The Reunion by Kayla Olson(81)

A fake sunbeam streams through the window, lighting up my face just like the script calls for. I take a deep breath, try to summon the purity of Honor’s feelings amid the multiple cameras that are poised and ready to capture the scene from a variety of angles.

“We’re rolling in five, four, three…,” Bryan calls.

I could do this scene in my sleep, and—thankfully—muscle memory takes over. My voice says all the right words, in all the right ways, and Ransom doesn’t miss a beat. We slip into our characters so easily after all this time: there’s safety there, in Honor’s skin, where nothing can truly hurt because nothing we say or do is truly real.

That’s what I tell myself, anyway, as Ransom slips his arm around my waist. As his fingertips graze the line where the bare skin of my stomach meets the hem of my silk camisole, hidden beneath the thick white duvet. His eyes search mine, and I can’t look away—not just because it’s right for the scene, but because I can’t.

“I think you should do whatever makes you happy,” Ransom says, the line hitting me in a thousand fresh ways that feel all too real.

Whatever makes you happy.

What if I can’t have what makes me happy? What if, after all we’ve been through, Ransom feels we’re better off as just friends?

Or, what if I can have what I want—but despite our thousand best intentions, it doesn’t last—and we both end up miserable and broken?

I swallow, knowing before the line leaves my mouth that this will be the very best one I’ve ever delivered, and the most honest. “I just wish I knew exactly what that was,” I say.

We hold eye contact, twenty years’ worth of intensity suspended in the space between us, until—snap—Bryan’s voice cuts straight through the moment.

“Well, that was exceptional,” he says, with a slow clap, not a hint of sarcasm. “A true one-take wonder, right there. Okay, stay exactly where you are and I’ll clear the set as quickly as I can—let’s capture this next bedroom scene while you’ve got the same level of intensity, it’s absolutely perfect.”

My eyes find their way back to Ransom immediately. His are still on me, lingering on the line where my seriously thin camisole strap hugs my skin, probably thinking about how one of the first things he’ll do in the next scene is take the entire thing off of me. It’s like we have the exact same thought at the exact same moment—his eyes flicker back to mine with a hunger and fire that was so, so absent yesterday.

“Liv, I—”

“Don’t,” I murmur, an attempt at cutting him off, but the word gets caught and mangled in my throat.

“I’m so sorry,” he finishes, clearly not getting the message.

I can’t have this conversation right now—I can’t. I’ll never get through the next scene.

“Talk later?” I say, my voice breaking.

He swallows, nods. “Yeah,” he says quietly. “Talk later.”

All at once, the sunbeam disappears from our window, and it’s like we’ve teleported to some moonlit midnight. I realize, with a start, how quiet it is on set, how empty: only Bryan is still around, and a single cameraperson—a woman named Jules.

“Liv, Ransom, are we ready?” Bryan calls. At least he’s been too busy clearing the set to listen to our every word; if he’d been listening, he wouldn’t be asking.

I close my eyes, push down the surge of emotion that rushed in during the short break. Five, four, three, I count in my head, trying to find the line where I end and Honor begins.

By the time I reach one, I’ve found it. Only barely, but I can do this.

“Ready,” I say, because Ransom still hasn’t answered yet.

“Ready,” he finally echoes, only the barest trace of an edge left in his voice.

There are no words in this scene; it will be a hard cut directly on the heels of another scene we’ve already shot. While we once had free rein to let the scene evolve naturally—within certain bounds, given that our audience isn’t X-rated, or even R-rated—this time around, our every move has been pre-choreographed by an intimacy coordinator; it’s Jules’s job to film all the right angles without us even realizing she’s there. The final version of the episode will have music, but for now, it’s silent—borderline too silent.

“Rolling in five,” Bryan says, counting us in to the scene.

Ransom’s eyes go from spark to fire in two seconds flat. The hunger there feels so, so real—my body can’t tell the difference, and suddenly it feels like I’m slipping on ashes, hurtling headlong toward the flames. He slides one hand into my hair and pulls me close, closer—

His lips find mine, tentative at first, and then they’re ravenous. I match his hunger and then some, letting the moment take over, fury fusing with passion until they’re indistinguishable. His legs tangle with mine under the covers; no one will see just how close we are in this moment, no one will know there’s not an inch of space between us. The heat of his skin, his strong body pressed up against mine: he feels good.

I feel good.

His fingers graze my stomach as he slips them under the hem of my camisole. He pulls the soft silk up and over my head, expertly keeping all the necessary parts of me covered under the thick duvet, where the cameras can’t see. Only my silk shorts and his boxers are between us now, a barrier that’s simultaneously so little and so much—I kiss him deeper, my hands curling into his hair so hard it might hurt.