A Midsummer Night's Fling (Stage Kiss Series Book 1) (23 page)

"Am I doing that?"

"I think you're doing it more than Judith is giving you credit for. And I think at this point Judith is more hung up on the verse than she needs to be."

The sun filtering through the leaves gilded his hair, turning the straw color to a beautiful gold. She laughed and he glanced over at her, his eyes bright blue, and he raised one eyebrow in question.

"You're different," she told him. This was, she realized, a truth which had been building inside her for weeks. Something about sitting with Max in this quiet corner of the theater under the trees had hammered the point home. She could never imagine the younger Max taking time to sit thoughtfully and parse a speech, figure things out. He'd always jumped in headfirst and pulled her along behind him, and they'd usually both ended up smashed on the pavement.

"Different?" he said.

"More methodical. Thoughtful. Careful." She frowned, thinking. "Centered." Yes, exactly that. Old Max had seemed to careen along off-balance, out of tune, but now he'd grown into himself. He knew who he was, what he wanted, how to get it.

Max gave a small, bitter laugh. "I was a thoughtless, careless, selfish bastard before. It wouldn't take much to make an improvement on that."

"You weren't."

"Thoughtless, careless, or selfish?" He laughed, trying to make it into a joke, but his eyes were bleak.
 

"A bastard. You did love me. I know you did. And I know I hurt you too."

He studied her for one long heartbeat before he glanced away. "Why did we break up?"

"You know why," she said.

"I think I know why. Give me your perspective."

She smoothed her clammy palms over her knees. "You partied so much. Your drinking. The smoking. The fighting. I thought you were gonna get yourself killed." She sucked in a deep breath then let it out, staring through the screen of trees. "And . . . "

The stage was barely visible, a few wooden boards glimpsed between two tree trunks. How easy to pretend they were alone. They had been transported to some magical fairyland where it was only the two of them.
And if you can't tell the truth in fairyland
. . .
 

"I didn't trust you," she murmured. "I held on to you so tight because I was scared you'd leave me. Cheat on me. Like my dad did to my mom."

"I'd never have done that." He grabbed her wrist, and leaned over to see her face. "I would
never
have done that to you."

She stared into his eyes. "I know that. I do. This was all me. I was so sure you'd break my heart somehow, but I thought I could hold the crash off if I kept you in my sight, kept you away from other people." She raked her fingers into her hair, loosening her ponytail. Her stomach was in about six different knots right now. "I got so scared after Dad split. I thought it was a matter of time before you wanted out too. So I smothered you instead."

He reached up, smoothing his hand through her hair. He tucked a strand behind her ear. "You rarely smothered me. And I put you through a lot of shit too. I don't know why you even wanted me. I was such a fuck up."

She bumped his shoulder with hers. "A beautiful fuck up. A marvelous wreck."

"We were so damn young when we met. I always thought I found you too soon. If we'd been older, more mature when we started . . . " His thumb tickled beneath her chin as he stared into her eyes. When he'd fixed her hair, his hand had lingered on the side of her neck. Nicola became intensely aware of the weight of his palm as her skin fired with sensation, a match struck to life. "Nic . . . " He leaned toward her.

She wet her lips, a craving for him starting low in her gut. "Max." She covered his hand and lifted his palm from her skin. She needed to know
what
she was doing with Max before she
did
anything else with Max.
 

Trying to reclaim their earlier camaraderie, she adopted a chipper tone – which sounded grating even to her own ears. "So, the 'forgeries of jealousy' speech. How would you handle that?"

A muscle ticked in his jaw, but he gave a little nod. He shifted his butt over so he sat farther from her and their arms and sides no longer touched. With an effort that was obvious by his furrowed forehead, Max wrenched his focus back toward work. "OK, the thing with long speeches like 'forgeries of jealousy' is you don't want to approach them as a big block of text you have to get through. Break the speeches into distinct parts, they usually are anyway."

"How so?"

He held up three fingers then lowered one of them as he made his first point. "Number one, the speech starts because the character is responding to something that just happened, right? Oberon is accusing Titania of adultery so she fires back at him."

"Right."

"The second part of a speech," he ticked off a second finger, "is the character articulating the situation, exploring the problem. In your speech, that's all the middle bit where she's talking about the weather going screwy."

Nicola drew herself up and projected out, using her Queen voice. "'Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain, as in revenge, have suck'd up from the sea contagious fogs; Have every pelting river made so proud' . . . yada, yada."

"Right. The last part in a long speech," he held his remaining finger up, drawing special emphasis, "the character usually comes to some sort of realization or solution. Or they've realized there
is
no solution. That's the end where Titania tells Oberon the screwy weather is their fault because they've been fighting. Take the audience on that journey with you; show them the thought process and the forward momentum."

Nicola blinked, processing this, reviewing the speech in this new light. It did seem clearer, more manageable. "
Thank you
, Max."

He beamed at her, laugh lines crinkling. Something inside her, her heart, her soul maybe – corny as
that
thought was – stretched, her very self reaching toward him even though she kept her arms pinned against her sides.
 

"They're calling for you two," Isabelle said from behind them.

Nicola jumped, twitching with guilt even though she hadn't been doing anything wrong. Only
thinking
wrong things.
 

"What are you doing at rehearsal, Isa?" Max asked.

"I'm recruiting for the school program we're putting on next week at that performing arts high school. I need actors to do demonstrations."

Max rolled to his feet then held his hand out to Nicola. "Count me in. School demos are always fun."
 

"Me too." Nicola slid her hand into his, taking a secret thrill in the slide of palm against palm as she let him pull her to her feet. As she stood, she dusted her butt off then offered Isabelle an apologetic look. "I'm sorry if we held rehearsal up. Max was helping me with Titania."

Isabelle folded her arms, lips pursed. "I saw that."

Nicola braced herself for the storm, but Isabelle merely cocked her head to the side and said, "Where did you learn to do that, Max?"

He shot Nicola an uncertain look. She shrugged.
I'm lost too
.

Isabelle frowned, impatient. "Direct actors. Give notes like that."

Max raised an eyebrow. "I've been in the RSF company for years, Isa. I don't always just stand around and look pretty. Sometimes I pay attention to you."

"Hmm." Isabelle narrowed her eyes then turned on one heel and started along the "forest" path toward the stage.

Max frowned and glanced over at Nicola.
 

"I don't know," she said. "But Isabelle is right. You're good at this."

He brightened and started down the path beside her.
 

Resisting the urge to reach for his hand took everything Nicola had as they walked together to the stage.
 

I need to figure out what I'm doing here
.
 

To be with Max or not to be? She puffed her breath out on a deep sigh.
That's the fucking question
.

Chapter Fifteen

When Max wandered back to rehearsal, Nicola in tow, Judith sent him a withering scowl. "Where were you?"

Isabelle piped up before he could answer. "I held them up talking about the school program next week. I'm sorry, Jude."
 

Judith grimaced, perhaps annoyed that Isabelle had short-circuited her scolding. The director waved a dismissive hand and returned to working on scenes with the four lovers.
 

Isabelle poked Max, jabbing her nail into his arm. "Now you owe me, and you
have
to do the school program."

"I said I would – "

"And you have to talk Lachlan into doing it. I want to show a fight scene. In costume. Armor."

Max groaned. "
Isabelle
, that's going to be a pain in the – "

She poked him again. "Don't complain. Just do it." As she walked away, she turned over her shoulder. "You're in too, Nicola. I want you to perform a Titania and Bottom scene. You're doing good work." Isabelle left.

Max glanced over in time to catch the pole-axed expression on Nicola's face.

She blinked. "Has Isabelle been taking new happy pills or something?"

"
No!
" Judith yelled at the young woman playing Hermia. "You're crying too much. Start again. Focus on the
language
."

Max guided Nicola by the arm around the corner of the stage to reach the house seats. He murmured, "If Isabelle's got happy pills I wish she'd share them with Judith."

"No!"

Nicola jumped under his hand as Judith yelled, but the director was still focused on poor Hermia.
 

"Pull your ass in when you hug him, girl!" Judith yelled. "Jesus, are you trying to show your figure off? You
love
Lysander, you
want
him. Act like it!"

Nicola shot Max a mock pout. "Now I don't feel special anymore," she murmured. She wet her lips and looked around, drew in a deep breath then let it out. "Did you want to keep talking about . . . you know?"

His chest constricted as he glanced around. Isabelle was still there, and Judith. Lachlan. So many people. So many ears. The shady trees above had seemed like their own little world, but now, here, he was full of doubt again. He squeezed her hand then let it go. "Later?"

A frown flashed over her face but then she nodded. "Yeah. Later works." She gave him a quick, polite smile then with a small sway in her step she waltzed to the back row of the theater to sit beside Lachlan.
 

Max fought the simmer of jealousy in his gut and stomped into the green room where he wouldn't have to watch Judith eviscerate the actors one by one. Or watch Nicola cozy up to Lachlan.

Through the ingrained habit of being an actor, he checked his phone. No calls from his agent, but his brother had texted him not five minutes ago:
Hey need to talk
.

Succumbing to his already shitty mood, Max wrote,
If you want to give me crap about Nic then skip it.

No
, Peter wrote after a few seconds. He had to be on break during filming. Peter never texted while working; it "distanced him from the character".
Coming home for sure
, Peter wrote.
Told Mom. It's official.

Max frowned at his phone.
Why is he telling me?
He typed,
OK . . .
 

I want to stay at The Bunkhouse.

Max stifled a groan.
What's wrong with YOUR house movie star?

I let the lease expire,
Peter wrote.
I'm always workin & the place was always empty.

Max rolled his eyes.
Stay at Mom's house?

Peter texted back,
Ha
.

And then,
Ha ha ha

And then,
Hahahahahaha hahahaha hahahaha hahahaha hahahahahahahaha hahaha haha haha hahaha hahaha hahahaha hahahaha hahahaha hahahahahaha hahahaha hahaha haha hahaha hahaha hahahaha haha hahaha hahahahaha
. . .
 

Max wrote,
K. I get it. Bunkhouse has an empty room. What day are you flying in?

Dunno. I'll get back to you or I'll have the assistant call.

K.

Thx bro
, Peter wrote.

Yeah
, Max replied.

Don't kiss Nicola! :-D Bye
.
 

Asshole! :-D Bye
. Max chucked the phone into his bag.

What was it with people today? Was it "Annoy Max Day"?
 

He could not
wait
for rehearsal to be over so he could get home and get away from
everyone
.
 

***

"I want to invite everyone to drinks at The Bore's Head tonight," Judith said as she wrapped up rehearsal.
 

Max swallowed a frustrated howl even as the rest of the cast voiced appreciative murmurs.

"First drinks are on me," Judith continued. "I don't know at least half of you as well as I should like and I want to remedy that. Get to know you all better."