Heartthrob (38 page)

“Personally, I have reached the ultimately perfect
groove to play this character,” Jamaal said. “I am
completely
in tune with his pain.”

Susie was standing mere feet away from him, but she still wouldn’t even meet his eyes.

“Any questions?” Victor asked.

“Yeah,” Jamaal said. “In order to play
this
scene, I need to know: what was the decision about that earlier scene? You know, the one we did in the slave quarters. Did you guys decide to leave in that—”

Kiss. He was going to say kiss, but Susie was looking straight at him now, her eyes wide. She shook her head very slightly, glancing quickly over her shoulder at her father.

Shit.

Victor cleared his throat. “Actually, no,” he said, smart enough to be able to talk around it. “Kate talked to the writer, and between the three of us, we decided to cut that out. The scene’s just as intense, but the consensus was that it seriously changed the focus of their relationship. We thought it would be more poignant for these characters’ feelings to be implied, never confronted.”

“So it never happened,” Jamaal said.

Susie glanced up at him again, and this time, he was ready for it. He turned his back to her watching father, and mouthed, “Are you okay?”

Her eyes filled with tears.

Shit.

Susie turned to Victor. “Please, can we just run the scene?”

Victor glanced at Jamaal. “Yeah. Remember, I want a really tight two-shot, so make sure you get close together.”

The scene started with Susie coming inside. She backed off, and Jamaal faded into the shadows.

“This is a run-through,” Victor said, “but—just for the hell of it—let’s roll film.”

As Jamaal watched, Susie’s father stepped toward her.
He could see her shoulders tighten, feel her increased tension from all the way across the room.

“Anyone who’s not actor or crew, please stay ten feet behind the camera,” the assistant director droned. He looked pointedly at Russell McCoy, who backed off before he could speak his poison into his daughter’s ear.

“Settle.”

“Rolling.”

Shit.
What was his first line?

“Speed.”

“Action.”

Susie took a beat, then came in from behind the camera, carrying a bundle from props, and setting it down on one of the barrels. “Moses?” She turned around, looking for him in the dimness. “Are you here?”

“You don’t really think I’d leave without saying goodbye.” He spoke from the shadows.

“I think you should do whatever it takes to reach freedom—including leave without saying good-bye if need be.” She paused. “Laramie’s set to take you north tonight.”

He stepped out, into the light. “What about you?”

She turned away, pretending to be busy with the bundle she’d brought. “What do you mean, what about me?”

“If you stay here, your brothers will make you marry Brooks.”

Susie turned and looked at him then, and her eyes looked so weary. Her soul looked bruised. How much of that was acting, and how much was real?

Shit
, the line was still his. And Victor had wanted a tight two-shot. They were still too far apart for that.

“Maybe you should come north, too,” he whispered, shifting toward her. He was close enough now to smell her perfume, to see every freckle on her nose, to be able to lean forward and brush her lips with his …

She was looking up into his eyes now. “Now,
there’s
a fine dream.” Her voice caught.

Think about Moses’ secret desire. It’s the last time he’s going to see Jane, most likely for the rest of his life. These next few minutes were going to be his last possible opportunity to tell her that he loved her. Jamaal could relate. Damn, considering that he didn’t have a clue when next he was going to see Susie, he could
really
relate …

He had to swallow the lump in his throat before he could speak. “I’ll never forget you.”

She turned back to the bundle. “I’m doing this for purely selfish reasons—not for your gratitude.”

“My gratitude is all that I’m free to give you.” He paused. “I have a wife and son waiting for me up in Boston.”

She froze, then glanced back over her shoulder at him. “I didn’t know that.”

“I was told I had to marry, and was sent to lie with a girl I’ve seen only a few times since. She bore my child—when I left I couldn’t leave either of them behind. They made it north, I didn’t. But now she’s waiting—this stranger who was chosen for me.” He reached out and very lightly touched her hair. “Don’t let ’em choose for you, Miss Jane.” He ad-libbed then, hoping she would get his message. “Don’t let
anyone
choose for you.”

She turned toward him then, all but throwing herself into his arms. Her action was not in the script, but Jamaal didn’t care. He held onto her just as tightly, knowing that all too soon he’d have to let her go.

“I’ve got to see you,” he whispered almost soundlessly into Susie’s ear. “Just tell me when and where, and I’ll be there.”

“I can’t,” she breathed.

She pulled away. “There’s money, food, and clothing in the bag. Go with God.”

With a swirl of her skirt, she was gone.

“And … cut. That was great, but let’s go back and do it again. Moses, get closer to her next time. Jane—you’re backing away. Keep it tight.”

Jamaal looked across the room at Susie. She met his eyes only briefly before she looked away.

Jed had wandered away while Kate was on the phone, and he now stood outside Grady Falls’s only bar.

As she watched from the steps of the production office, he stood there on the sidewalk, like a kid drawn to the window of a candy store.

He’d turned himself into a zombie. She’d held his hand on the charter flight to Alabama. She’d held his hand during David’s funeral. She’d held him in her arms every night that had followed, waiting for him to release just a little of his grief.

But he didn’t cry.

Sometimes he was so tuned out, she was tempted to check and see if he was still breathing.

When they’d returned to Grady Falls, he’d insisted on getting back to work right away. His performances were brilliant, loaded with emotion and a sensitivity that surpassed everything she’d ever seen him do.

But Jed’s performances didn’t end when the assistant director yelled cut. They continued when he left the set. He was acting all of the time, she realized. Even when they were alone, even in bed at night.

He didn’t look up as she approached. Not until she spoke. “Jed.”

He didn’t seem surprised to see her there. It was going on five days now, and he didn’t seem to feel anything at all.

“There was a message for you in the production office,” she told him, watching his eyes. “Alison called. I think she was making sure you’re okay.”

Still nothing.

“I would’ve thought it would be the other way around,”
Kate continued, ruthlessly trying to raise
some
kind of reaction. “That you would’ve called her first. Considering she’s the one who’s pregnant and all alone.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I should’ve called her.”

He glanced up. Pastor Kincaid was heading toward them, several of the girls from the church youth group in tow.

“Jericho. Miss Kate,” he greeted them, his southern manners impeccable. “How are you?”

His words and his concern were aimed at Jed.

Jed smiled, morphing into Jericho, complete with a hint of sadness in his eyes. It was scary to watch. “I’m doing okay,” he told the pastor.

“I’m here, if you ever want to talk,” the pastor said.

“I appreciate that,” Jericho told him. “But I’m fine.”

Kate had watched him slip into this character often following David’s funeral. But it wasn’t real. He was an incredibly talented actor, but he
wasn’t
fine. Inside, he was letting himself feel nothing.

And Kate was certain that although she loved him, there could be no way on earth that he loved her. How could he, when he was so careful to keep himself distanced from any and all emotions?

He could
act
like he loved her, and in the course of his performance, he could create feelings for himself similar to love. But since he was only acting, he was completely in control. He would never truly be swept up. He might never feel grief and pain, but he would also never feel blazingly intense joy.

Unless … somehow she could force his hand, force an emotional release.

They walked to the trailer in silence. Once inside, Jed picked up his script and sat down.

Kate took it from his hands. “We need to talk about David.”

A muscle jumped in his jaw, and she felt the faintest stirring of hope. But then he gave her Jericho, the same
way he’d pulled him out for Pastor Kincaid. “Kate, I know that you’re worried I’m going lose it and—I don’t know, maybe start drinking again but—”

“I want to know what you’re going to do, now that you don’t have David to talk to.”

“I’m not going to drink. I’m … not.”

He was giving her Jericho’s sincere look. She wasn’t buying. “Instead you’re just going to stand outside the bar? Or maybe you’ll go in, have ’em pour you a shot so you can smell it?”

He shook his head. “No, I’m gonna try not to … No.”

“Do you even know that just a few minutes ago, you were staring at the door to the bar, like it was the gate to the Emerald City?”

His eyes went blank.

Kate laid all of her cards out on the table. “Jed, I’m worried because you’re holding everything inside. Your best friend died. You’re supposed to be angry. You need to grieve. It’s only going to hurt you if you don’t let yourself feel something.”

He didn’t speak, didn’t move.

“I once had something really bad happen to me,” Kate whispered, praying that he could hear her, because she didn’t think she could tell him this twice. “And I didn’t talk about it for nearly ten years. And for all that time, nearly an entire decade, I let it eat away at me.”

“Eighth grade,” he said. He was listening, thank God. “Please, God, don’t tell me you were raped.”

Kate shook her head. “I wasn’t. I was … assaulted, I guess you’d call it, for lack of a better word. It was more emotional than physical, but I
was
only in eighth grade, I was just a kid, and …” She looked down at her hands, held tightly clenched in front of her. “I was at a party. It was my friend Nancy’s thirteenth birthday. Her older brother Doug and some of his friends were there, and they brought us out onto the driveway to check out Ben
D’Adario’s new car. We got in, and everyone was laughing and, well, flirting. These were high school boys, and we were flattered and impressed by their attention.

“But then I looked up, and I realized I was the only girl left in the car. I was in the backseat, with a boy on either side of me, and Ben pulled out of the driveway. At first I was like, ‘Come on, you guys.’ I thought they’d take me around the block, but they didn’t. They kept going. Someone gave me a beer, but I didn’t drink it. They were starting to scare me—some of the things they were saying, the language they were using, talking about sex, about body parts. Tits. They kept making references to tits. God, I hated that word. I still hate it.”

She stood up, unable to sit still, unable to talk about this with Jed watching her. “Doug spilled his beer down my shirt. He started wiping it away, touching me, and I knew he’d done it on purpose. The other boys were laughing, like it was the funniest thing in the world. The other boy sitting next to me—I didn’t know his name—he starting pulling up my shirt, saying that I had to take it off or I’d catch a cold. He thought he was so clever. And I couldn’t stop them. Their hands were all over me. Even between my legs.

“I was fighting by then, and crying, but they were so much bigger than me—and they were just laughing. They yanked my shirt up over my head so I couldn’t see, and somehow they got my bra unfastened, and I was fighting and trying to cover myself and all I could hear was this
laughter
and—”

Kate closed her eyes, their voices still echoing in her head, even after all this time.

“Ben was the only one who had a soul. Or maybe he was just afraid of getting into trouble, I don’t know. But he stopped the car on the side of the road, and pulled me away from Doug and the other two. They were still laughing and
saying how I wanted it, how I’d been asking for it, just by walking around and sticking out my chest.

“I was crying so hard by then I couldn’t see, but I ran. As soon as Ben pulled me free and my feet hit the ground, I was out of there. I was close to four miles from my house, but I didn’t stop running until I got home. I took a shower, and I washed that beer off me, but I couldn’t wash away the feel of those hands or the sound of that laughter.”

Jed touched her shoulders, coming up behind her to slip his arms around her. “I’m so sorry,” he whispered.

“I didn’t tell anyone,” she told him. “I was so ashamed. And I thought if I told, people would blame me. I thought they would think Doug was right, that I’d asked for it, as if I’d somehow had control over the fact that I’d matured so fast. I lived with the shame—shame that I shouldn’t have felt—for
years
, because I didn’t talk about it. There were times that I thought it was eating me alive. And I’m still … not entirely okay, even after all this time. It’s still really hard for me to talk about it.” She turned to face him. “You need to talk about David, about what you’re feeling. I know you’re very angry, but you’re not letting any of it out.” She’d lost him. She saw it in his eyes before he moved even one muscle. She’d brought him halfway back to life for a moment with her story, but now he was gone again. “Don’t hurt yourself that way.
David
wouldn’t want you to do that. Please,” she begged him. “Talk to me.”

“I can’t.” He turned away. “I’m sorry.”

As Kate watched, he went into the bathroom. She heard the door shut and the shower go on.

No, she hadn’t lost him. It wasn’t possible to lose something she’d never really had. “I’m sorry, too,” she whispered.

“Lookit, I’ve made my decision about the end of the movie,” Victor told Kate as the camera was reset. “I’ve rewritten the last four scenes myself and—”