Starlight Nights

  As soon as she sees us, she waves to a sleepy-looking Beth and, pulling a roller bag behind her, pushes open the door in the pre-dawn gloom. Without bothering to put on the coat.

  Damnit, Callie, just wear the stupid thing. I drop my fist onto my leg in annoyance.

  She’s always cold. But not when she wants to make a point, apparently.

  Her chin is set and her gaze fixed, like she’s marching into war, as she steps down the stairs briskly. Jimmy puts her suitcase in the trunk. She smiles at him when he opens the door for her, but the smile vanishes completely by the time she settles in the seat next to me.

  “Here.” She gives me my coat, and I want to shove it back at her and tell her to stop being ridiculous.

  But that’s part of the whole “feeling too much” thing. Why should I care whether she wears a coat? Or if she’s cold? It’s not my business. And she’s made that more than clear.

  So I take it and fold it in a square to put behind my head as a pillow.

  She smells of vanilla and mint, and now my coat does, too. Which is fine because it’s not like I’ll need it after today, anyway.

  Jimmy shuts the door behind her, and she puts her backpack on the floor and then reaches for her seatbelt.

  “It’ll be at least an hour and a half to O’Hare,” I tell her. “Maybe more.”

  “Okay.” Her gaze flicks to mine and away as she nods. She looks bright-eyed and well-rested, if still slightly pissed. Clearly nothing was keeping her up until the early hours of, well, now. “It’s fine. I have homework to do, anyway. My forensic accounting assignment is due the Monday I get back.” The words come out as a challenge, as if she’s daring me to deny her return.

  But I keep my mouth shut as she pulls her laptop out of her backpack.

  I stretch out my legs, careful not to veer into her space, and close my eyes. I’m never my best at this time in the morning, and after a sleepless night in a cheap-ass motel, I’m desperate to zone out.

  But my eyelids keep flipping open. It’s not that she’s being loud or anything. She has her laptop out now, the keys clicking quietly, her forehead furrowed in concentration. It’s more that there’s this steady drumbeat of awareness in me that she’s here.

  Fuck.

  I resettle myself in the seat, sinking lower, and shutting my eyes with determination.

  That lasts for about five seconds. “We won’t have time to stop for breakfast,” I warn her, expecting a protest.

  “That’s fine,” she says, without looking over at me. She pauses only to blow on her hands to warm up her fingers. Her feet are bouncing against the floor in a way that tells me she’s trying to keep her feet from freezing.

  It would help, at least a little, if she would just wear my coat. But I manage to keep from saying that.

  “Jimmy,” I call. “Can you turn up the heat?”

  “I’m fine,” Calista says.

  “You got it,” Jimmy responds, and a blast of hot air roars in from the vents.

  “Maybe I’m the one who’s cold,” I point out, just because I can. In reality, my shirt is already sticking to my back.

  Calista rolls her eyes. “Right. You’re always, like, ten degrees warmer than…” She clamps her mouth shut, her cheeks turning pink. And her fingers go still on the keyboard.

  I know exactly what she’s thinking for the first time since I arrived. They always kept stage seven, where the main Starlight sets were, so cold. She was forever huddling in a coat or scarf or both. In scene, between takes, Chase used to scrub his hands over hers to warm her up. Or she would tuck her toes—which were, by the way, like blocks of ice—under my leg.

  But not after that one episode, that one scene.

  So warm me up.

  After that, I stayed the hell away. Or at least, I tried. I really did. She deserved better than me.

  “Maybe it’s my thin California blood,” I say, daring her to call me on it, to tease me for not being able to handle it when she’s been freaking living with it for months.

  But all she says is, “Maybe,” in a completely noncommittal tone.

  Is this the way it’s going to be? Probably. I got what I needed. She’s doing the show. That’s all that matters.

  But it doesn’t feel like that.

  Whatever. It doesn’t matter. Giving up on sleep, I pull out my phone. There are always emails waiting now. Like I’m a responsible business person or some shit, with actual answers.

  There’s a text at the top of my screen.

  Dr. Katie: How did it go? I’m here if you want to talk about it. Let me know if your flight changes.

  I grit my teeth against the guilt. Even though I have nothing to feel guilty about. I did exactly what I said I would do: nothing more, nothing less. Her concern that Callie might remind me too much of my past mistakes and that I “might be tempted to spiral” amounted to nothing.

  I’m here, I’m fine. Mission accomplished, just as planned.

  Except, possibly, for caring too much about the girl sitting next to me. That I wasn’t counting on.

  It shouldn’t surprise me. It’s probably just leftover … whatever from all those years of looking out for her. But someone had to. Her mother was doing her best to drive her into the ground.

  A mother I had just reintroduced into her life. Shit.

  But it’s what had to be done. Calista is an adult now. She can handle herself. And if she can’t, that’s her problem, not mine.

  I unlock my phone, grit my teeth, and dive into the waiting emails.

  For a long while, it’s quiet in the limo except for the low murmur of the radio in the front with Jimmy, Calista’s laptop keys clicking, and the buzzing hum of the road beneath the tires.

  “Who’s writing?”

  Calista’s question startles me from scowling at a location-scouting report. “What?”

  “Who did you get to write the episodes?” she asks, her attention still seemingly focused on the screen in front of her.

  “Oh.” I smile. “Jude Graves.”

  Callie’s head snaps up, and she stares at me. “Are you serious?”

  Trying not to grin at her reaction, I lift my shoulder in a shrug. “She wanted to. It was part of the deal I agreed to for the option.” I had to do something, offer her something she wanted to keep the project from going elsewhere. “She used to write for TV before she wrote Fly Girl.”

  “Have you met her?” she asks, shifting slightly in her seat to face me.

  “Yeah. We’ve been working together for a few months. It’s been kind of tricky breaking it down into ten-minute episodes without losing the heart of the story.” I hear the words coming out of my mouth, and for a second, I’m surprised. I actually sound like I know what I’m talking about. But I’ve been working hard to try to figure this all out. No way am I going to let someone say I didn’t earn this, that I’m only coasting on my dad’s name and reputation. “Each one has to have an arc, but they have to build to—”

  “What’s she like?” Callie demands, closing her laptop with a definitive click.

  I raise my eyebrows.

  Calista, in general, is more reserved. She can turn it on and off as needed when the cameras are rolling. But in person, she’s more reflective—not shy exactly, just more prone to listening than speaking. You can practically see the thoughts churning inside her head, though; she’s just learned the hard way not to voice them. Especially back when I first met her, when Lori was prone to flying off the handle at any given moment, at anything she deemed a provocation—like the temperature in Callie’s dressing room or the lack of gluten-free, dairy-free, sugar-free options at lunch.

  Seeing Callie come to life, for lack of a better phrase, that third season without her mom dogging her had been amazing.

  But I’ve never seen Callie as excited as she was about that book. I’d only asked about it, really, to kill time during a set up. But Callie had launched into a full description of the story and the characters. Which was interesting, yeah.
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  But I was more intrigued to see her face flushed with enthusiasm, and her hands flashing and darting as she explained. The book meant something to her. At that point, I’d never seen her so happy.

  After reading it, I understood. Callie saw herself in Evie, a girl only valued for what she could do. It must have been a relief to feel less alone, though Calista had never talked about it that way.

  When Callie was talking about Fly Girl, it was like someone had added color to a black-and-white picture of her. That moment left me with the unreasonable and impossible desire to be able to make her that happy.

  “Jude is not what you’d expect,” I say, shifting away from those dangerous—and ultimately pointless—memories. “I thought she’d be kind of a snob. You know, like one of those people who claims not to watch TV?”

  And to be fair, the picture on the back of the book did lead one in that direction: Jude staring back at you with her glasses perched on the edge of her nose and her arms folded across her chest, looking like every pissed-off set tutor I ever had.

  Callie nods.

  “But she’s not. She’s little,” I say. “Short and tough. She’s from Jersey, and she says ‘fuck’ a lot.”

  Calista laughs. “I’m sure that endeared her to you.”

  “Hell yeah.” I shift forward in the seat, trying to get a bit of cooler air. It is so hot in here, but Calista has her foot tucked under her leg. Another sure sign that she’s still cold.

  She fidgets with the edge of the laptop, where the outer shell has cracked. She needs a new one. It only takes a couple clicks on my phone to order the newest model of what she’s using. My funds aren’t what they were when I was playing by my dad’s rules, but I have enough to get her a laptop if she’s going to insist on doing homework the next couple of weeks. Since she probably won’t buy one for herself. And her mother certainly won’t do it for her. Fucking Lori.

  “Will she, uh…” Callie begins, and then shakes her head. “I mean, I know that writers aren’t usually there, but—”

  “Jude is coming for a set visit. One day next week. She wants to make sure I’m not fucking it up,” I say. “Her words, not mine, by the way.”

  “Are you serious?” she asks, her cheeks flushing with color.

  “And she wants to meet you,” I add.

  She swallows hard. “I don’t know. I mean, I’m not … Evie is such a great character, she has all this depth. I don’t know if I—”

  “So what you’re saying is, you’re not feeling your craft at the moment?” I ask with a feigned frown.

  It takes her a second, then she snorts with laughter, clamping a hand over her mouth. “I forgot Chase used to say that,” she says, her voice muffled through her fingers.

  Whenever he was screwing up take after take, which happened to all of us at various points, he would say, with this deep and troubled expression, “I’m just not feeling my craft right now.”

  Completely understandable, but kind of hilarious to people like Callie and me who’d been working since we were little kids and—the only craft we were worried about was the kind spelled with a “K” that came with an orange cheese packet. (My dad’s chef hated it, but Miss Claud, the nanny who took care of me until I was nine, wanted me to have some semblance of a normal childhood.)

  “Callie, it’s fine,” I say. “She’s seen the show. She knows you can do it.” What Jude had said was something to the effect of, “She’s a spitfire, huh?” Which, hey, close enough.

  Callie nods, and I expect her to return her attention to her laptop. But she doesn’t. She just keeps playing with that edge of loose plastic. “Have you heard from him?”

  It takes me a second to put it together. “Chase?”

  She nods.

  We’re walking a fine line here, right at the edge of territory that we, by unspoken agreement, don’t discuss. Or, at least we haven’t. And I really don’t want to. Reliving one of my most shameful moments—and there’s plenty of competition—is something I prefer to reserve for nights when I can’t sleep and I’m left staring up at the stained ceiling of a terrible motel room.

  In other words, nights like last night.

  “No,” I say. And I don’t expect to hear from him. He made it pretty clear that he was done with me when he went into rehab for what turned out to be the last time. That’s probably for the best. I screwed up his life almost as much as Calista’s that night. My dad cleaned things up—before cutting me off—so Chase wasn’t in trouble for the accident. But Chase is as much of a cowboy as exists in this version of the world—honorable to a fault—and his conscience ate at him until he couldn’t stand it. So he had to cut me loose, along with everyone else who reminded him of who he used to be.

  I understand that. That night changed everything for all of us. Even my sense of right and wrong, which was usually flexible enough to allow for almost anything, wouldn’t stop bugging me about it—even now, years later.

  It’s why I’m here, why I’m trying to fix things for Calista, even if she doesn’t want me to. Okay, it’s one of the reasons why. She really is the best person for this role.

  Hey, I’m trying to be a better person, not a saint.

  “I wrote him a letter when I was … away,” Callie says. “He never responded. I don’t know if it even reached him.”

  I wonder what she wrote him. If she told him everything. I wince inside. Not that it really matters anymore. Chase wouldn’t be around to give me that grave, disappointed-in-you look.

  Or punch me in my apparently oh-so-punchable face.

  “And since I didn’t have access to the internet while I was at Safe Haven—”

  “I’m not sure where he’s living right now,” I say. As selfish as it is, I can’t stand to hear reminders of exactly how badly I messed up her life. “But he’s back in the city, I know. And I think he’s dating that girl, Amanda Grace.” I hear the incredulity in my voice. “The one who got kidnapped and—”

  “Yeah, the thing with his poster reminding her of home.” Calista nods. “I saw some of the coverage.”

  “You think it’s real?” I ask, shaking my head. Sometimes Chase could be a little too much of a good guy; it made it easy for people to take advantage of him. Nothing about this Amanda Grace girl seems like she’s in it for the fame, but sometimes people can surprise you.

  Calista lifts her shoulder. “He seemed happy from what I saw. And he deserves that.”

  “But talk about baggage, Jesus.” Just the idea of that much commitment and risk, where one mistake would bottom out everything, makes me feel like I can’t breathe. Or maybe that’s still the superheated dry air in here. I tug at the collar of my button-down. “It has to be complicated as fuck, and—”

  “Not everyone wants the easy, attachment-free option, Eric,” she says sharply.

  Ouch. That would be Calista dragging her foot across the line of which we do not speak.

  I clear my throat, shifting uncomfortably. “Yeah, I guess.” And I have to clamp down on the urge to say something asshole-ish, something that would divert the conversation elsewhere by making her seriously pissed. You know, something like, “Better him than me.” Or, “Hey, damaged girls are always the most grateful.”

  But that will only further the endless cycle between us.

  So I let the silence hang, even though it makes my skin itch.

  “Who did you get to direct?” she asks after a long moment.

  Safer ground, but still likely to cause trouble. But this kind of trouble I can handle. I think.

  “Vincent Meyers,” I say, bracing myself.

  She groans, twisting to face me. “Oh, come on, Eric, seriously?” She slaps her hand against the seat. “You hired The Terrorist? He hates us. Hates you,” she adds, shoving the shoulder part of her seatbelt behind her and out of the way.

  She’s not wrong.

  “Actually, I’m pretty sure he hates everyone,” I say.

  “Oh, that makes it better.” Calista drops her head in
her hands. “Do you remember that time he screamed at me because my phone went off during a take?”

  I laugh. “Oh my God, he was so pissed.”

  “It wasn’t even a call. Just a stupid alarm my mom put in there to remind me to drink more water. I didn’t even know about it. I thought that vein in his neck was going to pop.” She gestures at the side of her neck, moving her hand back and forth to indicate a pulsing mass.

  “And then you kept missing your mark,” I remind her.

  She gives me a sour look. “Because you missed yours.”

  “The first time.” Vincent is exacting as a director, but not always the best at communicating. “But after that?”

  Calista avoids my gaze. “He was being a dick to you.” She shrugs. “And he really wasn’t clear.”

  Callie always had my back, fighting more fiercely for me than I would for myself. And I did the same for her. Until I ruined that, too. I feel that loss all over again suddenly, like it’s fresh. A hollowed-out place beneath my ribs that just won’t heal.

  I clear my throat. “Vincent’s good, though.” One of his episodes of Starlight, the one with the bus crash where Brody has to choose between saving Calista and saving other innocent lives, made critics’ year-end lists of best episodes and was our one and only Emmy nod. “He was willing to take the job at scale because he wants to expand his portfolio. Plus, I heard my dad wanted him for an episode of Triple Threat so…” I shrugged. That knife was particularly fun to twist.

  Calista raises her eyebrows. “Really? Is that what this is about?”

  “No!” I shift in my seat, kicking my legs out further. “It just doesn’t hurt.” I grin, but it feels more like a baring of teeth.

  “Wouldn’t be so sure about that,” she mutters.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Just that…” She shakes her head. “Never mind.”

  “No, say it,” I demand.

  She huffs out an exasperated breath. “It’s just, if you’re expecting this to force him to admit that he’s wrong about you, you’ll be disappointed and—”