were going with each nuanced moment, how much time they invested in just two minutes of the play. The technique allowed her to sink her teeth into this role like she’d never done before. The jury was still out on whether this had been a good move, career-wise, but on the plus side, she was learning a lot from working with Ethan Moore. He damn well knew his stuff. They’d gone over objectives, tactics, line-by-line intentions, all of it, and they still had over three quarters of the play ahead of them. Mind-boggling.
“You good, Evelyn?” Carly asked before beginning. Evelyn nodded politely and looked away as if choosing not to engage further. “Before we start, do you need anything more from me in the scene? Or less, for that matter? I’m open.”
“I’m good,” Evelyn said coolly.
Inside, Carly sighed. The two of them definitely had different processes. Carly liked finding the moments in the rehearsal room, taking a more organic approach. Evelyn showed up with every choice already made in advance. What you saw on the first run-through of the day with Evelyn was often the same set of choices she ended with. Didn’t allow for a ton of collaboration.
As Carly reset herself for another run of the scene, she stole a glance at Lauren Prescott, who sat at the table next to Ethan, complete with her clipboard and series of file folders, all neatly laid out. She was studiously scribbling something in her production book. From the moment they’d first met, she’d noticed Lauren. She came with a quality that was hard to look away from. She carried herself with confidence, and while she seemed friendly, there was also a removed quality that drove Carly nuts. She’d tried several times to break through that shell, to only fleeting success.
“Lauren?” she’d asked on their last break of the day, because she was apparently five years old and simply couldn’t seem to leave it alone.
“Yep. What can I do for you?”
She rested her chin in her hand, hoping Lauren would make eye contact. “How many tickles do you think it takes to make an octopus laugh? I’m just curious. I’ve been dying to figure it out. Up all night. It’s a problem.” She flashed what she hoped was a killer smile.
Lauren looked up from her laptop with confusion in her green eyes that quickly dissolved into what could best be described as slight amusement. Not a full-on smile, no, but the start of one. “I don’t know, Carly. Why don’t you tell me how many? I have a feeling you know.”
“Ten, Lauren. Ten tickles to make an octopus laugh. Can you imagine?”
Lauren shook her head and laughed silently, returning to the solace of her production book. “I can’t believe you just said that,” she murmured. Her dark hair, when Carly studied its length, fell just above her breasts, not that she knew much about them. The clothes Lauren wore to work, while professional enough, didn’t offer too many glimpses of the body beneath, which she had a feeling was being undersold.
“Oh, but I did. I did say it. And there’s more where that came from. I’ll hit you up tomorrow.”
“If you’re on time, I’ll consider it,” Lauren said casually, this time not glancing up from her work.
“Now you’re just tempting me.”
“I’m entirely fine with that.”
Carly noticed that Lauren didn’t socialize with the cast much during their downtime. She maintained a professional distance, which made sense given how she was not only the person who kept them moving forward but, in a way, the disciplinarian as well. Kind of like their very put together camp counselor.
Carly stole another glance. The really, really hot kind you made out with before summer ended.
Chapter Three
Over the course of the next week, several things became clear to Lauren. Number one: Carly Daniel was single-handedly breathing life into each scene without much help from Evelyn Tate, who was still holding back, and turning in a stiff interpretation of Mandy. Number two: Carly Daniel was proving herself to be a total thorn in Lauren’s side. She was chronically late and had twice now organized the cast into a late-night gathering at the bar down the street, leaving them all slower and hungover the next day. She hadn’t memorized any of her lines and didn’t seem to care about simple requests like returning a prop to the prop table when not in use. Number three: she was, conversely, always upbeat, positive, and actually kind of fun to have around. Sigh.