“Every actress who can sing wants to play Eponine,” I say. “But it’s incredibly hard to pull off the feisty Eponine, along with the love-struck Eponine, and then be dying Eponine on top of it all. Most actresses can handle one of the personas, sometimes two. You’ll see someone who can sing the hell out of “On My Own” or fawn all over Marius and then do a damn good death scene. But they can’t manage the playful side of her. But you, Jill,” I say and I pause because there’s something about her name that sounds too good on my lips, like I want to say it more, and in different ways, and in different places, and in a desperate voice too, and a hot and hungry one, and…fuck me now. She’s looking at me with the glass held in one hand and her lips slightly parted, and she’s hooked on every word. The moment is more intoxicating than it should be and threatens to cloud my cool head in a haze of heat. I tell myself to turn it off for her. It should be business. It should be a compliment.
Besides, I didn’t cast her because she’s f**k-able. I cast her because she’s f**king amazing. I try to keep it on the level as I finish, “You were brilliant. You were stunning. You were everything and more.”
As I say this, her face lights up. She might not know I’ve failed miserably at being business-like, but I know, and that’s the problem. I pride myself on control, and within mere hours of casting her I’m treading close to breaking the first rule of directing, and the second one too.
I return to the earlier topic—Fiddler on the Roof—as we finish our drinks, knowing a quick chat about that show will help me shut it down. The second she puts down her empty glass I call for the check, pay, and say goodnight.
Then I head to the boxing gym near my home in Tribeca, and I spend the next hour working out all my frustrations on a punching bag.
Chapter 4
Jill
The next night my roommate Kat swirls her straw in a chocolate milkshake, looking at the drink with disdain. “Not the same. These milkshakes are not the same as they are at Tino’s Diner.”
“I know. But you won’t let me go there anymore.”
“Well, obviously,” she says, and I can’t argue because the last time we went to our favorite diner for chocolate milkshakes and fries the creep who was stalking her and her boyfriend followed her there. Kat was pretty sure he had a knife in his pocket. Honestly, if he’d pulled that thing on me I’d have kneed him in the crotch so fast he’d have crumpled to the floor. I have two older brothers and they beat me up when I was younger then taught me to fight when I started filling out in the boobs and h*ps department. They didn’t have the chance to beat up too many boys, because I only had eyes for one boy back in high school. Aaron—he was on the swim team, and we were together my entire junior year, and everything was wonderful for a while. But given how it all ended, I would do just about anything to rewind time and change things. To have stayed away. For his sake.
“So we’ll just have to keep experimenting with all the diners in Chelsea and midtown and elsewhere to find a replacement milkshake,” I say to Kat.
“Obviously. Besides, we’re going to be celebrating every day, right, Miss Next Winner of a Best Actress Tony?”
Narrowing my eyes, I brandish a French fry at Kat, pretending I’m ready to chuck it at her. She leans away. “You think I haven’t learned by now how to avoid your projectile French fries?”
I hold up another one for emphasis. “Don’t. Jinx. Me. You know my rules about jinxing.”
“Yeah, you didn’t even tell me you were auditioning until you got the callback because you were so superstitious.” I look away. The truth is, there are a lot of things I don’t tell Kat. A lot of things I don’t tell anyone. A lot of things I make up. It’s a good thing I can act, because sometimes my whole life feels like one. “And now you’ve gone and won a role in a Broadway show.”
“With Patrick Carlson,” I say excitedly.
“And in a Frederick Stillman show, and I know he’s your fave.”
“And let’s not forget Davis Milo is directing,” I add, suddenly feeling the need to point him out too, especially after the drink with him last night. I’m not quite sure what came over me, asking my director to have a drink and then practically daring him to follow me into Sardi’s, but I was pretty much floating on cloud nine last night, and there he was in my vicinity, giving me the best news of my life.
Not to mention, he’s almost too gorgeous for words. I’d never seen him up close and personal before yesterday. Sure, I’ve seen him while watching the Tonys and the Oscars, and I’ve heard other actresses go dreamy-eyed while talking about him. But there in the bar with him last night, I could feel it. I get why women dig him. He has undress me eyes. He looks like the kind of man who doesn’t ever break your gaze. Who walks across the room, all crazy possessive and marks you with a territorial sort of kiss. Pushes you against the wall, cages you in with his arms, and claims you. I wonder what it would be like to be kissed like that.
“I wonder if he’ll bring his Oscar to a rehearsal,” Kat muses, breaking my naughty reverie. I dismiss the thoughts of Davis, since Patrick is the man I plan to focus on. “I love that movie he did where he won it. Ransom.”
“Want me to tell him you’re a fan?”
“Oh, please do. Anyway, I need all the details about the audition scene with Patrick. I want to hear about the kiss with the love of your life.” Her eyes go wide and she motions with her hands for me to spill the details. “Does he know you’re the same gal who once sent flowers to him and asked him out?”