut my dad off a long time ago.” He paused to glance up at me, and there was something terribly sad in his expression. “Now there’s just me left.”
I wanted to ask what his father had done to warrant being cut from his life, but I didn’t.
“Well, Julian and I know all about losing family,” I said softly. “My mum passed when I was twenty, and his mum’s been living in a psychiatric ward for the past few years. She’s there but…not there, you know?”
Damon nodded but, like me, he didn’t ask questions. I poured some oil into the pan and began cooking the meat. The next time I looked up, he was gone. My eyes travelled across the flat to find him standing by the shelves in our living room, where we kept all of our books and DVDs.
I watched as he scanned the titles before calling over his shoulder, “Gene Kelly?”
“I’m kind of obsessed,” I admitted sheepishly.
“You must have his entire back catalogue here,” he commented. There was something in his voice that hinted at amusement, but I couldn’t be sure. He didn’t seem to smile very often, so it was hard to tell what he was thinking.
“He’s my idol, like, the greatest dancer who ever lived, in my opinion. I even went to a talk given by one of his wives a few years ago and got to meet her afterwards. God, I was such a fangirl. The whole time I had this internal dialogue that was all, this woman TOUCHED Gene Kelly. This woman HAD SEX with Gene Kelly. She probably even did his laundry. I hugged her way longer than was appropriate and may have freaked her out a little. You’d swear I was a thirteen-year-old meeting Zane Malik,” I confessed.
Damon returned to the kitchen, his eyes finding mine. “I was a little like that when I met Gary Oldman. I idolised him for years.” He paused to wince. “We were working on a film together, and when we were first introduced my hands got all sweaty and I stammered through half my sentences. He probably thought there was something wrong with me.”
I chuckled. “Man, I’m glad I’m not the only one. Nice name drop, by the way.”
Damon’s cheeks reddened the tiniest bit. “I didn’t mean to.”
I smiled warmly as I stirred some chili sauce into the meat. “I’m pulling your leg, but speaking of idols, you could find yourself in the running to becoming one of mine. Where on earth did you get those pipes? Your singing is just incredible.”
A new expression took shape on his face, one that made my belly flutter. It was intense. His eyes met mine and held them. “Thanks,” he murmured.
“You’re welcome,” I replied, and a strange ticklish sensation whispered across my chest.
A few moments of quiet fell as I served up the food. Damon ate quietly, like a well-behaved St. Bernard chowing down in the corner. I found myself studying him. The man was such a contradiction, with the rugged looks of a heartthrob and the personality of a hermit just coming out of hibernation. I could tell that quietness was natural to him. It made me wonder how he ever got into acting, though they did say that to act was a shy man’s revenge on the world.
“What?” said Damon, drawing me from my thoughts as I realized I was staring – quite like he’d been staring at me in the cab earlier.
I scooped some rice up onto my fork and gave him a small smile. “I was just thinking how you’re the most unlikely person to be an actor, particularly a stage actor. Have you ever done a play before?”
Damon frowned as he glanced down at his plate. “No, this will be my first.”
“Are you frightened?”
Now he looked back up. “Terrified.”
There was something about his candour and his unveiled expression that had me reaching across the table to squeeze his hand again. “Would having a friend make it easier?”
He seemed surprised by my question. “You’d like to be my friend?”
“Well, I’ll admit I’m not offering for entirely selfless reasons. I’m still broken-hearted over Blake. I could use a friend, too.”
He squeezed my hand back, his gaze intent on mine. I smiled at him, and he seemed fascinated by the expression. His attention moved over my features, from my eyelashes to the tip of my nose and then finally to my lips. Slowly, his mouth started to curve, and I suddenly realised he was smiling back at me. It was startling because it was so unexpected, the expression transforming his face into something powerfully beautiful. It practically knocked the air from my lungs.
“Friends, then,” he said finally, and I tried to steady my rapidly beating heart.
Four.
*Damon*
Stop staring at her. She’ll think you’re a creep.
Farrah, one of the women from the costume department, w
as measuring me up for a suit, while various cast members hurried around us. I would have found it more stressful if I wasn’t so focused on Rose. She sat on the floor in one corner of the dance studio, earphones in, eyes downcast, an iPod in one hand and a sandwich in the other.
A couple of days had passed since we shared dinner at her flat, and I noticed this was her routine every lunch time. I hadn’t yet summoned the courage to approach her. Our only real contact was to say hello when we passed each other by. Nothing really.
Yesterday she gave me a secret little smile when our eyes met across the studio. I didn’t know how to take it, so I just turned away. It was fucking awful. The disappointed look on her face afterwards almost killed me.
Why was it so hard to just smile at people? I’d managed it when we shared dinner in her flat, but maybe that was a fluke. Sometimes I felt like I was made from stone, solid and unmoving, only ever free when I delved into a role and became someone else.
Still, the way I trusted Rose was unforeseen. I didn’t easily let people in, but there’d been something in her eyes, something guileless that made me feel like I could give her a glimpse of the man behind the mask.
“For someone so wonderfully tall, you slouch way too much,” said Farrah. Work was starting on designing costumes for the show, so she was visiting today to take measurements from all the lead actors.
I glanced down at her. When you were my height, you were forever glancing downward. “Sorry.”
“Just.” She pursed her lips and reached up, grabbing my shoulders and straightening them out. “Stand like this. That way, we’ll be done quicker. You clearly hate this.”
I did. I hated people touching me, especially strangers. Briefly, I remembered Rose taking my hand and squeezing it the other day. I hadn’t hated that, not at all. Not knowing what else to say, I simply repeated myself. “Sorry.”
Farrah snickered. “A man of few words, I see.”
I shrugged because again she was right. I was far more eloquent and articulate inside my own head than I ever was when I spoke. Being quiet was my nature, even when I was a young lad. Perhaps that was why acting suited me; the words came pre-prepared.
My childhood tutor, Mr Gilroy, had held a devout passion for extending the vocabulary. This passion worked on me to a certain extent. I could write endlessly wordy and expressive essays and short stories, but when it came to speaking out loud, the words fled. There was this strange block that prevented them from travelling from my mind to my mouth. There still was, probably always would be.
I returned my attention to Rose as Farrah stretched a measuring tape down my right arm. Her friend, Julian, had said she’d been burned by some actor, and she’d told me herself she’d sworn off them, so it was a waste of time being so curious about her. Unfortunately, I found myself noticing everything.
Her dark brown hair was never out of its chaotic, messy knot, and she always wore leggings and tops that were too big for her. They had a habit of falling off one shoulder, or dipping down at the front as she demonstrated a dance move. She had no idea how sexy she was, completely unaware of my perverted ogling or the dirty thoughts I found myself succumbing to. But perhaps that was part of the allure, her complete and utter lack of self-awareness.
There was this freckle on the underside of her jaw that I found myself studying like I was going to be tested on the bloody thing.
“Damon, I need you over here,” Jacob called, and Farrah let out a sigh.
“Go on. I’ve just finished anyway.”
She hurried off. Alicia, the lead actress, walked into the studio alongside Eddie, who was playing Harold Zidler, and Bob, who was playing the Duke. We had a read-through of the entire script on Tuesday, but I still wasn’t sure what to make of my costars. It’d been a long time since I’d experienced showbiz types. These days I was used to ordinary, down-to-earth people.
“Where’s the bathroom?” Bob asked as he stumbled up to Jacob, a little unsteady on his feet. The bloke was addled.
Jacob’s lips firmed as he took him in, clearly coming to the same conclusion.
“First,” said Jacob, “the bathroom is down the hall and to the left. Second, I don’t tolerate the consumption of alcohol in my productions, so get sober and keep your drinking for your day off. Now please, go use the facilities so that we can begin rehearsing this sequence.”
Bob scrunched up his brow and Jacob sighed, motioning for his assistant to show Bob to the bathroom. I stood holding my pages, running the song lyrics through my head. I didn’t have the entire show off by heart yet, but I’d get there.
“I don’t know what I was thinking casting him. The man’s got an alcohol problem,” said Jacob flippantly as he approached me. He moved his shoulders as though shaking off the unpleasantness. “Anyway, how are you today, Damon?” He reached up and ran his fingers through my hair. I shifted backward, finding him way too overfamiliar. “Have you given any more consideration to having these locks chopped? Lovely though they are, they don’t exactly match your character.”
“I’ll do it this weekend,” I told him, and he seemed pleased by this. As far as I was concerned, hair was just hair. I didn’t have any kind of emotional attachment to it, but for some reason, Jacob had interpreted my social awkwardness for aggression, surmising I was pissed at the idea of changing my appearance.
“Marvellous! In that case, I’ll look forward to your transformation.”
Iggy, the choreographer, entered the room just then, and I saw him wave Rose over. He was a strange-looking man, with long, fine brown hair and sinewy muscles. Rose pulled out her earphones, stuffed the last of her sandwich in her mouth, and wiped her hands off on her leggings. I smiled at her lack of femininity, because ironically it was captivatingly feminine.
She glanced at me as she approached the group and shot a friendly smile my way. Smile back, I urged myself. For fuck’s sake, do something! In the end, all I managed was a slight grimace, but maybe that was because I had to start dancing in a minute.
“Okay, this is the scene of The Pitch. Today we’ll practice the dance routine for ‘Spectacular Spectacular.’” Jacob paused and glanced over his shoulder to his second assistant. “Is Bob back yet?”
“I’ll go get him,” said the woman before scurrying off.
Jacob let out a dissatisfied breath. “Probably throwing his guts up as we speak.”
Alicia, who stood just next to Eddie, appeared disgusted at the description. A minute later Bob was back, and he looked decidedly less bleary-eyed. I wondered if Jacob’s assistant had rammed her fingers down the man’s gullet and forced him to vomit just to sober him up a bit.
Jacob eyed him narrowly before turning back to the rest of us. “As I was saying, this scene is The Pitch. The Duke has just walked in on Christian and Satine” -- he paused to motion between me and Alicia -- “in a compromising position. In order to cover up what they were doing, the two, alongside Harold, Toulouse, and the rest of the gang, pretend they were rehearsing, and proceed to make up a fictitious play which they would like the Duke to bankroll. We won’t worry too much about vocals. Right now I just want to see how you all do with the choreography.”
And cue my nausea. I hated dancing and had been fumbling my way through routines for days now. I was beginning to wonder if I should just chuck it all in and find a job that didn’t involve this kind of daily humiliation. Unfortunately, I was a stubborn git and hated quitting anything once I’d started. That meant I was in this for the long haul.
I didn’t see her approach, but I felt someone tug on my sleeve and glanced down to see Rose at my side.
“Relax. This is one of the easier sequences. You basically get to crawl around on your knees and bounce up and down like a toddler. So long as you can coordinate with the others you’ll be fine.”
She was trying to make me feel better, but it wasn’t working. I’d been born with two left feet.
“All right, everybody, let’s limber up, shall we?” said Iggy, and he began doing
scissors jumps. Soon everyone was joining in, and Rose gave my sleeve another little tug as if to say, go on. I joined in, and she went off to stand by Iggy.
When we’d completed the warm-up, Iggy began demonstrating the routine. “A one, a two, a one, two, three,” he instructed as he glided across the stage like some kind of muscular gazelle. The others mimicked his movements, all of them experienced with dancing.
I, on the other hand, was completely lost. Rose walked through, giving guidance where it was needed, and then finally she came to me. Without a word she began fixing my posture, one hand going to the base of my spine and pushing it forward, the other to the backs of my knees to straighten my legs. She touched me without hesitancy, but with a keen eye and near scientific precision, a little like a nurse or a doctor might. Still, her warm hands soothed me, and I inhaled the scent of her citrusy perfume.
“Can’t dance indeed,” she said with warmth in her eyes. There was no criticism in her voice, just a mild, friendly hint of teasing. The next half hour was pure agony, but less so because Rose helped me step by step. Once it was time to practice the song, I was confident I could at least complete the dance routine without injuring myself.
Maura, the choral director, played the opening chords on the piano as Rose stepped away, and I took my position next to Eddie.
Bob stood before us, assuming the role of the Duke, as Eddie began to sing. Alicia laughed when Henry, who was playing Toulouse, accidentally shoved an elbow in her side. I hadn’t spoken to her much, but she seemed nice, not too high maintenance like you’d usually get with film stars.
When I sang to her toward the end of the routine, she fluttered her eyelashes, her green eyes turning doe-like, as she played her part. Satine and Christian were supposed to be falling in love. I tried to convey that when I sang, and caught a quick glimpse of Rose, who wore a strange, captivated expression.
In fact, when I looked around, I noticed most of the others were looking at me in the same way, even Jacob. The song we’d been practicing came to a stop.
“What?” I asked.