You Had Me at Hola(11)

Ashton was so attuned to her every movement, he didn’t miss his cue. His character shot back a retort, which he delivered in strong, rapid Spanish. He paused at the end of his lines, waiting for Jasmine’s response. It was supposed to start with, “?Y quién diablos piensas que eres?” A sort of, “Who the hell do you think you are?” And then she would put him in his place.

Except Jasmine stumbled over her lines, messing up the vowels. She paused, stared intently at the script in front of her, and he imagined her repeating the words in her head. She started again and made it through the entire passage, albeit slowly, and without the fierceness she’d displayed when speaking her lines in English.

They finished the scene, but Jasmine’s difficulty with Spanish puzzled him. Ashton replayed the coffee moment over again in his head, recalling her long pause and the way she’d stared at him after his poor attempt at a joke . . .

Wait, was it possible she didn’t speak Spanish?

Carmen in Charge had a bilingual script, cast, and crew. It was a big part of the promo for the show. How was this going to work if the lead actress wasn’t fluent?

He listened to Jasmine work her way through a scene in Spanish with Miriam Perez. Maybe he wasn’t being fair. Jasmine’s accent was spot on, even if her pronunciation was a little inconsistent.

It was something he particularly worried about for himself. While his English was good, he still had an accent and sometimes came across idioms he didn’t immediately recognize or that didn’t translate easily to Spanish. Would wider American audiences accept a new leading man with a Puerto Rican accent? A few Spanish-speaking actors had achieved success—guys like Javier Bardem, Diego Luna, and Gael García Bernal. Was there still room in that lexicon for Ashton Suarez?

The sudden silence made him blink. Jasmine stared at him expectantly. No, not just Jasmine. Everyone was staring at him. Pu?eta. It was his line.

In his rush to flip the page, Ashton knocked over his drinking glass. Lemon water splashed all over his script and the table. He shoved back his chair before it could get on his pants. To his left, Jasmine leaped out of her seat like she’d been stuck with a pin.

Ashton imagined a sinkhole opening beneath him and swallowing him up. That would be preferable to whatever was happening to him today.

“Did it get on you?” he asked under his breath.

“Not this time,” she answered.

It was amazing how much mortification could feel like heartburn.

A pair of PAs rushed in with paper towels to sop up the mess, and Ashton leaned back to get out of their way. “Sorry,” he muttered. “Too much caffeine.”

Jasmine turned a laugh into a cough.

She was laughing at him. Was it a good laugh? Like a haha, we have a shared joke about coffee kind of laugh? Or a bad laugh, like, you clumsy idiot, always spilling drinks?

He didn’t dare look at her to find out, and everyone was waiting for him. His neck felt hot. Another PA handed him a fresh script. This time, he would give it his complete attention. Something he should have been doing anyway. On any other set, on any other day, he would have.

But today . . . today sucked.

Somehow, Ashton got through it. Even though nerves made his skin feel too tight, and he couldn’t stop fidgeting. He was like Yadiel trying to sit through Sunday mass. It was the most awkward table read he’d ever participated in.

Marquita made her closing speech, and this time, Ashton listened.

“That was a great start, team! I’m so excited to be embarking on this journey with all of you. Now, enjoy the rest of the weekend, and I’ll see you at the studio Monday morning, bright and early.”

Before Ashton could turn to Jasmine to apologize for almost spilling another drink on her, she slipped out of her chair and rounded the table to chat with Lily Benitez.

No problem. He’d catch her before he left. He felt terrible about ruining her outfit, and he couldn’t end this day without trying to make things right. This entire production hinged on the two of them selling the audience a romance between their characters. If she thought he was a fool, this would never work.

And he really needed it to work.

As Ashton was saying goodbye to the others, his ears picked up Jasmine’s voice somewhere behind him.

“Oh, the outfit?” She gave an easy laugh. “Spilled a giant coffee on myself right before we started. Had to make do with what was available, you know?”

The person she was talking to chuckled and said, “The show must go on?”

“Exactly.”

Ashton turned his head to catch a glimpse of her out of the corner of his eye. She was chatting with one of the ScreenFlix VPs, but standing with them was someone else—someone wearing a visitor’s badge and recording their conversation with a phone.

A reporter.

Ashton did a sharp about-face and made a prompt exit. Peter called his name, and Ashton waved, but kept going. Farther down the hallway he encountered Skye, and asked them to show him back to the elevators.

Once the doors shut behind him and he was on his way down, Ashton was finally able to take a deep breath.

He hated talking to the press. While the Miami-based entertainment reporters were used to his standoffishness and had reached the point of joking about it good-naturedly, he was in New York now. He had no idea what to expect from the media here. And the last thing he needed was for a reporter to record him apologizing to Jasmine. It would spark curiosity, and he couldn’t afford rumors or invasive questions. His son’s safety was too important.