Unscripted Joss Byrd Page 6

I roll my eyes. “You’re already over here every day,” I say. Then I test the newest rung with the tip of my toe. “We’ll never have to walk down to the shore again,” I say, looking down at the top of Chris’s sweaty head. “Except when we want to.”

  Chris lifts the ladder from against the tree and leans it against the old speedboat that’s rotting along the side of the house. It’s the spot where Terrance told me to focus, and where I knew Norah hated me.

  “Hey, Buzz, maybe three more rungs,” Chris says. “That should do it.”

  “No. Do more!” I tell him. “The higher we get the better!”

  Chris wipes his brow. “Four more.”

  I smile.

  “You got it.” Jericho wipes his brow.

  I know I’m supposed to feel like Norah, but I’m thinking about her, not as her. I’m wondering which of my movies she’s seen and who she’d rather have playing her instead of me.

  Standing and grasping the tree for balance, I crane my neck to peer through the branches. “Hey, we can even see up the road from up here!”

  “A perfect lookout.” Chris nods.

  “Genius,” Jericho says again.

  “All’s we need now is a pair of binoculars,” I say. “Then we can see clear through to the lighthouse. Don’t you think?”

  “We just might.” Chris lifts the drill and revs it up twice like a motorcycle before pushing a screw through the next rung. “I think I can scrounge us up a pair, somewhere.”

  React. That’s what matters most. Just keep reacting and make it look like I’m feeling. I lift my hands and look through a pair of imaginary binoculars. “Or how about one of those old-timey pirate telescopes that stretch! You know the kind I mean?” I adjust my hands and pretend to pull one long scope. “If we get one of those, we’ll have it made. We’ll be the luckiest kids in Montauk.”

  “TJ!” Rodney yells from inside the house. We all jump at the sound of his voice. “You dumbass, no-good…” He bursts out from the screen door, huffing and puffing. “You put that ladder against my boat!” The spit on his lips stretches and snaps. He grabs the ladder, and I pull my legs up just in time before he slams it against the tree.

  “I didn’t scratch it or anything!” Chris takes two steps back. “I leaned it, that’s all.”

  My heart is racing, remembering Rodney’s weight pressing against my chair.

  Rodney holds the metal ladder in front of Chris and shakes it at him. “You piece of shit! How stupid can you be?”

  I grasp my shoulders where Rodney touched me. I know how he smells and how dry and heavy his hands are.

  “Rodney, the boat’s not even painted yet!” Jericho says.

  “Shut up!” he screams at Jericho. Then he turns all his anger back to Chris. “I’ve been workin’ on that boat for a year!”

  Chris sticks his chin out. “From the couch?”

  Rodney flings the ladder across the backyard. It crashes and clangs onto the grass. “What did you say, you little turd?” he hisses.

  I shrink against the tree.

  “You heard me.” Chris stands tall; his chest rises and falls. I want him to back down, to run.

  Rodney lunges forward, just as Chris dodges away. But Rodney grabs him by the back of his jeans. He lifts Chris off his feet and slams him against the boat.

  “TJ!” I scream, and shake.

  “Cut!” Terrance calls.

  Terrance rubs his eyes and then clears his throat. “We’ll do it again. This time, just a beat faster between Chris and Rodney.” He holds his fingers up to measure a pinch. “Just a tad.” He looks at me and nods.

  When he lets out a breath, so do I.

  * * *

  Back in tutoring, I’m supposed to be studying a history chapter on Egyptians. Damon is helping me preread the section questions and showing me how to find bold words in the chapter because those are usually the answers. But I can’t concentrate, not when my nerves are still worked up about Rodney and the fight scene keeps churning outside our window. The crew turned the camera around; it’s replaced me in the tree so it can film the fight from Norah’s point of view. Terrance won’t need me again for a long while. I wonder how Chris is doing.

  “I’m afraid we’re not being very productive,” Damon whispers as we listen to Rodney yelling at Chris. “How about we take a break the next time Terrance calls cut?”

  This is fine with me because I’m pretty sure “break” is code for “watch the fight scene.” Damon’s been sneaking peeks out the window almost as often as I have.

  As soon as we get outside, I pick a snack from the craft service table—a package of shortbread cookies—then I sit in a chair behind Terrance and Peter Bustamante where they’re watching the monitors.

  “Snack break?” Peter asks me.

  “Yes.”

  I want to ask Terrance how I was up in the tree, but the back of his head tells me he isn’t in a talking mood. I didn’t count how many takes we did, but do know I only messed up three times, maybe three and a half. That’s no more or less than the boys, so I think I did pretty okay, even though I felt more like myself than like Norah.

  I always feel very professional when I sit in these tall director’s chairs. During my first movie, my chair even said TALLULAH LEIGH on the back. The Locals didn’t bother personalizing chairs. That’s how I can tell if a movie has a big budget or a small budget. This chair only says CAST, but I still like sitting in it.

  Chris is inside the house while the camera is resetting. He’s probably working himself up to be upset, or maybe he already is. I wonder if he’s been using a trigger.

  “Here we go. Let’s everyone get back into place. Back to one,” Terrance says, and that’s when Chris comes out with a hand over his face.

  Jericho takes his mark in the middle of the grass, and Chris stands against the boat in front of Rodney, exactly where they stood when I was up in the tree.

  “Rolling, rolling!” Terrance calls.

  Rodney presses his hand right under Chris’s throat and shoves him up against the boat. Just as Chris starts to struggle, Terrance calls, “And … action!”

  “Get off him!” Jericho jumps on Rodney’s back, but Rodney hurls him right off, elbowing Jericho in the temple.

  “Listen to me, worthless beach rat.” Rodney holds his arm against Chris’s chest.

  I cover my eyes but peer through my fingers.

  “Mouth off to me again and I’ll send you and your sister away on a long, long journey, and your mama’s never gonna miss you. Hear me?” Rodney plants his big hand on the side of Chris’s head as if he’s gripping a football. Then he shoves Chris into the dirt. “Good-for-nothing runt.”

  Chris spits and spurts on his hands and knees.

  Terrance has turned his head. Now I can see the side of his face. He’s as still as can be, and the color’s gone from his skin.

  Rodney plants one foot on the ground, the other against the tree, and starts ripping a rung off the trunk. He curses, struggling with the wooden plank, rocking it back and forth until it cracks and the screws rip from the tree. The bark tears away, leaving a splintered, naked wound.

  Terrance hasn’t checked the lighting or even looked at the screen. He’s just staring. I knew it would be a tough day to play TJ. But now I realize that it’s also a tough day to be him.

  On the monitor, I watch Chris sitting in the dirt with his knees up. He grips the back of his head with both hands and starts shaking, from his stomach to his chest to his shoulders. He looks up. The camera zooms in close. His face is a mess of dirty tears.

  7

  Viva skipped out on our lobster dinner—or maybe she’s having it, just not with me. I thought for sure we’d go since Terrance didn’t have a bad thing to say about scene 15, but it didn’t happen. “We don’t have to go now. We can go any night,” is what my mother said. I’m not holding my breath. Most times when she talks about doing something it’s just daydreaming; the planning is usually the best part.

  All week t
he crew has been barbecuing at the public beach across from the hotel, so I’m walking over to see if Chris is there. My head is swimming with things to tell him after scene 15, like how he was so good I almost cried, even when I wasn’t on camera, and about Norah being disappointed with me.

  I can’t find Chris anywhere at the bonfire. Jericho is here, but he’s with his dad. They don’t need my company; it looks like they’re having a good time taking selfies in front of the fire. That’s what it’s like on a first movie—everything’s exciting, and maybe you’ll never get to act again, so you take a picture of the craft service table because you’ve never seen so many snacks before in your life. And you take pictures of each other in front of the fuzzy boom microphone or a wardrobe rack. Me and Viva used to go nuts with that stuff, too.

  One picture we still do on every job is of me in front of my trailer. I stand beside my character’s name that’s taped to the door: first Tallulah Leigh and then Yoli and then Margaret and now Norah. Some moms measure their kids and mark their height inside a closet. I think of each dressing trailer as the way Viva measures me.

  Someday we’ll print the pictures out. In houses on TV there’s usually family photos framed on a staircase wall. Once we get stairs I’d like to do something like that. But for now our pictures live inside the computer.

  Jericho’s dad has a real camera (not just a phone). He wears it around his neck like the paparazzi. Jericho said that they’re going to make a slideshow for his mother and his little sisters who are home in Chicago. I bet their whole family will eat popcorn and watch the slideshow together on their big-screen TV and talk about what a fun hobby acting is. And isn’t it a bonus that now they have some extra fun money for vacation? Lucky them.

  I really miss my movie dad, Brian, from Hit the Road … my Pops. We took lots of pictures together with his scratchy beard against my cheek. Viva says it’s good to miss someone; it means that you cared and so did they. But you gotta move on in life. “Say goodbye quick like a bandit,” is her advice. I cried for a week when I wrapped Hit the Road but for only a few days after Buy One, Get One and just a couple hours after Zany Aces. Letting go of stuff is a skill to work on like any other.

  The beach is divided with movie folks around the bonfire and a new gang of local kids along the shore. I stare at the real locals: the girly types are in short skirts and fluttery bikini tops, strolling in a clump with their arms linked, watching the sporty boys toss a spiraled Nerf football that whistles in the air. It looks like sports sacks are popular here—those drawstring bags you can wear on your back. Some have initials on them; that probably costs extra.

  The Montauk girls are giggling up a fuss. I follow their eyes and see Chris scrounging around for something in the tall reeds.

  “Go, Arianne. Go!”

  “Omigod, omigod, omigod!”

  The local girls push their friend forward—the one in the group with boobs, not little boobs pushed up high, but real-sized ones that jiggle on their own.

  The boys stop tossing the ball to nudge each other and laugh at Chris. “Hey, check it out. It’s the Crapper!”

  In his movie Camp Magaskawee, Chris had diarrhea against a tree. The Montauk boys are ripping on him about it, but the girls sure aren’t turned off. Arianne fans her face with her hands. Then she does a stupid sashay up to my movie brother.

  These girls probably think they know Chris, all because they’ve seen him in Sixth Period Lunch. How shocked would they be if they found out that Chris is nothing like that role? He’s quiet and shy, not cocky. And he hasn’t got moves or pickup lines. He’s got worries and wonderings. Suddenly I want to talk to Chris about Rodney, even if I’m not positive Rodney is a full-blown creeper.

  But Chris is being polite to Arianne; he’s letting her babble on and on, while the whole time he’s kicking up sand and looking past her shoulder. She keeps flapping her hands, probably to make up for Chris saying nothing. If I have to tell the truth, she is sort of pretty. But Chris is an actor, so he’s used to movie-star pretty. To him Arianne might only be average.

  “Hey! This is you, right? Joss Byrd?” one of the local boys asks. He holds his phone to show me a picture of me wearing my specially made multicolored designer Betsey Johnson dress.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “That’s so cool. That was at the Oscars, right?” He keeps asking questions about the red carpet, but in my head his voice shrinks into the background because I’m busy watching Chris, who’s walking off with Arianne. They’re close now, so close that his arm rubs against hers each time he lifts his right foot off the sand. “… Did you get to meet Robert Downey, Jr.? How about Mark Wahlberg? He’s, like, my favorite actor. Who’s yours? Ever see The Fighter? It’s wicked good.”

  Some of the guys from our crew are waving Chris over to the bonfire. “Christopher Tate, you dirty dawg!” A greasy-haired guy called Slim, who works the sound for us, pulls Chris over to the side. “Look at her. You should. You have to.” Slim is pointing at Arianne. Then he whispers to Chris in secret, elbowing him like he’s giving sex advice, while Chris shrugs and smiles at the ground. Right about now, I hate Slim. “She’s practically begging for it.” He raises his voice again. “That’s an easy in. You want to, don’t you? Well, don’t you?”

  And Arianne—while the crew is chanting, “Stud! Stud! Stud!”—is mouthing to her girlfriends for them to take her picture with Chris when they walk by. What a sneak. She isn’t the girl for Christopher Tate. Arianne’s friends are getting their phones ready, holding them real low, as if no one can tell exactly what they’re doing.

  The sound guy runs back to the bonfire and grabs a six-pack of beer; I hate him so much. I look around for a real grown-up, a responsible one who might care. But that’s not as easy to come by as the beer. I’m not sure what Damon does after we wrap on set every night, but he’s never come to the bonfire. Chris’s own guardian, his Grandma Lorna, reads large-print books and naps all day in the trailer and then goes to bed at eight.

  “Slim! Not a good idea,” says our wardrobe girl, Monique. Maybe there’s hope. “Leave the beer here.”

  I knew I liked Monique from the start. When we first met her, she was nice enough to listen to my mother ramble about her business idea for dancewear that doubles as shapewear.

  “The kid asked me for it!” Slim says, pointing at Chris. “Are you about to say no to number one on the call sheet?” On a film shoot, each actor has a number on the call sheet. I’m two. Number one plays the most important character in the movie.

  “Yes, I am, when number one on the call sheet is fourteen years old and his parents are a thousand miles away,” Monique says, grabbing at the beer.

  “Well, I’m not.” Slim pulls the six-pack away and hustles it up to Chris.

  “This one is on you, Slim! Don’t come crying to me if something happens to that kid!” Monique calls.

  And that’s that.

  Chris holds the beer against his chest as he thanks Slim—it looks like he really did ask for the beer. Now I hate Chris, too, I really do. Obviously he doesn’t have Doris Cole for an agent. If he did, he’d know that the other thing that can ruin a child actor besides puberty is a trip to rehab.

  Chris is carrying the beer down at his side. Then right in public, in front of people we work with, people who load film into our cameras and hand us our paychecks, he lifts his other arm and drapes it over Arianne’s shoulders! How could he? How could he even be so hypnotized by boobs when I really need to ask him: If I tell you something private about Rodney, will you keep it a secret?

  “That’s our boy!” someone yells from the bonfire as if we’re all watching Chris in Little League, up at bat.

  The Montauk boy is still talking to me. “How’d you start being an actress?” he wants to know. “Is it the funnest thing ever? Because it looks like it is—auditions and fans and the E! channel? Joss?”

  I’m thinking about Rodney and his chest hair poking through his holey undershirt. But the Montauk boy wants a
shined-up interview answer about awards shows and limos. He doesn’t want the honest truth about all the unscripted parts of my life.

  “It’s the funnest,” I say, finally looking at him.

  “Cool.” He smiles. “Does this movie need any extras? Like, to walk by on the beach or to sit in a restaurant? I can skateboard.”

  “Uh, I don’t really know.”

  Chris and Arianne disappear past the sea grass. My neck isn’t long enough to follow them any farther. There goes all the stuff I need to say. And for the first time, I don’t want to play a child forever; I want to grow up already and be a hot girl.

  “Hey, can I ask your professional opinion? What do you think of acting classes? I mean, are they a good idea or … because there’s a workshop here on the weekends. But if you think it’s lame…”

  “I don’t take classes,” I say.

  “No. I didn’t think so. I mean, of course not. Okay. So, wait. No workshop?”

  “Well, if you want.” What does he care what I think? If he can read then he’s already miles ahead of me. And if he wants to take a workshop, then he should take a workshop. If he doesn’t, then he shouldn’t. Who am I to stop him from becoming his favorite flower?

  “Ray! Hey, blowtard!” When I turn around, I see the surfer girl from the parking lot with her shorts low and her attitude high. “Keri’s lookin’ for you—Keri, your girlfriend,” she says, adjusting her dozen bracelets. One of her thick leather straps is branded: GWEN.

  “Do you know who this is? I’m talking to Joss Byrd, from Buy One, Get One,” Ray says, as if I’m not standing right next to him. “She’s worked with the coolest actors and she’s not owned by Disney, which is, like, career suicide.”

  “So?” Gwen shrugs.

  “Whaddaya mean, so? Buy One, Get One was nominated for Best Picture!” He lifts his phone, showing her my photo. “At the Academy Awards! Dang it, Gwen, you know I’ve always wanted to be an actor.”

  She smirks. “Since when?”

  “Since always. High School Musical.”

  “Pfft.”

  Gwen is so cool she doesn’t even care about being cool. If she did, she’d probably comb her hair or redo her nails before they chipped down to dirty bits of black polish. Gwen would crush the kids back in Tyrone, Pennsylvania, who only think they’re cool. I’d love to have a head-to-toe makeover to look like Gwen. I bet if I went back to Tyrone looking just like her, they’d never stuff my backpack with sweat socks again. What would be best would be if I had the makeover and then switched schools. My new classmates wouldn’t know me any other way. I would start cool. A cool actor.