Grabbing a script off the stack on a table by the door, I sigh heavily and collapse into the closest aluminum chair.
I probably should’ve read the call sheet Cynthia emailed me last week, accompanied by a terse note reminding me that I am not getting any younger and haven’t had a steady role since I was wearing training bras a full decade ago. As is the case more often than not, her admonitions fell on deaf ears. I haven’t exactly bothered to prep — unlike the perfect, pretty, petty girls littering the room around me like mannequins in a store window. Heads buried in cue cards and hand mirrors, they run through last minute lines and check their makeup.
My eyes drop to the phone clutched between my fingers. I scroll through a week’s worth of backlogged spam emails until I find my mother’s message. I pick absently at my chipping black nail polish as my gaze sweeps the casting call. It’s a recurring guest role on a new pilot set during high school, featuring vampires or fallen angels or some other incomprehensible shit. Beth or Becky or some equally non-threatening name suited for a sidekick. A best friend.
Not the lead. Those were cast weeks ago.
I snort and the girl in the chair closest to mine makes a deliberate show of scooting away from me, as though my unkempt state is contagious and I’m liable to lessen her chances by sheer proximity. Twin spots of color appear on her high cheekbones when I waggle my fingers at her in a teasing wave.
“Don’t worry, sweetie,” I confide in a whisper. “I don’t want the part. But if you do, I think we both know what kind of qualities the casting director is really looking for.”
I make a crude pumping gesture with my hand and push out the inside of my cheek with the tip of my tongue.
With an indignant huff and a resolute shake of her slim shoulders, she turns her attention to the phone in her hands and attempts to ignore my existence.
That suits me fine.
The double doors at the opposite end of the room swing open and every head pivots to watch, faces etched in various expressions of critique, as a production assistant wielding a clipboard steps out, trailed closely by a girl who’s just auditioned. Looking a bit green around the gills, the girl makes her slow march through the gauntlet of aluminum chairs on which her competition sits, her eyes never wavering from the exit. Judging from the way her hands are shaking and the thoroughly bored look on the PA’s face, it’s clear she won’t be playing Becky.
A new name is called. A girl clamors to her feet and vanishes into the inner sanctum. I read through the script sheet briefly, grimacing at the cheesy lines. It’s even worse than I imagined, and not just because my headache has evolved into a migraine. This is bad writing, even by network television standards.
After a few moments of painful study, I close my eyes and lean back in my seat, wishing I’d had time to grab a bagel in my mad rush to get here. The thought of composing myself enough to walk through those doors and say the words, “What do you mean, Stefano is a… a… a vampire?” in a tone of breathy incredulity is almost more than I can bear without any carbs in my system.
Every few minutes, I hear the sound of the doors swinging open, of girls exchanging places, of heels clicking against tile floors as those who have failed to impress the producers escape eagerly into the parking lot where they will sit in their cars and cry until their perfect mascara is smudged beyond recognition. The hopefuls — those who still cling to this impossible dream of “making it” — always take rejection the hardest.
I should know. I used to be like them. I used to give a shit.
Slumping down so my neck is braced against the curved back of my aluminum chair, I fight the waves of nausea coursing through my veins. God, I’m hungover. I haven’t felt this crappy since last April, when Harper and I did mushrooms at Coachella. Fun at the time; not so fun the next morning, when I woke up naked in a stranger’s tent covered in glitter, missing both my panties and my dignity.
An abrasive tapping sound intrudes on my recollections, followed shortly by an impatient cough. I open my eyes to find the stony-faced PA staring down at me, her clipboard clutched so tightly it’s a wonder her acrylic fingernails don’t pop off with the force of her grip. When our stares meet, her lip curls in a hint of disdain.
“Katharine Firestone?”
I blink. “Guilty.”
“You’re up,” she says coolly, turning on a heel and marching toward the double doors without another word. I push to my feet and follow her at a leisurely pace, feeling the heat of glares from the rest of the girls in the room burning into me from all sides, an inferno of female contempt. Just before I reach the doors, I turn and blow them a goodbye kiss.
“They’re waiting,” the PA informs me testily, tapping her pencil again.
I push down the urge to reach out and break it in half. Denying her a snappy retort will spoil her dramatic little power trip, so I simply arch my brows and wait patiently, a small smile playing on my lips, until she shoves open the doors and ushers me inside.
There’s a table set up across the room, about twenty feet from where I’m standing, its surface littered with empty iced coffee cups and stacks of notes. Sitting behind it are three people, none of whom bother to glance up when the door closes behind me with a resounding click. I hear the PA take a seat somewhere out of sight.
“Stand on the X in the middle of the floor, please,” one of the women says in a tired voice.
I walk soundlessly to the spot marked with masking tape.
“Name?”
The woman at the center of the table is speaking again. She seems to be in charge. There’s something insectile about the way she moves that reminds me of a large praying mantis — too thin, too jerky, highly inclined to bite your head off. Every strand of hair in her bleached blonde bob stays perfectly in place when she tilts her head to scan the sheet in front of her.
“Katharine,” I say, my voice parched and cracking. Cynthia always says I have a voice made for radio, but my hangover has made me sound even huskier than usual. I clear my throat and try again. “Katharine Firestone. But I go by Kat.”
The man on the right looks up when I speak, interest written plainly on his angular features. He’s in his early thirties and strikingly handsome — tall with an athletic build, his blondish-brown hair pulled back in a man-bun. I usually hate that look, but he somehow pulls it off effortlessly. I suppose, if you’re attractive enough, it doesn’t much matter what you do with your hair.
He looks like a Viking. Or maybe an Instagram model.
His eyes rake me from my messy pony-tail down to my battered Doc Martin boots. Surprise flickers in his dark blue irises as he takes me in.