I'm with Cupid (19 page)

Rocco stared at her blankly—as if there was no one home. She couldn't believe it. He was simply not about to say his next line. “Rocs, what gives? You totally knew these lines the first time we shot the freakin' scene.”

“Mea culpa,” said Rocco, releasing his grip, which caused Anushka to slide to the floor.

“Excuse me? On the floor here?” she protested, but Rocco just stared into space, his eyes narrowing, his fists clenching. Anushka got to her feet and brushed herself off. “What's with you, dude? This scene is totally simple and you're the smartest person I know. I say, ‘Where I'm going looks don't matter' and you say, ‘I see someone's in a dramatic mood.' How hard is that? Not very!” She put his arm around her waist again and leaned far back, waiting for him to say the line she'd just fed him.

Rocco erupted. “Can't you see how this is tearing at my soul????” He dropped Anushka to the floor again.

Anushka bared her teeth. “That is
so
not the line.” She scrambled to her feet. There was fire in her eyes as she felt a bruise rising on her million-dollar
tuchus
. But the fire in her eyes was nothing compared to the fire in Rocco's eyes. He looked like a man possessed. The thick veins in his massive arms were bulging as if lava were flowing through them. Anushka took a step back.

“I'm not talking about the line, Anushka!” Rocco bellowed. “I'm talking about myself! Rocco DiTullio, scion of a famous filmmaking family, spending my days reciting cheeseball lines on a TV show so tawdry, tasteless, garish, and vulgar that it manages to take popular culture back twenty years! And for what? So I can pay the bills while living as a frustrated auteur? The indignity!”

“Okay, look,” Anushka said in a soothing voice as she lead him back to the sofa while checking the extent of her butt bruise with a hand mirror. “I only understood about half the words you just said there, but I think I get the gist. You're an
artist
. And you think you're lowering yourself. I have two words for you:
what ever
. You can sort that out with some shrink, Rocs. In the meantime, hit your mark, say your line, and don't drop your costar! Are we reading each other?”

She waited for him to say yes. Or no. Or
something
. But he just stood there, quivering at first and then, after a moment, rattling like a tall building in an earthquake. Anushka put down her hand mirror and stepped back. Something inside her told her to be afraid—be very afraid. It was at that precise moment that Rocco made a sound—a sound that started somewhere in the depths of his massively muscular body and proceeded upward, a sound that sounded a little like a sleeping lion who'd just been stepped on.

“Indigestion?” inquired Anushka, now officially scared out of her wits at the quivering mass of boy muscle clenching his fists just inches from her. She scrambled backward, trying to find the door to her trailer without taking her eyes off Rocco—but he was too fast for her. He leaped over her in a flash, reaching for the door before she did and—in the process of bolting from the trailer—he tore it off its hinges.

Anushka stood in the sand outside Rocco's trailer. The hot afternoon sun bore into her bare shoulders, but she felt a chill nonetheless. Rocco was obviously in deep doo-doo, that was clear enough, and she was maybe the only one on the set who could help him. That's because she was convinced they were more alike than they'd ever want to admit. She rapped on the door quietly. “Rocs? It's me. I think we need to talk.”

“Is it just you?” came an uncharacteristically chastened voice from within.

“Just me, yeah.” After a moment, the door opened. Rocco, eyes downcast, gestured for Anushka to enter. She'd never been inside Rocco's trailer before and she was amazed—but not surprised—to see that it had been decorated exactly like the inside of a library, with shelves of books and comfy chairs and reading lamps. So masculine, so smart—just like Rocco.
If only he weren't such a snob
, she thought as she entered,
I could be really turned on by this dude. . . .

She took a seat on a tufted brown leather Ralph Lauren armchair and crossed her legs, assuming a stern yet maternal pose she'd co-opted from one of her former rehab counselors. She gestured for Rocco to sit across from her. He did. “Look,” she said. “I know what this is about.” Rocco was about to give her his signature arrogant look that said
you can't possibly know
. “And before you give me that look like you're all alone in your little smarty-pants world, let me just say something.”

“What is it?” said Rocco respectfully, looking impressed by her tone.

“It's about you being frustrated you can't get your movie off the ground, right?” Rocco sighed a sigh that said it all. “You want to be a director, but no one is going to give some hunk with big pecs and no directing experience a shot—no matter
what
family he comes from.” Rocco gave a sad little nod. Anushka continued, leaning forward. “And so instead of fighting harder to get where you wanna go, you've taken the easy route again, haven't you?”

“What do you mean?” said Rocco, looking afraid at what her answer might be.

“I mean 'roids,” Anushka said, looking him directly in the eye. “Don't lie to me, Rocs. You feel totally sucky about yourself and you don't want to. You want to feel all strong and Rocco-y—but even better. So you turn to the 'roids! You're back on the stuff again, aren't ya?”

Rocco turned away, his face darkened. “How—how did you know?”

“Puh-lease. Don't tinkle on my bikini and tell me it's a sun shower. It's Anushka you're talking to here! Your neck's the size of a dumpster and your arms are as big as Rosie O'Donnell's thighs. ”

Rocco put his head in his hands. “I'm so ashamed, Anushka . . . I've let myself and everyone down yet again. What shall I do?”

“Here's what you shall do,” she said, placing her hand on his knee. “You're gonna call this doctor I know who specializes in addiction. He ain't cheap, but it's your health you're talking about here, right? Maybe even your stupid career, too.”

Rocco looked up. “A doctor? Like a psychiatrist? I don't know, Anushka. I've always looked within for my strength . . .”

“Yeah, well maybe it's time you looked
without
. Take it from me. Sometimes we all need a little help.” Then she gave him a big wink to show she was in his corner. “And if you ever mention this moment to anyone, Rocco DiTullio, do NOT say I was wearing a bald cap and looking fugly. Cause I will freakin' kill you.”

“You can count on me, Anushka,” he said.

“That makes one DiTullio I can count on,” she said ruefully. “Your cousin totally played me! Total tonsil hockey the first night I met him, but then not one text message since! He even declined my Facebook invite, the creep. Ouch. Experiences like that can affect a girl's self-esteem.”

Rocco looked embarrassed. “I love Patrizio because he's family, but the truth is he's a bit of a player. You know what, it's his loss. You're smart and funny and totally smokin'—he's lucky you even breathed in his direction.”

“Well, thanks for the compliment. Though it's hard to believe anyone could see me with this cap on and still think I'm smokin'.”

“
Au contraire
, mademoiselle, the bald hat just accentuates your beauty.”

“Ya think so?” Anushka asked, as she absentmindedly patted her head.

“I do. And I'm sorry about my cousin. I guess I should have warned you about him. ”

“Well, why didn't ya?”

A grin crept across Rocco's face. “I think I was too busy warning him about
you
.”

“Ugh, you are the worst!” said Anushka, laughing and pelting Rocco playfully.

“Ow, watch the hair!” he teased.

“Well, whaddya know?” said Anushka, standing back with her hands on her hips. “Rocco and Anushka are actually paying each other compliments and getting along.”

“Huh. I guess that's never happened before . . .” he said thoughtfully.

“I guess hell is getting a little cold,” she responded. “But I likey. Why couldn't we be friends?”

“I see no reason not to be,” he said. “Okay, then—friends.”

They even shook on it.

“Okay, now do me one more favor, Rocs.”

“Name it.”

“Let's not tell anyone about
this
little Lifetime moment, either.”

“Deal.”

JB was on his hundredth push-up. His concave chest bulged and sweat poured from his brow, snaking in little rivulets into his eyes, making his contacts swim around like pinwheels.

He wanted to get to a hundred and fifty push-ups for two reasons. The first was he was supposed to be bare-chested in the next scene and partial nudity always filled him with a red-hot terror. The second was that he'd been feeling
the urge
again. The urge to go online and spend his paycheck investing in stocks. Bad stocks, probably. The kind he'd end up spending the next two years paying for. He thought if he could just keep pumping his twiggy little arms that dastardly urge would evaporate. “One hundred,” he huffed, “one hundred one . . .” he puffed.

“JB,” said Max, casting a shadow over him as he arrived, “please cease. We don't want you breaking anything, even though we're insured. We're behind again because Rocco—of all people—refuses to come out of his trailer, and I need to shoot your big scene now.”

“Almost there, Max! One hundred seven, one hundred eight—uh-oh.”

Max knelt in the sand, putting his face against JB's. “You pulled one of your scrawny little muscles, didn't you?” he said. “I knew it . . . Where is the set nurse?” he called to his assistants, who promptly stirred up a sandstorm as they scampered off to find the set nurse.

“Hold the ambulance!” said JB, collapsing to the ground in a puddle of his own sweat. “I didn't pull anything, I just lost a contact . . .”

“Thank God,” said Max, walking away immediately, leaving JB half-blind and facedown in the sand. “And if you see Corliss,” he said as he went, “please tell her to come to my trailer. She is once again missing in action. I swear, half the time directing is like herding kittens . . .”

“Righto,” said JB with a mouthful of sand. He pulled himself up and brushed himself off. He was going to need a quick shower before he shot his big scene. He started in the direction of his trailer, but he didn't get far with only one functioning eye. That's when he thought he saw her. Corliss. In the parking lot, about a half mile away. At least he thought it was Corliss. The afternoon sun was high in the sky and he struggled to focus on the figure in the lot.

Whoever it was, she was talking to someone. JB squinted hard with his one functioning eye. It
was
Corliss. And she was talking to . . . a guy. He couldn't see who it was, but he didn't like what he saw. In fact he
so
didn't like what he saw that he staggered back, just like the time in junior high he was bodychecked behind the gym by the captain of the girls' lacrosse team. All the air went out of him, and his blood tingled all over.

He'd never felt such a feeling before, but he had a hunch what it was. “Oh my God . . .” he said aloud. “I think I'm . . . jealous!” Which could only mean one thing: that he had a crush on Corliss. “Oh my God . . .” he muttered again as the truth finally hit him. “Oh my God!” he said again, unable to stop repeating himself. Then something occurred to him that was unlike anything that had ever occurred to him in the entirety of his eighteen years. “When I find out who she's talking to, I'm gonna pulverize that dude!”

Corliss shook her head and adjusted the lacy white halter Anushka had lent her. She knew it wasn't an appropriate item to be wearing for the particular conversation she'd been having, but she felt sorta sexy in it. “Petey,” she said as gently as she could to the underage writer standing in front of her with a wad of coleslaw caught in his gums, “it's just—the thing is—you and me—me and you—it's not—it will never—”

“What you're saying,” Petey droned, his raccoon eyes bloodshot, “is that Max can make all the rules he wants prohibiting dating among the staff, but that even if you and I weren't on staff, it's not happening between you and me, it's never going to be happening between you and me, and I should pack up my pathetic little heart and store it away forever.”

“Well, I wouldn't go that far . . . but yes.” Corliss felt terrible. She'd been putting off Petey for the last bunch of weeks, but she finally wanted to tell him the news he needed to hear. “Petey, I want you to know that aside from a little personal hygiene problem, and an attitude that would make Dracula seem cheerful in comparison, you're a pretty cool guy. I'm sure you'll meet a nice girl who will appreciate that!”

“But—but—what am
I
supposed to do until then?” said Petey, looking for the first time like the seventeen-year-old he really was. “I go to bed at night thinking of you, I get up in the morning thinking of you, I spend the
all the minutes in between
thinking about you . . .”

“Gee,” said Corliss, “that's quite a round-the-clock tribute, Petey. But what I think you're supposed to do is, well, set me free. Just like that bumper sticker says.”

“What bumper sticker?” said Petey.

“The one that says ‘If you love something, set it free. If it comes back to you it's yours, if it doesn't, it never was.'” She batted her eyes to drive the point home.